Girl's Day: Let her be spoiled in this auspicious Day and be respected forever
It’s around 7 o’clock; the yelling of the boys can be heard loud and clear out side of girls’ dormitory. Miss Ting opened her door and found many colorful balloons tied on it, she popped them one by one and the wish cards from 14 boys exposed their appearances to her. Even though she had known the boys would prepare gifts and surprises for March 7th — the Girl’s Day, Ting still felt deliriously happy. Soon afterwards, she got a whole day of “Princess treatment”: There were boys serving her rice and dishes; there were beautiful blessing videos on her email; there were flowers from unfamiliar boys on her way to classroom… On this day, girls are not only the “favorites” of boys in her class, but also the special protected objects of boys in the whole campus. All of these are Ting and the other girls’ happy memories in Tsinghua.
Starting from the 1990s, “3.7 Girl’s Day” has been for almost 20 years at Tsinghua campus. In one sense, this festival which was set one day before “International Women’s Day” defines youth, vigor, an independent and confident attitude to life for all girls and it also shows men’s respect towards women and also the equality of men and women. Respecting women is also a tradition of Tsinghua, deeply influenced by western education and modern civilization; since the early years of Tsinghua, the concept of sexual equality was very solid. From 1911 to 1914, apart from a few female foreign teachers and family members, there was no female student in Tsinghua campus. ince 1914, Tsinghua started to send girls abroad to study, since then, 7 batches with a total of 54 people have been successively sent to the United States from 1914 to 1928; however, these girls had never studied in Tsinghua.
In 1928, Tsinghua formally started recruiting female students. Tsinghua’s behavior to break stale customs indicated social requirements of improving women’s rights and the idea of equal education; this also added a bright color to this beautiful campus. The first batch of girls had a total of 15 persons; they were recognized as “treasure” due to the small amount of them. At that time, Gu Yue Tang (Palace of the Ancient Moon) was temporarily used as a girls’ dormitory. In 1932, a building (Jingzhai Building today) especially made for girls’ living was completely constructed, and then all the female students and a part of female teachers moved into Jingzhai.
During then, the management of girls’ dormitories was very strict and boys were not allowed to get inside. If they wanted to see some one, they had to circulate a notice and meet in a specified place, therefore the boys always described Jingzhai as a “fortress”. Later, Tsinghua released a rule, which stated that the girls’ dormitories would open on the anniversary day of the founding of Tsinghua. Since then, every anniversary day, visitors would come in a continuous stream, just like a “pilgrimage”. Therefore, Jingzhai also became very busy and full of youthful vitality.
In today’s Tsinghua University, the relationship between girls and boys is more civilized and harmonious. Girl’s Day offers a special time for girl, while they are able to keep their simplicity and vitality, enjoy to be loved and they also get doted.
Contributor
Spotlight Group
Text
Anish Vincent Pandey
Image
Li Na, Song Chen
