Chinese people frequently complain that the world has misunderstood their country, but Chinese media pointed out in Beijing Thursday that Chinese themselves have a lot of misconceptions about the big wide world.

"Many of the misconceptions stem from historical experiences, but others can be laid at the door of the media," the latest International Herald Leader said.

Apart from superpowers like the United States and Russia, Chinese have sought to know more about other countries that have historical connections with China or who play an important role on the world diplomatic stage, like India, Japan, Israel and Iran.

It used two full pages to list a series of major misconceptions, ranging from Iranian people's attitude toward the United States to dieting habits in Singapore.

The newspaper blamed domestic media for exaggerating the 'anti-America' sentiment in Iran, saying that such reports failed to reflect the real situation.

"U.S. brands like Nike and Coca Cola are popular among Iranian youth... Many of the young people hope to study in the United States," the newspaper said.

It also tried to correct Chinese people's ideas about India, saying that India is not the "aggressive", disaster-prone, underdeveloped neighbor depicted in many Chinese reports.

"Chinese people tend to judge others by their appearance," said the newspaper. "India's disorder and poverty are only on the surface...Under the surface is a young country full of vitality."

The newspaper said that most Chinese believe that India lags behind China in many areas apart from software. But the fact is that, besides the software industry, India also has a leading position in many other sectors including biology and pharmacy.

In addition, the newspaper said India has the world's youngest demographic structure, which means it will have abundant human resources for its economic development in the next 20 years.

It said many Chinese make unwarranted assumptions about foreign countries and their people's lives. For example, many Chinese believe that westerners are more sexually promiscuous.

"But the fact is that westerners tend to be open about sex education but are often conservative about sex," the newspaper said.

The newspaper said the world is changing quickly and it urged Chinese to beware of cliches when trying to understand other countries.

"A country which is striving to achieve a positive image in the world, should first learn to get along with the world in a positive way," the newspaper said.

Source: Xinhua