Some 500 people gathered together here Saturday morning in Zoo Atlanta to welcome the arrival of a Chinese delegation which came specially to see the two giant pandas in the zoo.
The 11-member delegation, which consists of government officials, a panda researcher, journalists and a TV production crew, was from Chengdu, capital of Southwest China's Sichuan Province.
"We came here to visit Lun Lun and Yang Yang whose parents live in the Chinese city with 10 million people and 80 percent of the world's giant pandas," said Song Minwen, chief of the delegation, in the ceremony marking the arrival of the Chinese group
Both pandas arrived in Zoo Atlanta on a 10-year loan from the Chinese Government in 1999. "Since then, they have brought great joy to locals, children in particular," said Blythe Randolf, vice-president of Zoo Atlanta, in an interview with chinadaily.com.cn.