50s: Starting with a storage ring

Chapter 193 Departure
The 73rd year is an important year, and many famous people were born this year:

In January, Guo Degang was born in Tianjin, in February, Deng Yaping was born in Shangdu, in March, Ren Quan was born in Northeast China, and Adu was born in Singapore.

Picture: Guess who they are?

In Beijing, in early March, Sun Zhiwei bid farewell to Tong Jiajia and his two children and began to study English in isolation at a language institute.

As soon as he arrived at the college, someone came to ask him to fill out a "Registration Form for Studying Abroad" in triplicate.

While filling out the registration form, each unit must also handle the political review and overseas approval procedures for the selected candidates in accordance with the (72) Science and Education No. 088 document.

Sun Zhiwei was lucky because their kindergarten was a directly affiliated unit and was directly reviewed by the higher-ups. Students coming from other places had to go through layers of approval, which was much more cumbersome.

After that, it was time to start school. Sun Zhiwei was in a language training class, and there were students who didn't speak English at all. He had to start learning from scratch, which was very difficult.

So, after the semester started, we took exams and were then divided into fast and slow classes. We studied tirelessly, practicing English listening and conversation while waiting for the results of our contact with the host institution in the UK.

These courses were too easy for Shen Zhiwei. After just one week, several teachers felt that he had passed them.

However, although he was the first to complete the English training for selected personnel, he was still not allowed to move freely and had to stay in the dormitory after completing the training.

This was very frustrating, so he applied to study professional English in a science and engineering class.

If English is classified by usage type, it can be divided into three categories: daily English, professional English and academic English.

There is no need to explain practical English. These overseas students are currently learning practical English.

Professional English is generally only used in specialized industries. For example, those who study law have legal English, those who study engineering machinery have mechanical English, those who study medicine have medical English, and so on.

Among the international students this time, there are 60 students majoring in science and engineering. They have all studied some professional English in college, mainly for reading foreign papers, documents and other works.

This is exactly the knowledge that Sun Zhiwei lacks in English.

Academic English is generally used by graduate students, professors, and above in their studies and research. It has a narrower scope of application but is more prestigious.

It is more professional than professional English, and there are currently no teachers in China who can teach this kind of English.

At this time, the language school already had foreign teachers, all of whom were hired in recent years.

Their treatment is comparable to that of teachers abroad, and they are paid in valuable foreign exchange. Domestic teachers cannot compare at all.

However, learning English with these foreign teachers is very effective, especially learning listening and speaking in daily English.

Because they are foreigners, they can simulate various situations that may occur abroad, and the students can also get real feedback.

This is much more efficient than Chinese teachers teaching Chinese students.

This continued until June, when a few more science and engineering students finally passed. Seeing this situation, the higher-ups no longer expected this group of students to depart at the same time.

At the end of June, the first list of dispatched personnel was announced, with a total of only 6 people.

They are Sun Manyi and Wu Zuze from the Academy of Military Medical Sciences, Zhang Shize from the Department of Thoracic Surgery of Huangpu Ruijin Hospital, Shen Xun from the Institute of Biophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Sun Zhiwei.

This round of studying in the UK was made possible by repeated invitations from the British side. I only needed to pay for the air tickets in China, and all expenses would be covered by the British side once I got there.

This reduces a lot of trouble for their departure. Otherwise, just approving the foreign exchange fees would be a difficult problem. According to historical records, our foreign exchange reserves have been particularly tight in recent years, especially this year, when domestic foreign exchange reserves were actually negative and will return to zero next year.

After Sun Zhiwei and the other four confirmed the itinerary, they began the subsequent preparations, mainly purchasing equipment and ideological studies.

At that time, the clothing expenses for people sent abroad on government missions were 600 yuan, which is quite considerable compared to the current average salary.

The clothes were made by a company in Huangpu City that specializes in exporting clothing. The money was mainly used to purchase a suit, a Zhongshan suit and a woolen coat.

In terms of ideological learning, Sun Zhiwei also made the fastest progress. Who asked him to memorize everything he needed to memorize? Many teachers did not remember as comprehensively as he did.

They waited for more than half a month. On the 21st, British Ambassador Sir John Addis personally hosted a banquet at the embassy for the five "visiting scholars" who came to the UK.

Speaking of the term "visiting scholar", we didn't understand it at first and suffered a lot of losses.

Our embassy initially called them "trainees", and used the term "teacher-student" when speaking to the professors of the other side.

This means that we need to bear a lot of self-care expenses when studying, such as laboratory usage fees, consumables fees, etc.

The cost is very high and cannot be afforded in China.

In fact, at that time, each university had relevant subsidies to cover these expenses, but only for visiting scholars.

Later, after being reminded by overseas Chinese, we changed our address and the relationship between us and the other professors changed from teacher-student to colleague, which allowed us to reduce and waive all fees.

On the 22nd, before leaving, Sun Zhiwei finally got a three-day vacation to say goodbye to his family.

He was just about to go back to prepare some supplies that he needed to carry with him.

He didn't plan to bring much food, just some emergency food, mainly chocolate and candy.

Only bring two sets of clothes and leather shoes for when you need to disguise yourself. If they are not enough, get them locally.

As weapons, he brought a few Big Black Stars and some explosive packs, one for single combat and one for multi-combat. If more weapons were needed, he would also obtain them locally.

Then bring two first aid kits, some miscellaneous items like flashlights, gas masks, respirators, raincoats, rubber shoes, etc.

Finally, there are ham, white wine, cigarettes and coffee beans that may be used as gifts.

As for money, he only had 5000 US dollars and large and small yellow croakers seized in his early years. He always carried these with him, so he didn't need to sort them out again. He still carried them with him in the space.

He rested at home for two days and only went to say goodbye to his relatives and friends on the last day.

On July 7, Sun Zhiwei returned to school with some personal clothes prepared for him by Tong Jiajia, including underwear, socks, white shirts, etc.

They officially set off on the 26th. Because my country did not have any flights to Europe at that time, the five of them had to take a Pakistan Airlines flight, stopping in Karachi, Cairo, and Rome before heading to London.

After lunch, they took a special car to the airport. The five of them wore uniform suits, carried their own suitcases, and waited at the airport to board the plane.

At this time, the comrade in charge of foreign affairs in the science and education group called them aside and gave them two one-pound notes.

(End of this chapter)