Vice President Hu, thank you for your kind and generous remarks. Thank you for welcoming me and my wife, Laura, here.

I am so grateful for the hospitality and honored for the reception at one of China"s and world’s great universities. The standards and reputation of this university are known around the world, and I know how what an achievement it is to be here. So congratulations.

My visit to China comes on an important anniversary, as the vice present mwntioned. Thirty years ago this week, an American President arrived in China on a trip designed to end decades of estrangement and confront centuries of suspicion. President Richard Nixon showed the world that two vastly different governments could meet on the grounds of common interest, and in a spirit of mutual respect. As they left the airport that day, Premier Zhou Enlai said to President Nixon, “Your handshake came over the vastest ocean in the world twenty-five years of no communication.”

During the 30 years since, America and China have exchanged many handshakes of friendship and commerce. And as we have had more contact with each other, the citizens of our two countries have gradually learned more about each other. And that’s important.

It’s my honor to visit China in 1975. Some of you were not even born then. It shows how old I am.

This is one of the most exciting times in the history of your country a time when even the grandest hopes seem within your reach. My nation offers you our respect and our friendship.

Six years from now, athletes from America and around the world will come to your country for the Olympic Games. And I am confident they will find a China that is becoming a “DaGuo”, a leading nation, at peace with its people and at peace with the world.