The couple was incredibly happy. How many high school students had ever come from the village? Ma Dexiang was one, Lin Fuqiang was one, and then there was Chen Jinshui's son. He was two years older than Lin Shuying, so he started high school two years before her.
Otherwise, Lin Shuying would be the first serious high school student in her generation.
But it doesn’t matter, she will soon be the most educated girl in Sihe Village!
Lin Guoqing was so excited that he wanted to hold a big banquet to celebrate, but was rejected by Chen Chunhua.
"God of gold! I've only seen full-month celebrations, weddings, and funerals, but have you ever seen a family hold a banquet for a middle school to high school? And what will you do when your eldest daughter gets into college? Beat drums and gongs and spread the news all over the place?"
"It's not impossible..." Lin Guoqing scratched his head and even started to calculate the expenses, but was interrupted by a slap from Chen Chunhua.
Finally, he invited Lin Fuqiang, Ma Dexiang and his wife, as well as Lao Shi, Ye Juncai and a few good friends, to his home to have a table of wine and liven up the atmosphere.
Lin Shuying herself was actually quite sad. Her goal was to get into a normal school. She wanted to be a teacher and educate people.
Even if you can't get into a secondary normal school, a technical secondary school will do. Getting into a technical secondary school is like having a stable job. The school will provide food coupons while you're studying, so your family doesn't have to worry about you. After graduation, you'll be assigned a job, your household registration can be changed from rural to non-rural, and you can eat in the cafeteria and get a house!
To this end, Lin Shuying studied very hard for her three years of junior high school, even suppressing her guilt and skipping housework to study. She hoped that if she could pass the exam, she could bring her parents a good life.
As a result, the facts proved that there are always people better than you. Not to mention junior normal school, she even missed the entrance to technical secondary school by two places and only got into high school.
She went home and cried all night, saying sorry to mom and dad... and she was choked by Chen Chunhua.
"Why are you crying? If you want to be a teacher, then study hard in high school. Then you can take the college entrance exam or the normal school entrance exam and become a teacher!"
"But...but even if I get into university...after graduation...it'll be seven years before I can start working..."
Lin Shuying cried bitterly. She felt that she was useless. If she could get into a technical secondary school, she would be able to earn a salary in three years.
"And, and...what if I...if I don't get into college..."
As she spoke, she burst into tears again. She couldn't imagine the scene of her graduating from high school with the tuition fees earned by her parents with great effort, but still failing to get into college and having to go home to farm.
Lin Shumei squatted beside her sister with a handkerchief in her hand, wiping her tears and comforting her, "If you can't pass the exam, then you can't pass it! If you can't pass the exam, come back and raise chickens! Didn't Mom say there weren't enough eggs to sell?"
No matter how high a teacher’s salary is, can it be as much as what their parents earn by raising chickens and ducks?
I can only say that the age difference between the older and the younger is still a bit too much.
Lin Shuying, who had been eating sweet potato pickles with her parents for several years, had witnessed with her own eyes the scene where they carried the rapeseed oil distributed by the village and the eggs saved at home, and humbly went to exchange them for food coupons with the people in the city.
Even Jeremy Lin still vaguely remembers that when he was about three years old, he seemed to eat sweet potatoes every day and go to the fields to pick grass seeds and insects to feed chickens. Later, when his brother went to school, his family started to not mix anything else with the rice and could eat pure white rice.
But as far as Shumei can remember, her family has never lacked food and drink, even meat and snacks. Her mother even gave her fifty cents pocket money every week when she was in school. Who in her class didn't envy her?
So compared to Lin Shumei, a little kid who had not yet experienced the class differences between urban and rural areas, Lin Shuying knew better what this failure to enter higher education meant to her.
As the eldest sister, she always wanted to share some of the family's responsibilities. Didn't she see that her two cousins, who were about her age, were working to support their younger sisters' education? And she did nothing, couldn't even study well, and was truly useless...
The example Lin Shuying gave was like stirring up a hornet's nest. Before Chen Chunhua and Lin Guoqing could even open their mouths, Liang Shengdi scolded her.
"I was thinking, our family has been doing so well these past two years, with rice and meat always available, so why does our eldest daughter just like to endure hardship?"
"Go out and ask around the village. Do they envy your life or the lives of those girls from the Ma family?"
"You've become stupid from reading so much!"
"Even an old woman like me has heard people call college students "golden phoenixes." Aren't these college students more valuable than secondary school or normal school students?"
"Since you're so sad and feel so sorry for your parents' few dollars of tuition, then why don't you work harder in high school? Didn't your mom tell you that you want to be a teacher? Then why don't you take the teacher's degree exam..."
"Teacher's College." Chen Chunhua added obediently while standing by the side.
"Yes! Normal school! If you get into a normal school, you'll be honoring your family and your ancestors! ... If you get into university, will you not be able to live in the city? Will you not be able to have a stable job? Our family doesn't need your little money!"
Oh, it’s rare that Old Lady Liang even brought up her ancestors. I’m afraid she herself doesn’t even know which ancestors she is talking about.
However, the effect of this scolding was obvious. Lin Shuying did not dare to cry anymore. Instead, she asked Lin Guoqing for help and asked him to borrow textbooks from Chen Jinshui's house.
"Brother Chuanguo is going to be a senior in high school. I wonder if he could lend me his freshman textbooks this summer, but I'm not close to him..."
"Okay! Dad will borrow it for you!" Lin Guoqing agreed without hesitation, and said, "Our family doesn't need your money. Just study hard and stop thinking about nonsense all day long!"
Lin Shuying nodded and secretly vowed in her heart that she must get into university! She must get into university!
…
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