I first came to China in 2015, but the journey to China started a long time ago. More than 15 years ago, when I was a little girl, I had a conversation with my dad about my future goals. He suggested that I should study the Chinese language, he said the 21st century is the “Century of China”, and the Chinese language is the “Language of the Future”. I didn’t understand him at that time, because China seemed to be very far away, and I hardly knew anything about this country. In those times, we didn’t have internet, and the only link to the world – the TV – never talked about China.我第一次来中国是在 2015 年,但我的中国故事很早就开始了。15 年前,当时还是小女孩的我和父亲一起讨论我的未来。他建议我学习中文,他说21世纪是“中国的世纪”,而中文是“未来的语言”。当时我还不理解这句话的含义,因为中国似乎很遥远,我对这个国家几乎一无所知。那个年代没有互联网,唯一能了解世界的渠道——电视也从未介绍过中国。