Graduates heed call to help underdeveloped areas
By ZOU SHUO | China Daily | Updated: 2023-09-04 09:15
Editor's note: The government is urging educated young people to use their skills to assist the rural vitalization program. Now, large numbers are rising to the challenge. China Daily profiles three such individuals.
Living the dream in a land of heroes
Since childhood, Yu Yu has dreamed of going to China's vast western regions, home of the boundless Gobi Desert and the places where generations of heroes shed blood in the fight against invaders.
"In a boundless desert, lonely smoke rises straight. Over the endless river, the sun sinks round."
The poem from which these lines come depicts scenes from the far west during a war. It was written by Wang Wei during the Tang Dynasty (618-907), and is one of Yu's favorite pieces of verse.
The 35-year-old wants to become like the heroes who feature in poems and classic literature, having made a name for themselves in the country's western regions.
That's why he turned down offers to work as a university teacher, a government official and for big companies when he graduated from Peking University with a doctorate in international security. Instead, he decided to work in a small village in the south of the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.
When he was about to graduate in 2019, he learned that representatives of the Xinjiang government were coming to PKU to hire talented individuals, so he eagerly attended the recruitment event.
"After I heard the officials describe Xinjiang's rich history, vast landscape, immense deserts and folk culture, something clicked in my head and I knew that it was the place I wanted to go," Yu said.
"If I were to work as a university teacher, I would focus on writing papers on international relations, but by coming to Xinjiang - an important geopolitical point on the Belt and Road Initiative- I can put what I have learned to good use."
So, he turned down all the other job offers and decided to go to Xin-jiang to become an official in a village in Artux, Kezilesu Kirgiz autonomous prefecture.
