I know I told you this already last time, but I have a diary.
I also write in that diary – every day.
So when it’s time for my weekly post I feel like millions of things have already happened that I could write about! How can I possibly narrow that down 🙁
Today, I’ve decided to write about my dad. Because in all honesty, his visit will probably be the highlight of my entire semester, past months and future months included. The two days we had together were far too short, but that’s also what makes his visit so precious to me.
As I mentioned last time, I haven’t seen my dad since winter break, because he lives and works in Shanghai. After this visit, it really struck me that this is how my relationship with my parents is going to be from now on. I mean if you think about it, most adults only see their parents a few times a year, right? Thanksgiving, Christmas, birthdays maybe. Unless I move back in with my parents after graduation, I’ll never really see them on a regular basis again. Ever. I’ll never live in the same house as them again, or eat breakfast and dinner with them again, or spend our evenings together. And that made me a sad. Very sad.
But I’m coaxing myself into accepting it as a part of growing up.
(Also, I know I should never say never, but I’m pretty sure that’s how often I’ll be seeing my parents from now on. And it was just a very jarring realization.)
But sentimentality aside, I had a great weekend with my dad. We had lunch in Chinatown one day, dinner on the pier another day. He got to tour campus as well as see parts of Boston he hadn’t explored previously.
My biggest takeaway from his visit, though, hands down, was overwhelming respect and admiration for him, as well as determination to make the most of my time at Wellesley.
I’d always known my dad had come to the US with only $20. I’d also known that the year he passed the college entrance exam and was accepted into university in China (1977) was the year after the Cultural Revolution ended. This is a crucial piece of information, because for the duration of the Revolution, all universities and institutions of higher education in China were shut down. The Revolution lasted 10 years, so when it ended, there were 10 year’s worth of young people who’d missed out on a college education who still wanted one. So that year, the first year the universities opened up again and were accepting students (and only for a limited selection of majors, too) there were 10 year’s worth of people taking the college entrance exam. Acceptance rates were 1%.
My dad made it, which is worth an ample amount of admiration in and of itself. (My mom made it the next year.) But what I hadn’t known before, and which my dad told me this past weekend, was that during those 10 years of the Revolution, his future had been extremely uncertain. In hindsight, this seems obvious, but it had never occurred to me. I also didn’t fully grasp the gravity of the situation as my dad must have when he was experiencing it.
During the Revolution, he was sent to the countryside as part of the reform programs. Working on a farm isn’t that bad objectively, but at the time it was devastating for my dad’s parents, who were of good standing (a lineage of professors, scholars, businessmen, and the like), to think that their son’s future was in farming. (Think of it this way: you’re in high school and looking to possibly attend Wellesley, and hopefully from there go on to have a career and make a comfortable living with a good salary. Now imagine the US being thrown into chaos, you being pulled out of school, and then facing the prospect of laboring in the countryside for the rest of your life.)
(Also please keep in mind that being a farmer in China – and at that time period – is incomparable with being a farmer in the US today, so please don’t take offense to what may seem as condescending statements about farmers.)
But the difference is, we just talk about this hypothetically. For my dad, it was reality. He didn’t know when the Revolution would end, or what state the country would be in afterwards. Would universities even exist anymore? He didn’t know. So for all intents and purposes, he WAS going to be in the countryside for the rest of his life. And he accepted it.
After a few years, he moved on to working in a factory pressing bricks. It was backbreaking work, but he was glad (!) because being a factory worker was better than being a farmer in China.
And I know there are tons of stories out there like his, and from various countries and ethnicities. I’ve heard of harder lives and much worse things happening to people, and I’m sure you have, too. But I guess what really hit home was that this is my dad. I can look at him and see the man that he is today and…I can’t even imagine the boy who labored in the countryside. I just can’t. And I will spare you the whole story of his life (it would go on for way too long than this blog post should be) but let me tell you, it didn’t get any easier for him after he immigrated to the US.
And this weekend, as we sat on a bench by the waterside in Boston talking about these things, and I looked at the man sitting in front of me, I couldn’t help but feel overwhelming admiration and respect for him. Here, he’d made is SO far, worked SO hard, and my life couldn’t even compare. The luxuries I’ve been privileged enough to have in my life are things he didn’t even dream of as a child, and, more importantly, are thanks to how hard this man worked for the past 50 years of his life.
To put it another way, when I told him I’d picked up a waitressing job, he said, “I waited tables so you would never have to.”
(Of course, I owe a huge thanks to my mom as well, and I would write about her life during the Revolution here, too, except in the interest of keeping this post at a reasonable length.)
And now that I’ve told you all this, you must understand why the second half of my “biggest takeaway from this weekend” is to make the most of my time at Wellesley. How could I not want to work hard and succeed after hearing about how hard he worked just so I could have the opportunity to attend a place like Wellesley?
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I realize this was a lot to throw at you in one blog post, and only my second one at that, so I’ll stop here in the interest of not losing your readership forever due to writing an overly long post. I do hope what I’ve written provides good food for thought, and that you’ll reconsider how lucky you are to live the life you do. Also please don’t forget to thank the people who made that possible for you. Gratitude is something I hold dear to my heart because it has magical a way of bringing joy and meaning to life.
Until next time,
Emily