Page 265 - updated on July

Yu Jihui: “A Stinking Old Ninth – A Tale of the Coal Capital” (updated on July 2020)

moment. Looking directly into my eyes, she said,

“What’s your family background?”

“I’m from a middle peasant family. But my

father is an engineer.”

“You must be from a landlord family. I was told

your father studied in the USA for several years. If

your father was not from a landlord family, how

could he have had money to study abroad?”

“My father was a state-financed student . He

relied on his real ability and passed the state-run-

examination to be a state-financed student and study

abroad. It was very hard for him to pass the

examination. It was held in Beijing in the thirties. My

father worked very hard in order to pass the

examination. He lived in a small house without even

a stove. You know, Beijing is also very cold in the

winter, even if it’s not as cold as our Northeast.

Every day he got up at four in the morning to read.

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