Amanpour Intern, Vladimir Duthiers

By Vladimir Duthiers, Amanpour Intern

Many in the media have focused on President Obama’s recent photo-op taken with Emperor Akihito of Japan. It shows Obama waist deep in Ojigi – the act of bending the waist and the head at a 15 degree angle as a social gesture. AKA – bowing. The White House says the President was simply following protocol but to many in the United States, his actions seem to clash with America’s egalitarian origins.

Speaking to John King on CNN’s State of the Union, conservative commentator William Bennet called Obama’s gesture “ugly”, saying, “We don't defer to emperors.”

Over the course of an eighteen year career in global finance, I had the opportunity to travel to Japan many times. During these visits, I was always struck by the fact that my American colleagues never bowed to our Japanese clients and business associates, even if they were bowing to us. As a long time student of the Japanese martial arts, I knew that in Japanese culture, bowing is simply a traditional way to show respect to another person before you start to try and bash their brains in with a well timed punch, roundhouse kick or, a bamboo sword called shinai. FULL POST

Sr. Writer for Amanpour, Tom Evans, works on scripts with Christiane

By Tom Evans, Sr. Writer AMANPOUR.

1: China today, say many analysts, is in a comparable position to U.S. at the beginning of the 20th century... an emerging power that the dominant global power of the time is trying to downplay. Then it was Great Britain vs. the United States. Now it is the United States vs. China.

2: China's rapid economic expansion continues to outpace growth in the United States, 8.9 percent in the last quarter versus 3.5 percent in the United States giving Beijing huge economic leverage.

3: China is on the brink of overtaking Japan as the world's second biggest economy and could overtake by some estimates (PricewaterhouseCoopers) the U.S. economy in overall size (though not GDP a head) by 2025 and be 130 percent bigger than the U.S. economy by 2050 FULL POST

Oscar the Grouch, sitting on the Amanpour set - part of the 40 year celebration of 'Sesame Street'‎

Meghan, Christiane’s Producer, taking a phone call from home:

“Mom, I met Helen Thomas, Sam Donaldson and Oscar the Grouch yesterday… so it was a big day for me.”

Sr. Writer Tom Evans

On AMANPOUR. today, we look at U.S. President Obama’s first trip to China. What are we to make of U.S. policy toward China and what kind of leverage does the U.S. have on issues as crucial as climate change, trade, nuclear proliferation, and the global financial crisis? Is China the 800lb gorilla in the room that everyone is trying to ignore? Geo-strategic implications of China’s rise continue to astonish, particularly as it’s on brink of overtaking Japan as the world’s second biggest economy. We also look at China’s rising economic influence in Africa and South America and more. That’s not the only story making news today. Here are some perspectives on that and some other headlines.

- Tom Evans; Sr. Writer, AMANPOUR.

U.S. AND CHINA – interdependent partners or strategic rivals?

-         President Obama in China on his first official visit to the country amid tensions between Beijing and Washington on a host of issues

-         Both U.S. and China’s economies deeply intertwined. U.S. relies on China to buy U.S. Treasury bonds. China relies on U.S. to buy its manufactured goods

-         Some are calling for new global leadership by China and the U.S., a so-called “G2” to direct the world economy and address strategic issues such as North Korea and Iran

-         President Obama says U.S. is not trying to contain China and there are very few global challenges that can’t be solved if two countries work together

QUESTION: Is U.S. downplaying human rights concerns in Tibet and Xinjiang in order to strengthen the bilateral relationship between Beijing and Washington? FULL POST

Tell us what life is like in your part of the world. Each week we'll play a short film on our program that challenges how we understand the world. Use your video camera, webcam or cellphone:  submit your film here.