Chongqing

"Under these circumstances, my parents decided to send me overseas. My third uncle, Mr. Zhang Sihou, was then a professor at Northeastern University in Boston, and he chose for me to apply to Harvard University. Why choose Harvard? First, Harvard is a world-famous institution; second, Harvard is in Boston, and my third uncle could look after me nearby. But Boston also had another world-famous school, one that specialized in science and engineering: the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Why, after my father had clearly told my third uncle that I was going to study science and engineering, did my third uncle still not choose MIT for me? About this, I later asked my third uncle. He smiled and said, “The you I knew was the you at Nankai in Chongqing, when you loved the humanities. Later I heard you wanted to study business. It wasn’t until you got to Hong Kong that I heard you wanted to study science and engineering. I thought you should have time to gradually establish your own interests. Rather than rush you into the very specialized MIT, it would be better to let you have a buffer period at Harvard. Besides, Harvard’s science and engineering are also top-notch—it’s just not as specialized as MIT.”"

"My mother decided to let me attend Nankai’s summer class: on the one hand I could review my schoolwork, and on the other hand there was also the chance of doing well and being recommended. Nankai’s rule was that all students had to live on campus. This was based on practical considerations: although Shapingba was only twenty or thirty kilometers from Chongqing, transportation was inconvenient at the time, and commuting was impossible for the vast majority of students. But setting practical considerations aside, requiring students to live on campus was actually a very good educational policy. In my experience, the periods when I learned the fastest, felt the happiest, and made the most good friends were all periods when I lived in the school dormitory."

"Over the past several decades of life, I have already traveled a million miles, but no matter how comfortable or even luxurious travel in recent years has been, the journey I miss the most, the one that has the greatest meaning for me, and the one that left the deepest impression in my mind, is still the trek from Shanghai to Chongqing when I was eleven."

"Before I turned eighteen, I had already fled disaster three times, lived in six cities (Ningbo, Nanjing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Chongqing, Shanghai), and changed schools ten times. I had experienced gunfire (Hong Kong) and bombings (Guangzhou, Chongqing), and crossed battle lines (from Shanghai to Chongqing). I had a carefree childhood (Hong Kong), and also tasted the impassioned life of a middle school student during the War of Resistance (Chongqing); still more, I tasted the sorrow of leaving home and country, not knowing when I would return (from Hong Kong to the United States)."