Students encouraged to leave parents behind_美文

Students encouraged to leave parents behind

During the past decade, more urban Chinese families are accompanying freshmen to college, which in Chinese is called the "army sending off the child".

The price of plane tickets to big cities, where universities are concentrated, rises each autumn. Hotels and hostels are filled with joyful parents.

Peng Bin, a former student at Beijing Normal University, was sent by her mom to the capital in her first year of college life.

The 27-year-old Guizhou native sees it as an expression of love from her parents, saying that she accepts the way her parents provide for her.

She said that her mom looked on it as a chance for a vacation.

"It doesn't mean that I need help from my parents, nor that I couldn't carry the luggage, but I just want them to share my joy of being a college student."

However, she disagreed with taking it to the extreme.

"My roommate was accompanied by four of her family members and it was a little too much," she added.

There were also some students who wished to be independent from the start.

Wang Hao, a Beijing native also a former Tsinghua student, recalled that he fled from his parents' car and pulled out all the luggage on his own.

"They dropped me off and left," he said, adding that it is more comfortable to make new friends and learn about college without mom and dad.

About the broadcaster:

Rosie Tuck is a copy editor at the China Daily website. She was born in New Zealand and graduated from Auckland University of Technology with a Bachelor of Communications studies majoring in journalism and television. In New Zealand she was working as a junior reporter for the New Zealand state broadcaster TVNZ. She is in Beijing on an Asia New Zealand Foundation grant, working as a journalist in the English news department at the China Daily website.