My all-time favorite video clip from our travels all over the world was shot on a beach in Xiamen the other year. We had been shooting a fellow flying a really cool kite and there were a bunch of kids (all Chinese) of various ages playing on the beach, chasing the kite and making sand castles as kids all over the world do.
At one point a young boy about six or seven years old walked up in front of our camera, looked at it for a moment, and then said to my cameraman in an absolutely perfect American accent--- we could have been on a beach in LA--- "Salutations." He then paused a moment, cocked his head a bit at my camerman and added, "Do you even know what that means?"
All kids in China today take English in school. Almost all kids in China-- particularly the cities--- can speak English pretty much as well as you or I can. When we first arrived in China the Boeing site manager told us that if we went into the city and got lost or had some other problem, find a little kid. If they can overcome their shyness, you'll be able to have a conversation with them that's no different than what you would have at home. Their parents, and maybe even their older brothers or sisters probably won't have much command of English at all, but the young kids are right at home with it.
When we'd be wandering around the city the bolder of the kids would come up to us and say "Hello," and then ask us all sorts of innane questions about where we were from, our camera and tripod, and so on. There was no trace of a Chinese accent-- they all sounded like west coast Americans. They do this because, we were told, they like to practice their English.
These kids are the ones who will be running China when we go to #2 (or #3 or....)