Before the Anti-Japanese War, China’s university admissions examinations were conducted by each school on its own.
Starting in 1938, the Ministry of Education of the Republic of China conducted unified enrollment. The country was divided into 15 enrollment areas, and the main examination areas were in the west. After all, most of the land in the east had been occupied. The provincial examination agencies can recommend outstanding high school graduates, and these people do not need to participate
Examination, but the number of recommended students shall not exceed 10% of the total number of admitted students.
Admission tickets are issued at the end of June every year, the exam starts in early July, and you can get your admission notice in August.
Wang Zengqi, known as "China's last scholar-bureaucrat" and "the last Beijing-style litterateur", had to take a boat from Shanghai to Hong Kong, then take a boat from Hong Kong to Vietnam, and then go overland from Vietnam in order to take the Southwest Associated University exam.
To Kunming.
In order to ensure that he took the exam on time, Wang Zengqi came to Kunming more than half a month in advance. He sneaked into the student dormitory and lived there for several days. He went to class and ate in the cafeteria with the college students every day, but no abnormality was discovered from beginning to end.
Today, Wang Zengqi happened to meet Zhou Hexuan, who offered to treat everyone to eat pork. Forty years later, he wrote in an article titled "Zhou Mingcheng and Southwest Associated University":
"Southwestern Associated University has five colleges: liberal arts, science, law, engineering and normal school. The liberal arts college, law school and science college are in the northwest corner of Kunming. The engineering college and normal college live in the city and west of Kunming respectively. I came to
On the fifth day of Southwest Associated University, we encountered a grand event that was later talked about by alumni - Zhou Mingcheng's Pig Killing Banquet."
"At that time, teachers and students from the School of Engineering received the news and traveled through most of Kunming to attend the banquet. When it was getting dark, everyone lit torches and walked through the streets, making the Kunming police feel like they were facing a formidable enemy, thinking that the students
We are going to engage in sports. The Normal College is closer to the school headquarters. They sang "March of the Broadsword", but changed the lyrics to "Cut the heads of the fat pigs with the big knife", which is quite a bit like "Aspirations to Eat Hungry Hulu"
Flesh's generous blood."
"The reason why I traveled thousands of miles to apply for the Southwest Associated University was mainly because there were Mr. Wen Yiduo, Mr. Zhu Ziqing, and Mr. Shen Congwen. What surprised me was that before I even took the entrance exam, I met the world-famous Zhou Hexuan
Sir, what he brought this time was not novels or historical works, but ten big fat pigs and boxes after boxes of cigarettes."
"Cigarettes are wartime controlled materials. You only need to have money to buy a few packs, but it is more difficult to buy in large quantities and they are high-quality cigarettes. Later I heard someone say that Mr. Zhou asked the bodyguard to hold his handwritten letter,
I went to find Long Shengzeng (Long Yun’s third son), and those fat pigs and cigarettes were urgently dispatched by the third son Long.”
"There is a story behind these cigarettes. When Mr. Zhou first arrived in Kunming, he was looking for directions and happened to meet Professor Huang Ziqing, a physical chemist. Professor Huang used his own money to conduct experiments for students. He was too poor to even buy cigarettes and was selling cigarettes at a hawker.
After wandering around for a long time, I reluctantly bought two cigarettes and smoked them on the spot."
"It is said that Mr. Zhou was moved to tears at the time. When he ran to the police, he heard that many professors had stopped smoking, so he asked the bodyguard to buy good cigarettes. The most violent smoker at that time was not Mr. Huang Ziqing, but Mr. Hua Luogeng.
He was eating meat and smoking at the same time. He didn't finish the meat but ended up smoking and got drunk. He fell to the ground and fell asleep."
"That night, bonfires were lit in the open space next to the school building. The teachers and students were very excited after eating pork and started singing and dancing around the fire. Since instruments were hard to find, Mr. Tang Yongtong, the head of the Department of Philosophy, used a basin as a drum. Professor Wu Dayou and his wife Ruan Guanshi
Mr. Zhou played the bowl to accompany him, and Mr. Zhou sang the song "Swan Goose" at the encouragement of teachers and students. Mr. Wen Yiduo's poems have musical beauty, but his singing is really difficult to listen to, and his singing is always out of tune..."
