A Story of a Repairman

He is a repairman.

I can’t tell his precise age but he should be in his forties as he once told me that his son was in high school. This is the only clue to his age, for he looks in his fifties with hair threatening to break out all over the face, which is always dotted with black spots, cheekbones prominent and cheeks sunken. He wears a smile on his face when he is not busy with repairing bikes and talks with others who now and then sit down in his deck chair, the one he uses to take a rest when there is nobody finding him for repairing his bike. But most of the time, it is empty so Jack or Tom or Harry whoever he knows or not would come and sit down in it for a chitchat.

When I go to work, he is there in the corner; when I’m on the way home, he is there in the corner; when I go out for a walk, he is there in the corner; when I go to grocery, he is there in the corner; when I go to supermarket, he is there in the corner, busy with repairing one or two bikes. On few occasions, I can see him lying in his deck chair, half awake and half asleep, with his legs stretching and his hands put behind his head. He seems too exhausted.

His family name became known to me in an accidental occasion where someone who came to find help with his bike called him Master Ma, since when I got to know his family name but I never found any chance to know his name. It seemed unnecessary. I really asked him for help with my bike once or twice, but it does not mean that I need to know more about him.

Gradually we get to know and become familiar with each other and he seems to like to tell me something about his family when I take a seat in his deck chair. But I seemingly take no interest in it and rarely respond to him and just listen. He doesn’t mind it, at least I think so.

On an autumn cool morning, I was free and unoccupied. I went out for a walk. When I saw his deck chair empty, I stopped and greeted him with a “Hi!” and then lay down. He gave me a smile and resumed his job to repair the bike of a lady who was standing by. But quickly he triggered  a conversation with me. He, in a peaceful tone, told me his story of finding a man in power for help with his daughter having a chance to receive senior high school education in a local time-honoured school. As a teacher myself, I know this school very well. And I knew there were many cases in which students who didn’t pass the examination for the school found chances to go to this school for education by spending some extra money.

Minqiners attach so much importance to education that they are willing to spend money on the chance that their son or daughter should get to go to a better senior high school for education. He is no exceptional.

As his daughter, unfortunately, did not pass the examination for the better school, he needed to spend a big sum of money for that. He was poor, to be sure. However, he would make every effort to achiever his goal: his daughter should go to the better school for education. He asked this man and that man and finally a man in power promised to help him only if he was willing to spend money. He was glad, even excited because he was poor and in low social status and it was not easy for him to find such a man who promised to help him with such an important thing.

He collected money by borrowing from this relative and that friend and at last he got 10,000 Yuan RMB for that. He gave this sum of money to the man and waited and waited for the good news that his daughter was enrolled into this better school.

Yeah, he got his good news, he got his good news by spending this sum of money. When he got the good news, he smiled from ear to ear. He felt relieved, seemingly accomplishing a big cause.

Yeah, all these things he told me in a peaceful tone. He accepted it as if it were his fate, his destiny.

I know, in China, parents are prepared to pay any price for their son or daughter to go to a famous school for a possible better education, but I still felt a little shocked to know that a repairman like him should have spent 10,000 Yuan RMB for that. He may have to work toil and moil for a whole year to make such a sum of money without eating and drinking.

致歉：我用編輯器編輯了這篇文章，系統(tǒng)卻提示不夠300字不能發(fā)布。只好改為現(xiàn)在這種形式。悲催！