Xia Xiaolan knew exactly why Ning Xue wasn’t participating in the English competition.
As the national college entrance examination champion, even though Ning Xue hadn’t achieved a perfect score on the English paper, she wasn’t far from it. According to Ji Jiangyuan, Ning Xue had been to America during high school and had good oral English skills. She didn’t participate in the English competition because she felt it held no value. Ning Xue was like a renowned master in the martial arts world – she no longer needed such competitions to prove herself. She was probably waiting for competitions in her professional field.
Xia Xiaolan was different; she still needed to earn more honors to change others’ impressions of her.
After military training and the National Day parade, Xia Xiaolan knew she had indeed changed somewhat. She had become more integrated into this era, with a stronger sense of collective honor.
As Liu Huazheng said, advancing to the finals wasn’t just for personal honor, but for Huaqing’s collective glory!
Looking around, they were surrounded by strong competitors: Peking University, Renmin University, Beijing Normal University, University of International Business and Economics, Posts and Telecommunications University… A rough count showed over two hundred people from the Beijing area had passed the preliminary round.
Standing out among these two hundred people, including English majors, wouldn’t be easy for Xia Xiaolan.
She estimated her advantage lay in speaking and listening skills, as everyone who passed the preliminary round had similar written test scores.
Ji Jiangyuan came over. “Are you two nervous?”
Liu Huazheng rolled her eyes at him, then suddenly lowered her voice:
“I heard a rumor that those who make it to the finals, whether they win awards or not, might have a chance at government-sponsored study abroad positions.”
“You mean government-sponsored study abroad?”
Teacher Lin had emphasized the importance of this English competition but hadn’t fully explained everything to Xia Xiaolan.
Liu Huazheng was better informed than Xia Xiaolan, and Ji Jiangyuan had heard something too. “Not exactly study abroad, more like an exchange student program.”
Exchange student?
So there were exchange student programs as early as ’84. Xia Xiaolan vaguely remembered that until 1995, the U.S. State Department hadn’t officially approved China’s participation in the “International Student Exchange Program.” She remembered this clearly because, in her previous life, she had entered university that same year.
Since there wasn’t yet an exchange program with America, it must be with other countries.
Being an exchange student wasn’t particularly appealing to Xia Xiaolan. If she had plans to go abroad, she would go for full-time study.
If she couldn’t get government sponsorship, she’d pay her way.
After all, earning more money was never wrong.
Among the three of them, Ji Jiangyuan had just returned from America, so being an exchange student held little appeal for him. Only Liu Huazheng was quite interested. For Xia Xiaolan, this news was just an interlude before the second round – she would approach the exam as planned.
The written test came first, including a listening section. Time was short but there were many questions, with lengthy reading comprehension passages. Just completing all the questions would be impressive, leaving little time to check answers.
The listening section alone filled an entire paper.
The oral test was conducted by teachers on-site. All university students participating in the second round were divided into odd and even groups, with each group having three teachers assigned by the Beijing Education Committee.
Many English articles were prepared on-site. Students would go up and randomly select one, read it aloud to everyone, and then answer the teachers’ questions. Simply reading through vaguely wouldn’t work – they needed to understand the article’s content and organize their thoughts to answer questions.
This was undoubtedly the most challenging part of the second round.
Those good at solving problems weren’t necessarily good at speaking.
Those good at speaking weren’t necessarily good at solving problems. Ji Jiangyuan felt certain he wouldn’t make it to the finals because he had done poorly on reading comprehension.
Though his speaking and listening were fine.
When it was Xia Xiaolan’s turn, she drew an article about environmental protection.
Except for a few words, she read the entire text fluently. When the teachers asked her views on China’s environmental issues – since the article was about foreign environmental pollution, the teachers probably wanted to hear that China was doing better than foreign countries – Xia Xiaolan thought for a moment and decided not to speak against her conscience:
“We’re currently prioritizing industrial development, which provides necessities for all our people and makes our country prosperous and strong. However, on the flip side, industrial wastewater is being directly dumped into rivers, severely polluting water and soil. Currently, environmental protection hasn’t drawn much attention. Without legal intervention and prevention, in 20 or 30 years, environmental pollution will become a serious problem we must face – rivers with excessive heavy metals won’t support fish and shrimp, polluted soil won’t produce healthy crops, and the air will be filled with dust, making it impossible to go out without masks! Nobody wants to see this happen. Rather than spending a hundredfold more effort on treatment afterward, we should start paying attention to and preventing these problems now.”
This was somewhat vague, as people who hadn’t experienced smog so severe that only gas masks would suffice could hardly imagine the scene Xia Xiaolan described.
Some thought she was being sensational, others felt she was fear-mongering.
Xia Xiaolan had just happened to draw this article and took the opportunity to speak out.
Perhaps it wasn’t the answer the teachers wanted. None of the three teachers commented.
At least she had said it all in English. After answering the questions, her oral test was over.
Ji Jiangyuan couldn’t help coming over. “You’ve been concerned about environmental issues?”
In domestic China in ’84, who besides relevant experts and scholars would pay attention to environmental protection? Ji Jiangyuan had always felt Xia Xiaolan was different from others, seeming out of place in the domestic environment, and now he had that feeling again.
Liu Huazheng also felt Xia Xiaolan’s oral response was a bit off.
“Your spoken English is so good, you should have just answered the teachers’ questions properly!”
Why give such an unconventional answer? Everyone had taken political science exams; every university student knew how to answer such questions.
Xia Xiaolan didn’t explain, only sighing: “Looks like I won’t make it to the finals.”
She wouldn’t regret what she said, though she felt she had let Teacher Lin down. Teacher Lin had high hopes for her, and she was the only one from the Architecture Department to make it to the second round.
Ji Jiangyuan felt Xia Xiaolan’s answer wasn’t wrong, but considering the general environment, though her English was fluent, her answer had deviated from the “standard answer.” He dared not praise Xia Xiaolan too much. If she wanted to make it to the finals but got eliminated because of the oral section, wouldn’t that make her sad?
Liu Huazheng was also quite emotionally intelligent; both of them dropped the subject.
Xia Xiaolan said she wanted to find and chat with someone from her hometown at the University of International Business and Economics. Since other students were still testing and all Huaqing second-round participants had come together by school bus, they naturally had to wait for everyone to leave together.
“Go ahead, I’ll make sure the school bus waits for you.”
Liu Huazheng assured Xia Xiaolan, telling her not to worry.
Ji Jiangyuan thought for a moment. “Come on, I’ll go with you.”