"The pig-killing banquet held by Mr. Zhou excited the mood of all the teachers and students in the school. The news that he was going to open a scientific chicken farm in Kunming also spread quickly. The teachers and students were looking forward to it very much. Professors from the School of Engineering took the students there spontaneously
We helped build the factory, and teachers and students from other colleges also helped dig up earthworms. Even before the chicken farm was built, there were already several pools of earthworms raised, and the students are all experts at raising earthworms."
"Mr. Zhou's chicken farm has indeed brought benefits to teachers and students. There are scrambled eggs for two meals a week in the student cafeteria, and there is crystal clear egg soup for each meal. We call these eggs 'Mingcheng Eggs'
.Eggs are also a subsidy material given to teachers by the school. Based on the number of people in the family, each teacher can receive five eggs per week to improve their meals."
"This situation took a turn for the worse in 1943. Due to tight school funds and rising prices, all the eggs the teachers received were exchanged for money at the vegetable market."
"No one is willing to eat it because life is too difficult. Once, classmate Hu Dingbang saw Professor Wu Han walking around with a vegetable basket in the morning market. He thought he was carefully selecting good vegetables. Only when he got closer did he realize that he was carrying a vegetable basket.
Walk around the market looking for cheap food.”
"Because they didn't have enough to eat, Jin Yuelin, Zhu Ziqing and other gentlemen formed a vegetable planting group. They recommended botanist Professor Li Jitong to be the leader of the vegetable planting group, and Mr. Shen Tong, a lecturer in the Department of Biology, to be the vegetable planting assistant. All the professors watered the vegetables together.
Fertilize and share the harvest together.”
"Professor Zhu Ziqing suffered from serious stomach problems due to being hungry. Once he had dysentery and insisted on grading homework all night. There was a toilet next to his desk. He corrected the composition all night and took it more than 30 times. The next day he was still
I looked exhausted and went to class as usual without washing my face."
"Compared to liberal arts professors, science and engineering professors have more unique skills. They can use crude machinery and raw materials to make homemade soap, ink, alcohol and other products for sale. We often say that if you learn mathematics, physics and chemistry well, you will not be afraid of traveling around the world. At that time
It’s really like that.”
"We students also had a hard time. Those who were able to go to college during the Republic of China were basically born into affluent families. In the past, for many children from rich families, the girls took their mothers to class, and the boys asked the concierge to run errands. But in Yunnan, you have to do everything by yourself and wash your own clothes.
They sewed and mended their own clothes, and changed their torn shirts into vests. At that time, it was most popular for students to wear old clothes sent by welfare organizations such as the Red Cross. Union students wore these clothes on the streets, just like beggars, and even robbed them.
The prisoners didn’t even bother to take a look.”
"But compared to teachers, at least we students don't have to worry about money. Tuition, food and dormitory fees are all free, and we can also receive a monthly loan of 8 yuan, which we can use to purchase study and daily necessities.
Until one day, we discovered that eight yuan was not enough to buy a bottle of ink - prices had increased 200 times from 1937 to 1943, and had increased to more than 2,000 times in 1944. How could the teachers' salaries be enough to support their families? We had to pay weekly
My husband’s eggs are converted into money to buy whole grains to eat.”
"I remember that it was at the end of 1943 that Mr. Zhou shipped 3,500 sets of cotton shoes and clothes from Chongqing, and purchased more than ten truckloads of supplies in Kunming. That winter, all the teachers and students wore new clothes, and they also had new clothes for the New Year.
Eat meat. I heard that Mr. Zhou has donated a large amount of materials to schools that have moved in, such as Southwest Associated University, Central University, Jinling University, etc. It is difficult to calculate the money spent. We usually jokingly call Mr. Zhou the 'food and clothing parent'. There is also some love
Just kidding, classmates, every time they see a truck delivering supplies, they shout loudly: Our dad is bringing food and clothing again..."