It seems she went to a military school after all

The current daily life of Jinlin involves getting up at 5 AM, walking long marches in military uniform, tough physical exercise, practicing martial arts in formation, training use of hand weapons, singing soldier songs and listening to lectures on military tactics. The heavy program continues to late night every day before she can fall to her bed exhausted.

But wait! Wasn't Jinlin supposed to have just started to study interior design in the Shanghai Academy of Arts? Indeed. But it turns out that first year university students everywhere in China are required to participate in one month long military training. The training is arranged by the university at the university and takes place usually in September immediately after the term starts. The teachers are actual soldiers and officers from the active Chinese army.

I had no idea of this weird tradition beforehand and certainly Jinlin had not mentioned it in any of our earlier chats. I had just started wondering why it was taking so long time for her to reply to my messages when she wrote:

I am very busy, I participate in the school's military training.
All of our students in universities will have military training.
This is very tiring, consume me a lot of physical strength. But exercise and my will, I strive.
School classes begin in the 25th September.
Now only military training, every day of the week, from morning to night

Of course I had to try to cheer her up, telling about my own nine-month compulsory military training in Finland. And:

- Well, you will have big muscles, when we hug next time ;-)  

- Ha ha. I am about to start training

I've been now reading more about this weird system of boot-camps mandated by the Chinese Communist Party. Jinlin will be joining over 6 million other new students as potential members for the already massive (largest in the world) and well-armed (including nuclear) Chinese military machine. I don't much like this thought. Even less attractive is the realization that these massive training operations are mainly a brain-washing tool for the ruling Communist Party to encourage patriotism (under the party rule) and banish any disobedience or requests for democracy and free speech. The training program was started in Beijing after the 1989 student protests at Tiananmen Square. The training first included only Beijing University, the focal point of the democracy protest movement, but later expanded to the whole country when its usefulness as tool for suppressing criticism become clear. So when other countries are trying to modernize their education systems to encourage critical thinking, China is marching to the other direction.

The training will have it climax in final parade where all classes march across the training ground and various martial art and singing performances follow. After the training tests are held on military practice and theory and if a student fails the test, she can be denied the right to start her regular studies in the university. On a lighter side, the training has so much outdoor exercise that older students joke that first-years can be easily spotted from their darker tanned skin. The point here is that in China the beauty ideal is fair skin and tanning is definitely a no-no, especially for women (Jinlin complained about her getting tanned already on our travel in Yunnan although I tried to tell her that her bronze skin looks great).

So, our video-chats are definitely on hold again for few weeks. No computers are allowed in dorms before the end of the training and cell-phones can be used only for short time in beginning and end of the day. But meanwhile Jinlin will get good physical exercise and a bonding experience with her fellow students and new friends. I try to focus on those positive thoughts and meanwhile continue to write more about our history and experiences together.