Separate lives

"The problem between me and my father, no one or two words can say it clearly.

"You have no idea how he forced me to study," Su Xiaomei says. "I still remember the first semester in my middle school. He forced me to do the exam papers until 2 o'clock in the morning every day, and I had to get up at 5 in the morning to practice soccer. I was just a child, but I only had three hours' sleep a day."

Now they are in the same college. Xiaomei has made her father promise her that during these four years, as long as she does not do anything bad, he must not interfere in her private life.

"A father and daughter need distance. I would go crazy if he stayed with me 24 hours every day."

Although she says she does not understand her father, Xiaomei still knows her father loves her a lot.

"Even one day when I grow up and get married, I will still be his baby daughter. I know he has done everything for my own good, but I just can't accept the way he's doing it."

After her father promised he would no longer control her private life, Xiaomei says she feels so much happier. "Now I know what is called freedom and hope."

A passion for study

Su lost his father when he was 12 years old, and he and his two sisters were brought up by his mother. Poor as his family was, there was no preventing his strong desire to study. However, during the busy farming periods, he would have to ask for leave from school to help out on the family's farm. To catch up he sold foodstuff to get money for tuition. "At that time, there was no ambition except to put an end to my farm work," he says.

In 1989, he took the university entrance examination in his hometown, scoring 495 points, which was 10 points lower than the enrollment mark for Hubei province, though much higher than the passing marks of many other regions.