LIFE / CELEBRITY
Photo of US rapper Kanye West in China as a child gets warm welcome from Chinese netizens
Published: Aug 09, 2020 06:13 PM Updated: Aug 09, 2020 08:13 AM

Kim Kardashian (left) and Kanye West Photo: IC



 US rapper Kanye West posted a photo of himself and his mother from their time living in China on Twitter on Sunday. The tweet received an overwhelming positive response among netizens, some of whom compared him to the character of Dre Parker in the 2010 remake of The Karate Kid.

The photo shows four people, including West and his mother sitting around a table, perhaps enjoying a meal. 

"When me and my mom lived in China for a year. She had the fresh jacket with the braids," the tweet said.

This post has been liked more than 29,000 times as of Sunday night, with hundreds of comments. 

Some netizens compared West's experience to The Karate Kid remake starring Jaden Smith and Jackie Chan in which 12-year-old Dre Parker moves to Beijing with his mother and learns kung fu.

In 1987, a 10-year-old West spent a year living in Nanjing while his mother Donda was a lecturer at Nanjing University.

West has frequently talked about his time in the country.

"We really connected there, so it'll probably be very emotional for me to go back to China. As soon as you, y'know, feel the energy and hit the ground and see familiar sights from your childhood, and familiar smells - which is the most memorable sense of all - it'll take me right back to fifth grade with my mom," West said in a 2008 interview with radiichina.com ahead of a series of concerts in the country.

When West announced his intention to run for US president in July it grabbed the attention of numerous Chinese netizens. The related hashtag had been viewed more than 860 million times on Sina Weibo as of Sunday.

Many Chinese netizens expressed their support for West due to his experience and close connection to China.