After failing the “Gaokao,” the horrible Chinese exam that gives you access to university, for the 27th time, 56-year-old Chinese millionaire Liang Shi wonders if he can fulfill his dream of going to Sichuan University can realize.
However, Liang Shi can be proud of his social success, as he started his career with a menial job in a factory before founding his own building materials company, which prospered and made him a millionaire.
AFP
But the 1950s have always brought with them one frustration, namely that he hadn’t achieved a sufficient grade in “Gaokao” to be able to integrate into the prestigious University of Sichuan, the province in south-west China where he lives.
After failing the exam for the first time at the age of 16, this stubborn man had repeated it almost ten times, always in vain, before having to quit as he had reached the age limit (25 years old) at the time.
When that limit was lifted in 2001, Liang Shi believed he had another chance.
And this year he was on his 27th attempt, each time after months of “living as a monk”: getting up at dawn every day to spend 12 hours a day in school books, no alcohol, no distractions, not even mahjong, his favorite game, with his friends.
And late Friday night, like hundreds of thousands of high school students in his province, he swooped onto the Internet to see his results. Along with a number of journalists who now follow him every year. Even before he saw his score, he could tell from her disappointed look that he had failed once again.
This year’s result leaves him in doubt. “I thought my score would not be high enough to enter Sichuan University. But I didn’t expect that my score wouldn’t allow me to get into any university, even the lowest rated one,” he told AFP.
So far he has never been discouraged and every year he immediately announced that he would take the exam again the following year.
“But if I really don’t see any improvement, I tell myself it might not be worth trying anymore. I really worked very hard every day. I don’t know at the moment if I’ll try again next year,” he admitted with a tired look.
On the other hand, he finds it difficult to imagine giving up. “If I stop showing up for gaokao, every cup of tea I drink will taste like regret for the rest of my life.”