From September 7 to 13, 2025, the fourth China–Japan Young Leaders Camp, hosted by Shanghai Jiao Tong University, wrapped up in Shanghai. Over the week, students from the University of Tokyo, Institute of Science Tokyo, Osaka University, Nagoya University, Tohoku University, and SJTU came together for cultural immersions, city visits, and in-depth dialogues—deepening mutual understanding and, with youthful energy, carrying forward the friendship between China and Japan.
During the program, an Open Day and China–Japan Six-University Student Forum was held on the morning of September 12 at Room 100, Dongshangyuan, Minhang Campus. Shanghai Jiao Tong University Vice President Liu Weidong attended and delivered remarks, expressing high hopes for exchanges between young people from both countries. Opening with the line “Friends journey here from afar, what joy could be greater?”, he welcomed the visiting Japanese students, thanked the organizers for their hard work, and reviewed the camp’s journey since its launch in 2019—noting that six years of continuity have made it a vital bridge for China–Japan youth exchange.
Speaking to the theme “China Through My Eyes,” Vice President Liu used “a boat gliding along the Huangpu River” as a metaphor to underscore the diversity of impressions and the importance of first-hand experience. He encouraged the Japanese students to set aside preconceptions and experience the real China for themselves, while urging SJTU students to tell China’s stories with sincerity—as both participants and narrators. He concluded by calling on young people from China and Japan to take understanding as the starting point, trust as the bond, and cooperation as the goal, and to jointly write a new, future-oriented chapter of China–Japan friendship.
This year’s camp was built around “traditional culture and modern development,” with carefully curated, immersive activities. In the traditional culture class, participants practiced Baduanjin qigong, discovering time-honored Chinese wisdom in each measured breath. With red paper and scissors in hand, they crafted intricate paper-cut works—unfolding, at their fingertips, the lively elegance of Chinese aesthetics.
Stepping beyond the classroom, students took their exploration to Shanghai’s tech landmarks and cultural venues. At the East China Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Base, they saw drone R&D and real-world applications up close—an immediate window into China’s breakthroughs in smart manufacturing. A visit to Meituan’s headquarters brought the ease of mobile payments and the speed of on-demand delivery into sharp focus, giving the Japanese students a tangible sense of how the digital economy is reshaping everyday life in China. At the Shanghai Table Tennis Museum, rare exhibits traced the sport’s evolution and—unexpectedly—revealed a historical thread: table tennis entered China from Japan via Shanghai. This century-spanning athletic link stands as a vivid footnote to the cultural interweaving of the two nations.
China’s advances in mobile payments, public transit, and everyday tech far exceeded my expectations—every detail was a revelation,” said Tanabe Mutsuki, a participant from the University of Tokyo. “Living and learning alongside SJTU students felt like being with family. Seeing with my own eyes how technology is changing daily life here, and getting to know the real routines of Chinese college students—this is an experience I’ll treasure for years to come.”
Language differences never stood in the way of genuine connection. Throughout the exchanges, Chinese and Japanese students set aside reserve, opened up, and built bridges with sincerity. Gu Fangting, a volunteer from SJTU’s School of Foreign Languages who accompanied the program throughout, shared many heartwarming moments: “Even if some volunteers weren’t fluent in Japanese and our Japanese friends’ Chinese was a bit tentative, everyone was eager to speak up. They’d excitedly try out new phrases they’d just learned in Chinese class, and we’d teach them playful expressions in our dialects—laughter melted the language barrier in no time.”
As countries within the broader the Chinese-character cultural sphere, shared cultural DNA made it easier for young people to find common ground. “We realized we hold the same reverence for tradition and the same longing for a good life,” Gu said. “Over this week, I felt more keenly the many threads linking Chinese and Japanese culture. Every small interaction convinced me that with a little more understanding and openness, young people from both countries can absolutely explore many more possibilities for cooperation—together.”
A week may be brief, but it planted lasting seeds of friendship in the hearts of Chinese and Japanese students. From academic discussions in class and city excursions to late-night dorm-room conversations, they shared personal journeys, cultural traditions, and life aspirations—gradually crossing linguistic and cultural boundaries and forging genuine bonds.
Many participants said that deep exchanges with their Japanese peers broke down stereotypes and revealed a more nuanced, authentic Japan. The Japanese students, in turn, were moved by their Chinese counterparts’ warmth and hospitality, and by the energy and openness they felt across Chinese society. As several Japanese campers put it, “Much of what we knew about China came from the news. Experiencing it first-hand, we realized just how compelling China’s pace of development is—and how vibrant everyday life here can be.”
Since its launch in 2019, the SJTU China-Japan Young Leaders Camp has become a flagship program for fostering exchange between young people from both countries. Coinciding with the opening of the “Year of Cultural Exchange among China, Japan, and Korea,” this year’s camp not only deepened mutual understanding of each other’s societies and cultures, but also strengthened the people to people foundation of China-Japan friendship, injecting youthful energy into trilateral exchanges more broadly.
Looking ahead, young people from China and Japan will uphold the spirit of “mutual learning through exchange and win-win cooperation,” turning what they saw and felt at the camp into motivation for growth. Moving forward together in fields such as academic research, cultural communication, and people to people exchange, they will contribute, in the vigor of their youth and through their efforts, to a closer China-Japan friendship and to peace and development across the region and the wider world.
