Chapter 19: CET 4 and the Computer


    Trantor: May Wiggins Editor: Efydatia


    Qin Guan and Cong Nianwei went out and got on a bus. Qin Guan felt much more rxed in his own clothes. He decided to get off at Xizhimen and have some hand-pulled noodles with Cong Nianwei.


    Soon, they arrived at a noodle restaurant. When their noodles were served, Cong Nianweiughed at Qin Guan, “You made quite a fortune today. Noodles! Is this your treat?”


    Qin Guan was really hungry, because he had not eaten much at lunch. As he was swallowing his noodles, he told Cong Nianwei, “Give it a shot. They’re yummy. They taste like the noodles at the restaurant near our high school.”


    Qin Guan had obviously not gotten her meaning. At the time, even the author had started to worry about his EQ. No wonder he had not officially be Cong Nianwei’s boyfriend.


    Cong Nianwei thought Qin Guan was both cute and silly. She picked up some noodles and found that they were truly yummy.


    The humble noodle restaurant located between used cell phone stores was inconspicuous. Despite its messy surroundings though, there were still no empty seats inside. The owner had set a table outside, but if that was also upied, customers had to squat down and eat on the sidewalk. Some customers rode a bicycle there while others drove a car. Old customers would even get off their BMWs for a bowl of hand-pulled noodles, and squat down and eat by the roadside.


    The noodles there were simple and coarse, but their taste was unforgettable. Qin Guan and Cong Nianwei stopped talking and emptied their bowls quickly. Putting down the bowls, they looked at each other andughed out loud.


    Qin Guan paid 10 yuan for the two bowls. It was cheap, but he and Cong Nianwei were fully satisfied. He saw off Cong Nianwei at the Xizhimen station, regretting that he had not gotten the chance to hold her hand.


    Qin Guan was upset. He had been courting Cong Nianwei for almost a year now, but he had not won over her heart yet. Cong Nianwei would blow him off without a second thought. What was so wrong with him?


    If Cong Nianwei had known what Qin Guan was thinking, she would have despised him. Ever since he hade to college, he had hardly ever called her. He even had a part-time job on the weekends. What irritated her more, was that Qin Guan had forgotten to officially confess his love for her. A girl would have to be a fool to say yes to him.


    The life of a sloppy guy was always a hard one.


    After his date, Qin Guan went to Huang Jiajia’s home. It urred to him that he might have pissed off the little girl earlier in the afternoon.


    He went into the house nervously, but to his surprise, he found that Huang Jiajia was quite well-behaved. She studied harder than ever and voluntarily asked Qin Guan to give her more assignments so she could exercise every day.


    Qin Guan was still puzzled when he went back to campus. Huang Jiajia had behaved so well that he found it hard to adapt to the change. She had neither made fun of Qin Guan, nor moved purposely closer to him. It seemed like she had totally changed.


    Of course, a rough guy like Qin Guan had soon forgotten all about it, but Huang Jiajia had gone through quite an interesting transformation.


    She was actually at home right that moment, throwing away her clothes. She wrapped all her fashionable clothes in a coverlet and gave them to her mother, telling her that she could either donate them or give them to others as gifts. Either way, she would never wear those clothes again.


    From that day on, Huang Jiajia decided to be a good girl. She had seen Cong Nianwei and how charmed Qin Guan had been by her.


    Huang Jiajia was both upset and sad. She did not know why, but she knew Mr. Qin loved Cong Nianwei. He would never love a girl like her.


    She was determined to change, though. She was still in her second year of high school, so it was not toote for her. She would study really hard and get epted into CUFE, where Qin Guan was studying. She would never wear makeup or dress up again. She wanted to be aely girl like Cong Nianwei.


    “When I get epted into CUFE, I’ll be closer to Mr. Qin than she is. I’m younger than her, so I can to wait for him toe back to me.”


    That poor little thing, with her full lips and enchanting eyes... Her style was the total opposite of Cong Nianwei.


    Huang Jiajia was desperate. She only wanted to get closer to Mr. Qin.


    Huang Jiajia’s mother noticed that her little girl had given up those hideous clothes. She had also stopped dying her hair and wearing makeup. Instead, she was studying hard every day. Her mother felt both d and relieved.


    “Should I give a bonus to Mr. Qin? He did teach her well after all. Jiajia has stopped idling about. Even more surprisingly, she has started studying hard.”


    Time flied. Qin Guan was leading a busy life, so a month passed by quickly. Before he knew it, it was already mid-November.


    His life had gotten more regr now. He had finished his two part-time jobs at the exhibition and done some odd jobs as a promoter. His tutoring schedule was as regr as it had been, but Qin Guan did not allow himself to waste any time. During the day, he had sses and recited English words. He could recite the full vocabry of College English Test Band 4 (CET 4) from A to Z, and had already started to recite the vocabry for CET 6.


    Qin Guan’s roommates wanted to sit CET 4 as early as possible. ording to Qin Guan’s experience, this was the best time for them to take the test. Therefore, all the boys in his dorm followed him in reciting English words.


    CET 4 was in mid-December, so Qin Guan and his roommates submitted their applications in advance.


    As a matter of fact, universities did not encourage students to sit the test in advance, because their passing grade was never satisfying. Qin Guan and his roommates were all top students in their sses, though.


    No one studied as hard as top students in their first year of college. Ye Dong, the oldest boy in the dorm, had been studying hard in order to get elected as a member of the Students’ Union, so he had never missed a ss.


    Qin Guan was both a top student and an enthusiastic reader. He went to every lecture and read a lot after ss. Liu Xiaoyang had a high IQ, and Wang Lei studied harder than everyone.


    As for Mu Lejiang and Li Jie, they maintained a good bnce between studying and fun. They had never missed any of their sses in favor of having some leisure time.


    Qin Guan thought that if he hadn’t been reborn, he’d never have been able to catch up with the boys in his dorm.


    When the boys had sessfullypleted their registration for CET 4, even their teachers had showed their approval.


    On November 15, 1998, it was raining lightly. The breaking news in Qin Guan’s dorm was that the six boys had carried in aputer. They all had chipped in and bought aputer from Zhongguancun.


    Qin Guan had tried to stop the boys, but he had failed. Liu Xiaoyang had heard that Inte would soon be avable in their dorm. For a gamer like Liu Xiaoyang, going to an Inte cafe on campus was too much trouble, so he had pestered everyone to buy aputer. He had paid the most because he was rich, but his roommates had also chipped in some money so they could use theputer to do research online.


    When it came toputers, Qin Guan could not stop Liu Xiaoyang’s craze. The young boy did not want to buy a popr brand either. Instead, he bought the most expensive one with the best gaming keyboard. There was even an extra memory bank in it.


    Qin Guan really wanted to tell Liu Xiaoyang, “Thisputer will be outdated in a year. A memory bank’s capacity is only 64 MB now. Do you know how fastputers are developing? By that time, you’ll hate yourself.”


    Liu Xiaoyang did not care about that, though. After several rounds of selecting, he finally picked aputer that cost more than 9,000 yuan. Liu Xiaoyang paid the 9,000 and the other boys shared the rest of the cost. Liu Xiaoyang was still quite satisfied.


    “Look at the mouse pad! It’s limited edition!”


    “Please, man. The shop owner gave it to you as a gift and told you it was limited edition. How could you even buy that?”


    “Look at theptop bag. It’s free!”


    “Gee, you bought a desktop! The shop owner just gave you aptop bag so you would buy aptop in the future!”


    Ignoring Qin Guan’s facial expressions, the boys excitedly carried theputer to their dorm and installed it together.