A duty to share

Through his educational cultural heritage centers dotted across the nation, longtime China hand Brian Linden is dedicating his life to sharing authentic China with visitors at home and abroad.

During the past four decades, I've traveled to 100 countries. Wherever I went, I attempted to share stories of China with people from around the world. But too often, their excitement focused on my being from Chicago, and the typical reaction would be: "Chicago, wow! Michael Jordan! Chicago Bulls!"

Then I would respond by asking them what they knew about China — had they heard of Mencius, Wang Yangming, Lu Xun, and Liang Sicheng? But they would ignore that and say: "Scottie Pippen! Dennis Rodman!"－both were players with the Chicago Bulls back then.

I quickly learned that many of my international friends and colleagues knew more about the Bulls than about China, which, to me, is an incredible country.