The Northwestern Chinese American Association of Greater Washington (NCAAGW) has been the key partner in establishing Montgomery County’s third Sister City. In 2012, NCAAGW’s Nan Qiao and Sabrina Hsu accompanied Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Tom Street, County Director of Special Projects Lily Qi, and Shannon Yang on a trip to China that explored the potential of a Sister City with Xi’an. One year later, County Executive Leggett led a large delegation to Xi’an where he signed a Letter of Intent on September 20, 2013. The formal Sister City agreement with Xi’an was signed in 2014.

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Best known as the home of the Terracotta Warriors (a World Heritage Site with thousands of sculpted soldiers buried with China’s first Emperor to protect him in his afterlife), Xi’an is a major educational and high technology hub in the northwest of China. Now the capital of Shaanxi Province, Emperors ruled China from Xi’an for one thousand years through several of the country’s most important dynasties. As the eastern terminus of the Silk Road, the people of Xi’an traded goods and ideas with travelers from diverse cultures across the globe.

NCAAGW, serving Chinese Americans with connections to China’s northwestern provinces, is the largest hometown based Chinese American Association in the Washington area. In 2014, NCAAGW members traveled to Xi’an for discussions aimed at coordinating cultural, educational, and economic exchanges and met with Xi’an representatives at the US-China Sister Cities Conference in Washington. On August 12, 2014, under the leadership of President Hui Li, NCAAGW hosted an event at the Rockville Memorial Library with County Executive Leggett to celebrate the formal signing of the Sister City agreement. NCAAGW facilitated ten day trips to Xi’an by teenagers from Montgomery County in July of 2013 and 2014.