[GirlySports]

you're invited to exercise creativity and submit your own snappy answers to actual questions from the Chinese exam.

WRITE A BRIEF, 400 WORD ESSAY ON ANY OF THE FOLLOWING

[National Test 1]
I was helping my family with some farming work during a weekend and the field was very muddy due to the rains. I was carrying a lot of equipment on my shoulders and was afraid of falling over. My legs were shaking. My mom spotted it and told me to take off my shirt and shoes and try again. It was much easier. Eventually I brought the stuff to mom and she said, “It’s not that you can’t do it – you were too worried about getting your shirt dirty. By taking them off, you got rid of the unnecessary concerns.”


[National Test 2]
A painter was asked to repaint a boat; he also fixed a hole on the boat although he wasn’t asked to. Several days later, the owner sent a large sum of money to the painter. “I was paid already,” the painter said. “This is for fixing the hole,” the owner of the boat said. “It was just convenient,” the painter replied. “When my children went out to sail, I thought they weren’t going to come back. But now they did. I should thank you for it.”


[Beijing]
Old Ji is a railway security man and he works on a mountain. His job is to examine the railways to prevent the fallen stones and trees from affecting the trains. He salutes every time the train passes, and the train will honk its horn in return. What do these scenes remind of you?


[Tianjin]
Two fish are swimming in a river. The older one asks, “How’s the water?” The younger one says, “I don’t know if it’s clean or cloudy.”


[Shanghai]
For the little shining in their hearts, people often let them go because they think that shines are really individual. But then they often recognise those shines in masters’ works.


[Chongqing]
A true story from a meat-processing factory: A worker was in the cold store when the door suddenly closed. He was stuck in there, struggling, for five hours. He was dying. Suddenly, the door opened, it was the security guard of the factory. Someone asked the security guy afterwards what made him do so, since it’s not part of his daily job. “I’ve worked here for 35 years, and he’s the only guy that says ‘good morning’ and ‘see you tomorrow’ every day to me, of all the hundreds of workers here. He said good morning to me today, but I never heard the other half.”


[Guangdong]
An English historian once said, if he could choose when and where he’d like to be born, he’d choose Xinjiang, China during the 1st Century, because Buddhism, Indian, Persian, Greek and Chinese culture came across each other then and there. Mr.s Curie wrote to her niece that, “You told me you wished to live in a century ago; another girl said she’d definitely prefer in the future. I think whatever age we live in, there’s a way to live meaningfully and interestingly.”


[Shandong]
A quote from Sun Yat-sen:
“My generation should take the reform and development of China as our responsibility. This faith should last till the end of the world. We shouldn’t be frustrated by failures or overcome by the difficulties. We should focus and step forward so as to catch up with the global progressing trend. Goodness shall accumulate and evilness shall eliminate and one day, we shall succeed.”


[Jiangsu]
Worry and love.


[Jiangxi]
Don’t think about what you don’t have. Think about what you do have.


[Hubei]
Various communications methods are being developed: email, SMS, etc. Do you think the letter is replaceable?


[Sichuan]
Talk about water.


[Anhui]
For several months, a sign was left on a ladder at a construction spot: “Notice: Ladder.” One day, a guy came and changed it to “Notice: put this somewhere else when it’s not in use.”


[Fujian]
A Chinese writer, Feng Jicai, wrote:
The race in the sports is about how much time you use to finish a certain length of journey. The race in life is the opposite: it’s about how long a journey you can cover within a certain length of time.