In a historic reunion commemorating 30 years of friendship between the Sister Cities of Zhuhai in Guangdong Province, China, and Redwood City in California, United States, the mayors of the respective cities met on November 14 in Zhuhai to celebrate the long union.
As part of the celebration of these three decades of brotherhood, the mayor of Redwood City, Jeff Gee, accompanied by a delegation of 21 people, traveled to China in order to cultivate the relationship in different sectors of both countries such as education, medicine , industry and government, as well he pointed Anna Lee Mraz in an interview with Manuel Ortiz during the Peninsula 360 Radio program, in collaboration with Marcos Gutiérrez from ?Hecho en California?.
The Sister City concept began in 1956, during the Eisenhower presidential administration, a few years after the end of World War II, when a global network of Sister Cities was created to build trust, brotherhood and rebuild relationships between nations.
In that sense, for Redwood City, a Sister City officially develops long-term ties that generate friendship, trust and strengthening between nations to promote cultural, educational, economic, social and technological exchange between communities.
“The idea of this delegation is to create connection and relationships, not only in politics, but also with industries. There were some investors, some people from the medical industry, some who make technology for medical instruments, there were also two professors from the University of Palo Alto to work on university exchanges with the Universities of Psychology,” Mraz added.
On November 13, the Zhuhai Foreign Affairs management team and its team welcomed the Redwood City delegation, taking them to see the bridge that connects Hong Kong with Macau and Zhuhai, the three main cities in the region.
During their tour, the importance of this bridge for the city was explained to the delegation; Its construction began in 2009 and was completed on November 14, 2017, it was opened on October 23, 2018, giving the opportunity to connect long distances, since it measures 55 kilometers, being a series of bridges and tunnels that connect, Its wonderful design left visitors amazed.
Anna Lee Mraz commented that the mayor Jeff Gee and the invited delegation witnessed of an act of union between two nations, as they came to water a small tree that was planted 9 years ago as a symbol of friendship between both nations.
As part of this cultural exchange, 30 books were given as gifts to Zhuhai, while the same number of texts were gifted to Redwood City.
Anna Lee Mraz commented that Redwood City has four sister cities, mostly belonging to Mexico: Colima, Ciudad Guzman, Aguililla, and Zhuhai in China.
“A citizen makes a request to the Council for a city to be considered based on some established criteria, for example, that there is a population interested in the creation of these Sister Cities and another condition is that this relationship remains alive,” he commented.
Creating and maintaining these types of relationships with other cities strengthens cultural diversity, in addition to creating closer ties between communities that are not stopped by color, language or religion, providing the opportunity to get to know their countries with different eyes, from the warmth of people to the great gastronomic diversity that characterizes each region.
“They received this delegation with open arms, as if they had opened the doors of their homes; They are very generous people, very giving. They gave us their time, their effort, their energy,” stressed Anna Lee Mraz. ?It was a truly vibrant experience.?
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