Beneath a ginkgo tree at Shijiazhuang Foreign Language School in Hebei province, the future of relations between China and the United States is written on red wish cards and hung from the budding branches. From March 14 to 22, a 100-member delegation of Iowan students visited places including Beijing, Shanghai, and Shijiazhuang in Hebei.

The visit was part of the "50,000 in Five Years" initiative, which was announced by Chinese President Xi Jinping in San Francisco in 2023 to encourage exchanges among the youth of the two countries.

The cards written by the Chinese and US students carried wishes for peace and prosperity, and were filled with the warmth of new friendship and the quiet surprise of seeing another country up close.

The "China-US Friendship Tree — The Ginkgo Project" was initiated by Luca Berrone, a board member of Iowa Sister States, to carry forward the sister-state friendship forged between Hebei and Iowa. It invites people on both sides to write or draw their hopes for the future and tie them to a tree long associated with resilience, longevity and enduring bonds.

While the Ginkgo Project began with a simple exchange of cards, its roots reach back to a 1983 agreement that first linked the cornfields of Iowa with the industrial heart of Hebei. Decades on, this sister-state bond has evolved from a formal handshake into a vital lifeline for sub-national diplomacy. As top-level geopolitical moves often dominate headlines, these grassroots connections — fueling the "50,000 in Five Years" initiative — provide a stable channel for dialogue. The ginkgo tree stands as a reminder that the most enduring relationships are often built from the bottom up.

Traveling through different cities, the group experienced both the scale of Chinese civilization and the intimacy of people-to-people exchanges — visiting historical landmarks, trying traditional activities such as Chinese knot weaving and martial arts, playing sports with Chinese peers, touring campuses, and, for some, visiting local homes.

Within that larger journey, the wish cards on the ginkgo tree turned a single moment into a symbol of something bigger.

For Berrone, the symbolism is deeply personal. His connection to China dates back to 1985, when he helped arrange Xi's visit to Iowa as a young county official and traveled with the delegation across the state. He still remembers Xi as a "very smart, very curious" and, above all, warm in person.

That sense of continuity resurfaced in early 2026, when Berrone joined other Iowa friends in sending New Year greetings to President Xi, saying they treasured their friendship with the Chinese people and would continue helping it grow.

On Feb 16, Xi replied to friends in Iowa and sent them a Chinese New Year card in return, recalling the warm reception he received in Iowa 41 years earlier. He said the hope of the China-US relationship lies in the people, its foundation is in grassroots connections, its future depends on the youth, and its vitality comes from sub-national exchanges.

For Berrone, the exchange was moving not only as a personal response, but as a reminder that people-to-people ties still matter deeply to the future of the relationship.

Another old friend from Iowa, Sarah Lande, placed the students' visit within that longer history of friendship in a video message shown during a China-US student icebreaking session.

Recalling Xi's 1985 visit to Iowa, Lande described her friendship with him as "a living testament to how genuine human connections can bridge differences and build lasting bonds of understanding and respect".

"Real diplomacy is rooted in people-to-people ties, in shared laughter, shared experiences and mutual respect," she said.

Watching students from Iowa and Shijiazhuang meet, exchange stories and form friendships of their own, she reminded them that they were "part of something truly special and historically significant" and called them "ambassadors of friendship, peace and mutual understanding".

For many of the US students, the trip was not simply about seeing China. It was about discovering how quickly a place that had once felt distant could begin to feel human, familiar and real.