'If you pass, I will die with you'

(Baonghean.vn) - The saying is half humorous, half contains a reality of mountain youth after leaving high school...

Fifteen years ago I took the university entrance exam.

Before the departure day, my parents prepared everything: sticky rice, chicken, clothes, and sold me a 500kg pig to pay for the travel expenses from the mountains to the provincial capital and then took the bus to Hue to take the exam.

That year I failed the exam. My parents and relatives encouraged me not to give up. I would take the exam again the following year. I would take the exam to get into university, then my future would be bright. At that time I was a good boy, only knowing how to study and listen to my parents. At that time, all my friends and I thought that going to university was the brightest path for young people in the highlands.

15 years later it was my cousin's turn to take the exam.

Before leaving, my uncle told his daughter: "If you pass, I will die with you. If you don't pass, you will die with me."

The sentence my uncle said has become familiar to me in recent exam seasons when entering university is no longer a “big deal” like in our time. The sentence is half humorous, half contains a reality of the youth in the mountainous region after leaving high school. Especially for girls.

A combined class at Tri Le School, Que Phong, Nghe An

For a long time, in the mountainous region of my hometown, young people leaving high school had only two thoughts: passing the university entrance exam would have a more secure future. Or at least choosing a certain profession, and only farming as a last resort. Usually, adults still want their children to study to become doctors, teachers, police, soldiers, border guards. If not, they must be commune officials. In short, they must work for the government.

Young people nowadays are a little more open-minded, but when their children go to take exams, their parents are always worried. They worry about how to have enough money for their children to take the exam, and if their children pass, they will be “half dead”. Surely, after finishing a course, each parent becomes a debtor to the Social Policy Bank and even has to borrow from siblings and relatives.

However, unemployed students in the mountainous areas are also rampant. Even students recruited by the government to train local cadres are left at home waiting for jobs after graduation.

If they fail the exam, the future of the young men seems clearer. Fathers like my uncle have painted a clear and somewhat naked vision for young girls. If they fail the exam, they will stay at home for a few years, cultivate the fields, plant forests, and marry off whoever they like. That's it. Girls who don't want to settle down yet can go to the commune to apply to industrial parks in Binh Duong, Thai Nguyen, or Bac Ninh to work as workers. The same goes for boys, after exam season, they flock to industrial parks.

Like their peers in the lowlands, after each exam season, the young people in the highlands really enter the world. Each person is forced to choose their own "baggage". Many times, the university gate is just a dream of a seemingly leisurely future. But the young people in the highlands and even the parents in the village have realized the reality: There are countless unemployed university graduates.

However, like my uncle, many parents in the highlands still have to "happily" let their children take exams and go to school even though they do not know what the future holds. They indulge their children's dreams. They are afraid that if they do not take care of their children's education, how will they blame them? Even if their children pass the exams, they will "die half-dead". Raising children to study is already hard work, but after graduating, they cannot find a job, and they have to apply to industrial zones, which is a waste of both time and money.

For people in the highlands, the university gate is no longer as “lofty” as the school-age poem of ours. When university education has been socialized, it is easier to get into school than before. However, the hardships of both students and parents remain the same. Even though the examination mechanism changes every year.

The university gate has opened wide, but the footsteps going down the mountain to take the exam these days are more cautious. The mountain boys and girls nowadays are not as eager for the university gate as we were 15 years ago.

You Wei