Time flew by quickly.
There was no news from Du Zhaohui’s side, but Xia Xiaolan wasn’t too concerned.
He still had business in Peng City and wouldn’t stay in Beijing indefinitely. Although Xia Dajun had saved his life, Du Zhaohui felt he had already compensated him. People had died for him before – even if he needed to compensate Xia Dajun, he wouldn’t worship him like a father. Du Zhaohui didn’t even particularly respect his actual father, Du Chengrong. If Du Chengrong were to hand over the entire Du family business to Du Zhaohui now, the young master would turn on him faster than turning a page!
If Du Zhaohui was fixated on anything about this matter, it wasn’t that Xia Xiaolan was beautiful, but rather that she made the young master uncomfortable.
Since Xia Xiaolan couldn’t bring him any benefits or advantages, and only made Du Zhaohui unhappy, he certainly remembered her. Xia Xiaolan benefited from her looks – Young Master Du had slightly more tolerance for beautiful girls.
When Deputy Director Wang tried to challenge Young Master Du, Du Zhaohui had crushed him with money.
Xia Xiaolan could attend classes and live normally because of Du Zhaohui’s tolerance for beautiful girls – in fact, it was because the investment plans in Peng City had been finalized and the entire project was about to launch. As the person in charge, Du Zhaohui couldn’t continue wasting time in Beijing.
But Xia Xiaolan was the only one who had caught Du Zhaohui’s eye in Beijing – first impressions matter and the young master hadn’t found anyone else noteworthy there.
He had actually wanted to meet some actresses, but his guide had earnestly explained the national situation to Young Master Du – mainland actresses were different from Hong Kong ones. Mainland actresses had formal work units and received regular salaries, and additional pay for filming. Whether big stars or not, they all treated it as a regular job they took seriously.
When Du Zhaohui wanted to flirt, they only wanted serious relationships, and once involved, “breaking up” wouldn’t be easy.
Du Zhaohui’s interest was immediately extinguished. Finding it all boring, he returned to Peng City.
Without Liu Tianquan holding things back, all of Chengrong Group’s affairs in Peng City were under Du Zhaohui’s control. He wasn’t afraid to humble himself before people who could benefit business, and quickly made friends from all directions in Peng City. The short-term progress outpaced Liu Tianquan’s previous two years of development… Fortunately, Liu Tianquan wasn’t managing Peng City’s business anymore, or he would have been furious.
Liu Tianquan was in high spirits, busy replanning the Du family’s smuggling routes!
Before they knew it, it was late January. With sufficient funds and no shortage of labor, the three stores in Beijing had taken basic shape in their renovation.
Since Liu Yong was in Beijing anyway and had adequate funds, he decided to fix up his courtyard in Nanluoguxiang.
It wasn’t a major renovation – he had no experience in renovating ancient buildings, and Xia Xiaolan, being an amateur, was busy with the competition and final exams with no time to design. Liu Yong simply demolished the randomly built small rooms in the courtyard, restoring its original appearance.
Then he had all the roof tiles renewed, painted the doors and windows the same color, and placed necessary furniture inside – just enough to make it livable.
Liu Yong had all the workers stay at his place this time, allowing the frugal boss to save on accommodation costs.
The courtyard near Shichahai was already well-preserved, so Liu Yong only dared to replace some tiles, leaving everything else untouched.
Xia Xiaolan said this courtyard should be saved for future “assignments.” The first-year studies were relatively basic, and students hadn’t started hands-on work yet. By the second year, when studies deepened, Xia Xiaolan wanted to practice.
Renovating ancient buildings was different from ordinary decoration. Xia Xiaolan’s skills weren’t there yet, and she lacked both the financial means and time, so the courtyard was left as is for now.
“Uncle’s courtyard can wait too, just tidy it up simply for now, make it livable.”
See, this was what having a dear uncle meant – unconditionally doting on Xia Xiaolan, doing whatever she suggested. He would even demolish and rebuild the courtyard if she wanted!
On January 20th, Xia Xiaolan saw news about the First National College English Competition finals in the newspaper. The Ministry of Education was building momentum for the finals.
Until now, the most widely recognized English program among Chinese people was CCTV’s “Follow Me,” and the most famous textbook was the university “English” textbook edited by Xu Guozhang. From the 1960s until now, Xia Xiaolan’s batch of students still used Professor Xu’s textbook set. “Wang in the South, Xu in the North” was a popular saying in foreign language teaching circles, with “Xu in the North” referring to Professor Xu Guozhang.
The newspaper announced that Professor Xu would be a judge at the finals!
The paper also included an interview with Professor Xu, who said that learning English required being “fearless and unrestricted.”
“Professor Xu is a judge…”
In Room 307, Lu Yan was envious. She also hugged her recorder constantly and spent lots of time studying English, but unfortunately hadn’t even made it past the second round.
Lu Yan was very enthusiastic about learning English, and everyone privately guessed she probably wanted to study abroad. Professor Xu had been teaching at Beijing Foreign Studies University since the founding of the People’s Republic, and Lu Yan envied Xia Xiaolan’s chance to interact with him up close.
“Even though Professor Xu is a judge, I might not get to speak with him.”
There wouldn’t be much contact between judges and contestants. It wasn’t like future shows like “The Voice” where contestants could team up with judges! There were no mentors or teams, so judges and contestants had no opportunities for in-depth interaction.
Xia Xiaolan also idealized Professor Xu. The 1985 English textbook was edited by him, and in her previous life when she attended university, they still used his version. She had started university in 1995, and Professor Xu had passed away around 1994… This highly respected English educator and linguist only had nine years left to live.
Xia Xiaolan suddenly realized another significance of participating in the English competition, or rather, living in the 1980s.
Many master-level figures like Professor Xu were still alive. In this life, she had reached a higher platform where she could interact directly with these masters – wasn’t this what countless people dreamed of?
In architecture, she had already met Ning Yanfan, and now she would meet Professor Xu. This magnificent era was studded with so many precious gems.
Early on the 25th, Xia Xiaolan got up and prepared quietly.
Teacher Lin was waiting downstairs at the dormitory, with a few final words of advice for Xia Xiaolan:
“You’ve seen the newspapers – the judges for this final all have impressive backgrounds, including Education Ministry leaders and experts like Professor Xu Guozhang. Television stations will be recording, and your competition process will be broadcast later… Aim for innovation within stable boundaries. Novelty needs limits!”
Teacher Lin was referring to the previous second round.
If Xia Xiaolan didn’t care about placing, that was one thing, but if she wanted to place, she shouldn’t go off-topic again in the finals!
Xia Xiaolan walked with Teacher Lin and met up with three other Huaqing contestants, including Ji Jiangyuan. Everyone was in good spirits.
Taking the school bus to the competition venue, there were 200 people. Just completing all the procedures would take half a day. The Foreign Language Department professor was still explaining strategy on the bus: “Your opponents today come from universities across the country. Don’t just focus on Beijing University and others – the contestants from Beijing Foreign Studies University are also your strong competitors…”