During his visit next week to Iowa, Vice-President Xi Jinping will reconnect with acquaintances he met decades ago rather than touch on anything concerning Sino-US ties, but the brief stop is significant for both the Midwestern state and for Xi himself.
For Iowa, hosting the future leader of another country is almost unheard of. And for Xi, his interaction with the Iowans will show that his ties to the US go back a long way - nearly three decades.
Reached by phone on Wednesday, Iowa Governor Terry Branstad said he had suggested the inclusion of Iowa in Xi's itinerary during a trade mission Branstad made to Beijing in September.
'At that time, he gave us 50 minutes of his time, which is a very large amount of time for somebody with a busy schedule. And the first thing he said was, 'I was in your office on April 26, 1985',' Branstad said, adding that 'Xi was impressed with the people he met here. I invited him to come back and we would do a reunion with the people he met'.
Branstad, who was re-elected to the governor's office in November 2010 after serving in the position from 1983 to 1999, first met Xi in 1985. He described Xi as being a hard-working and smart man.
'I'm back where I was; I'm back governor again. But Xi has risen from just a local leader to being the next leader of China. He has made great progress, and I am back where I was,' Branstad said.