My senior colleague Sheela Bhatt, who attended the lengthy media interaction with Hu and Dr Singh on Tuesday morning, felt there was little chemistry between the leaders of the Asian giants. Hu, Sheela noted, smiled just once -- when the television cameramen turned belligerent. On Tuesday evening, Hu appeared a lot more relaxed, smiling more easily. This, incidentally, is his second visit to India; in 1984, as leader of the Communist Youth League Central Committee (the Chinese Communist party's Youth Congress), he had come by.

I asked two Indian diplomats -- past and present -- if Chinese Ambassador Sun Yuxi's provocative comments on Arunachal Pradesh were designed to put India on the backfoot, ahead of Hu's visit, perhaps because the Chinese are unsettled by India's economic clout.

Both men said no!, that Sun was only reiterating his country's policy on Arunachal, and pointed to what they called an expansion of the India-China relationship in Tuesday's joint declaration.

Interestingly, while President Kalam toasted the 'everlasting friendship' between India and China in his speech, Hu preferred to toast the 'strategic cooperative partnership', a phrase he alluded to thrice in his speech.

As symbols go, it seems, the pragmatic Chinese may believe Beijing and New Delhi can be partners, not friends.

* Chinatown My Chinatown, a tune composed by William Jerome and Jean Schwartz in 1910, and recorded by the great Louis Armstrong and Chet Atkins among others. The only Western tune played at the dinner.

Image: Sonia Gandhi greets Hu Jintao and Liu Yong Qing, as President Kalam looks on.