Interview by the Federal President Gauck (Germany) with the Chinese magazine Caixin on the occasion of his state visit to China from 20 to 24 March 2016.
1. You are paying a four day state visit to China. What is the rationale of your visit to China? What are the highlights of your visit and who are you going to meet with?
First, I have to say that I am coming to your country brimming with curiosity and interest. My visit will take me to Beijing, ………….
Read MoreWhat is strange, who is strange and why, people think, somebody is strange?
I will tell you a little story about a man who as a child, born in Romania, came to Germany at the age of four. In Romania he was brought up in a very old German speaking and German rooted community. So he was used to the German language and the German culture. In those days this German rooted community was addressed as a strange community in Romania, a community of stranger, though they had the Romanian nationality. To bring it to the point: They were Romanians and not Romanians. They were Germans and they were not Germans.
The German government in those days was interested in the reintegration of such German speaking and rooted communities here in Germany. As I was told, German government paid some thousand German Marks for a grown-up person and ……….
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German-Chinese Academy for Psychotherapy
When reflecting the West-East-Integration I often think of my experience of the DCAP congress in May 2011 in Heidelberg / Germany. The issue of this congress was “body & soul – concepts in East and West”. It was a very intensive experience to listen to all the collegues froim Germany and China. It was also emotionally moving and personally impressive……….
Read MoreWhat is the secret?
…..I often ask myself, when facing this excluding smile, the secret recipee which can break down or open up the unseen wall of smile.
I remember what I read about the importance of group life in China. And the self-evidence of group behaviour. The group is important. The group gives relational orientation. The group makes sense for the Chinese. The group offers identity.
And the group is the base, the impulse and the structure for social life.
Well I am different. I am not Chinese. ……………………
Read MorePeople are different
Yesterday I visited Yang Liu in Berlin. She told me an astonishing story about her little book “East meets West”. The book is announced to be part of intercultural communication. It is presented as an attempt for better understanding the two fields of culture: East and West, China and Germany.
Of course, if you remember the foto, which I posted some days ago, the book helps to support better understanding.
BUT Yang Liu wrote this little book as a diary. She told me…………………………..
Read MoreYang Liu´s design blog
if you want to read more from Yang Liu or about her here is the link to her design blog. It is written in German, unfortunately. Nevertheless her posters convince without words.
Whenever I meet someone who saw her posters, smiles because now he knows what it´s all about. 😉
http://yangliudesign.blogspot.de/
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