The summer of the year 2008 was full of both amusements and anxieties. I knew that I had been deceived by ZTE but I couldn't do anything to change the result. The study in the final semester of university was rather relaxed, as we only needed to finish the final project, which everyone would be able to pass, whereas we couldn't get the highest rank no matter how well we did, as the highest rank had to be given to those who would continue to study postgraduate studies at the same university, which was a ridiculous policy. Games, dinings, parties, and various farewell activities had fulfilled the life of a student at this time. I was not sure when I would be able to meet those who lived with me in the same room for four years once we departed from the campus.
The time in ZTE passed quickly, as every day I would be heavily engaged in the training organized by the company for fresh graduates. I didn't realize the days would be that hard to spend after I quit the job.
I missed the many nights I chatted with roommates on bed until falling asleep. We shared many experiences in life. While they were jealous of my family background as I had a grandma living in Australia and they sometimes said I would go to Australia sooner or later, I was in my deep mind jealous of those who grew up in the countryside. In my blurred memory, I had longed for the natural world since my family moved to the urban area from a rural village when I was still a toddler. Chen Chao said his hometown was surrounded by mountains and there was a river that many students had to swim across to go to school, which sounded like the most romantic style of life to me. Many a time I urged Liu Zhengqiang to ring the phone number of the dormitory opposite to ours, only to get some excitements when hearing someone from Room 317 get up to answer the phone while the call suddenly stopped. Most of the time, Mo Can was silent. But suddenly he would utter one to two wonderful ideas that impressed others to remind us for his existence.
I missed the many days we went to classrooms together, we went to library together, we mischievously peed in the bush on the river bank together after dining out, we fought with each other with snow balls in winter, and we played in the swimming pool together in summer when Zhang Dehao pushed me to the pool unexpectedly only envying I could swim. They didn't believe I could speak Cantonese simply because I had been seldomly interested in pop music from Hong Kong until one day I sang a piece of passage from a famous Cantonese opera in a KTV, which had made them startled.
In the several months after leaving Xi'an, I often thought of the old days and was eager to know how others were. It seemed that I was just on a holiday that was longer than a normal summer vacation rather than having permanently leaving Xi'an. I occasionally felt a bit regretful to leave Xi'an too early, but if I continued a postgraduate course there, many of my friends had departed and lived elsewhere.
“Are they talking about me?" I wondered. "Do they still remember me?" I wondered. "Do they know I am under huge pressures?" I didn't wonder, as I knew they weren't. They envied me for studying in Australia but they didn't understand the pressures I was suffering. They had always thought of me growing up in a very rich family, and they couldn't believe that every step I'd taken was in fact full of challenges.
One day in a forum of our university, I read an anonymous post about a fresh graduate's half year's experience in a small, non-capital city in Sichuan Province. "Is it written by Chen Chao?" I wondered. Not sure why I would think it was written by Chen Chao, as it really didn't expose the author. However I did have a feeling from the way of narrative that it must be written by my roommate Chen Chao. I was mostly impressed that the article mentioned that one of his very good friends had gone overseas, making him rather lonely. "Am I the one overseas? His very good overseas friend must be me."
Time passed fast. Several years had been passed before I had the opportunity to meet one of them. In December of 2016, more than eight years after our graduation, I met Mo Can again in Shanghai. Despite he still remembered and was concerned about me, he'd lost ideas about many topics I discussed with him, including academic life, Australia, and immigration. I had felt the distance between us, despite the Shanghai gathering was the best among all that I met my old classmates! I met a few friends from Room 317 in Hangzhou, and felt rather disappointed with the coolness.
In 2017 I returned to China to work for a year and a half. In 2018, unexpectedly I met my French roommate Zhang Dehao and my Hebei province roommate Jia Chenggang. I had to confess that there had been a wall among our minds. The wall was caused by time and physical distance. I then realized that I was even more comfortable with two of my closest Chinese friends in Australia, as at least we could understand each other's lives better.
Classmates from our dormitory room have set up a WeChat group. At first we had discussions regularly. However, as time passed, I found my mind had become more and more distant from theirs. Eventually I decided to quit, as I had been tired of arguing with them.
Friendship is always unable to fight with time and distance, no matter how close you once were!
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