In his book China, West and the Islamic World - Romance of the Three Civilizations, the first book by an Islamic scholar that discusses how the three civilizations can live in peace and harmony in the future, Syed Hasan Javed, a renowned Pakistani diplomat, shared his own version of China story. 

 

“I saw in the last 40 years in China, how they carried out reform and opening-up, what structural changes they have made, what values behind their rapid rise were and how they achieved that,” he said.

 

As a witness to the rise of China and a new history that was made in China, he wrote in his book the lessons drawn from its reform and opening-up. 

 

About nine years ago, a Chinese textbook named Chinese Made Easy was popular in some universities and middle schools in Pakistan. It was the first Chinese learning textbook compiled by a Pakistani, Syed Hasan Javed.

 

As a professional diplomat for 37 years, Javad has been living abroad for 25 years and traveled to nearly 60 countries. He has served as a diplomat in China for nearly a decade, and he really loved this country. During our interview, Javad expressed he had never met a country that treated diplomats so well at a time when it was not rich.

 

“In the 1980s, there were few foreigners, few tourists, and few four-star, five-star hotels. There was no private car. China was in a very difficult situation in those days. However, Chinese people’s hearts were very rich. Wherever I went, the Chinese were very friendly. They always wanted to help foreigners, help diplomats carry out their duties,” he said.

 

Javed wrote seven books on China, such as Rise of China and the Asian Century, Chinese Soft Power Code, China, West and the Islamic World- Romance of the Three Civilizations. They have been very popular in Pakistan. He hopes to convey his understanding of China and Asia to more people.

 

“In my own observation, the Chinese have triple eight good values. I don't have the time to write all those good values, so I have identified 88 of them. I wrote a book called Chinese Soft Power Code. I wish I had time to write on those remaining 800 value systems of China,” he said.

 

After retirement, Mr. Javed starts to work in Pakistani universities. He tells stories about Chinese culture in his eyes to students. 

 

“Since I retired, I have spent my time here to tell China’s story that has not been told. How did China rise? How did it happen? Why did China achieve in 40 years what the western world took 400 years to achieve? And the western world achieved this by conquering, by discovering two continents and killing 200 million people and colonizing half the world. China did it just with the help of its soft power,” he said.