SOAS student triumphs at 2020 Chinese Bridge Competition
21 September 2020
SOAS third year student Harris Rahman won the top prize in 19th Chinese Bridge Proficiency Competition held online on 19 September 2020. His coach, Senior Lector in Chinese, Zhaoxia Pang was awarded Best Coach. There were 10 contestants representing 10 universities in this competition in UK.
This event was originally planned to take place in April 2020, which was cancelled due to Covid-19. At the end of August, Hanban UK (an organization to promote Chinese language and culture in UK) sent out the notice that the competition would be resumed on online in September.
Harris and his coach Zhaoxia Pang immediately started the preparation, which includes three parts: a three-minutes speech contest; a three-minute knowledge of Chinese language and culture, and a three-minutes artistic performance. Harris gave an excellent performance in all these three parts. His Kuaibanr, a very popular story-telling art form, demonstrated his great talent in performing.
Griseldis Kirsch, Head of Department, East Asian Language and Cultures sent out congratulations to the contestant and his coach immediately after she heard the news: “That is great news. Please shout it from the rooftops!”
Harris with three other prize winners will join the global competition representing UK university students in November 2020. We wish him luck to achieve even greater success on the global stage and showcase his talents as well as the excellence of SOAS to the world.
The Chinese Bridge Competition began in 2002 and has since become the world’s most prestigious Chinese proficiency competition for foreign university students. Since the start of the competition in 2002, at least one SOAS contestant has been among the top three winners to go to China to compete in the international competition – a televised event watched by millions in China. SOAS has also produced two winners of the international competition. The School’s consistency in the competition demonstrates SOAS' leading position in the teaching of Chinese language and culture.
Harris Rahman and Zhaoxia Pang.