By Kerri Pepoy,Staff Writer
Chinese students arrive just in time for a fall classic.

FRYEBURG – For a group of Chinese high-school students about to experience their first week in American classrooms, opening day at the Fryeburg Fair was an education in itself.

The five students and two teachers from the city of Jinhua, in the province of Zhejiang in southeast China, marveled at the hundreds of animals and cars at Maine’s oldest and largest agricultural fair Sunday.

“We have never seen horses so big,” said 15-year-old Yan Yuzhi as he watched a horse-drawn wagon roll by.

“It’s a very big festival,” said 16 year-old Ma Rugian, adding that she found the surrounding Maine scenery “very beautiful.”

The students and teachers arrived in Maine on Saturday after a 10-hour flight from Shanghai to San Francisco and a five-hour flight from San Francisco to Boston. The trip marks the first step in a student exchange program that was coordinated last year between teachers and administrators from Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School and the students’ school in China, Zhejiang Normal University Middle School.

There probably aren’t many better places than the Fryeburg Fair to give foreigners a genuine taste of American life. As the group strolled around the fairgrounds, petting animals and deciding what to buy for lunch from the many food vendors, live bands played classic rock tunes such as Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama.”

Teacher Chen Yong Fang said the group was especially fascinated by the size of the animals at the fair’s livestock area.

“We don’t have such big horses in China,” she said.

The Chinese students, who are being hosted by Oxford Hills high-school students and their families, will attend classes at the high school this week. Chen Yong Fang is staying with Principal Ted Moccia and his wife Sue, who is an elementary school art teacher, while Xu Yao Hua, head of the Zhejiang school’s English department, is staying with an Oxford Hills high-school teacher.

The group will return to China after the Columbus Day holiday weekend.

Xu Yao Hua said her city hosts an agricultural fair every year, which exhibits agricultural products such as grapes, peaches, apples and oranges.

“There are not so many animals,” she said. “Here I’ve seen cows, lambs, horses I feel very happy to experience this culture.”

History teacher Craig Blanchard said he would like students and teachers from Oxford Hills to eventually spend a semester or even a year in China. “That is the eventual goal of this program,” he said. In April, seven Oxford Hills high-school students and two teachers will travel to China for about three weeks.

///We feel at home’///

Moccia said more than 28 students applied for the trip, and seven were chosen following a rigorous application and interviewing process.

Blanchard said the exchange program exposes Oxford Hills students to other cultures, a benefit they don’t normally have in a largely Caucasian state. “We don’t have a lot of interaction with other cultures,” he said. “When our kids are in China, they will learn about a culture that is growing and becoming the most important in the world.”

He added that school administrators in China want to send their teachers to America so they are better equipped to teach English once they return.

“Everyone has been so wonderful to us,” said Chen Yong Fang. “We feel at home.”

She said the trip will hopefully foster understanding between Chinese and American youths. “It is very good for them to experience other cultures,” she said. “The world is becoming smaller and smaller.”