As a teaching assistant for the course "Quantum Computing", Lin Zhixia has taught a total of four undergraduate students this semester, and Wu Pinyan is one of them.
Wu Pinyan’s goal is very clear, she wants to study for a doctorate under Lin Zhixia’s guidance.
Lin Zhixia's supervisor enjoys a high reputation in the academic community. He has made great achievements and has high requirements for his students. The doctoral students in his group are all very good. For example, Aishwarya is like a paper-making machine, and every year at least two papers are successfully published in top international academic journals.
Aishwarya said to Wu Pinyan in the tone of a person with experience that if she wanted to publish an excellent paper, the first step was to find the innovative points - in order to find the innovative points, Wu Pinyan had to read a lot of literature.
Wu Pinyan nodded.
Lin Zhixia encouraged her enthusiastically: "In fact, you have already found the innovation point, which is why I invited you to work in our group. Come with me, I will take you to see the experimental equipment."
Wu Pinyan smiled and said, "Thank you."
Lin Zhixia walked in front and pushed open the door of the laboratory: "I have sent your resume and paper to the instructor and discussed it with him. I will teach you how to operate the experiment. Once you are familiar with the process, you can implement the model and collect data yourself."
"Thank you, senior sister!" Wu Pinyan said with emotion.
In the small classroom where they had classes, Wu Pinyan often called Lin Zhixia "Teacher Lin", but now, she changed her name to call Lin Zhixia "senior sister", which reminded Lin Zhixia of Zhu Chan, Luo Ying, Wei Ruoxing... these gentle and kind senior sisters.
Lin Zhixia said sincerely: "If you encounter any problems in the laboratory, please feel free to contact me and I will do my best to help you solve them."
In the spacious "Quantum Circuit" laboratory, there are all kinds of large machines. Wu Pinyan looked around and asked quietly: "Will you still be a teaching assistant next semester?"
Lin Zhixia heard the implication of her words. Lin Zhixia replied: "Whether I am a teaching assistant or not, I will help you. When you finish writing the paper, I can help you review it before sending it to the tutor. Your research direction is very novel, and our entire group welcomes you very much."
Wu Pinyan and Lin Zhixia have almost no personal relationship.
Their communication is limited to classes once a week.
Wu Pinyan clasped her hands together, pinched her finger bones, and thanked Lin Zhixia again: "Okay, thank you."
"Don't be so polite," Lin Zhixia said generously, "Keep it up, you are excellent."
When Lin Zhixia and Wu Pinyan were chatting, Wen Qi happened to pass behind them. His footsteps were silent, like a ghost, and Wu Pinyan called him, "Senior Wen Qi!"
The voice was like a hidden arrow that pierced Wen Qi's forehead. He froze in place and responded awkwardly, "Huh?"
Wen Qi had a hunch that Wu Pinyan was very cheerful, even more enthusiastic and outgoing than Lin Zhixia. Miao Danyi, whom he met last year, was also this type of girl. Such girls were almost his nemesis, and would make him unable to maintain even basic social etiquette.
As expected, Wu Pinyan took out her cell phone: "What's your phone number?"
Wen Qi actually said: "I don't have a cell phone."
Wu Pinyan was slightly stunned. She looked at Lin Zhixia.
Lin Zhixia could probably guess why Wen Qi lied. Even though she had a good impression of Wu Pinyan, she couldn't force Wen Qi to give her his phone number. While she was thinking hard, Wu Pinyan asked again, "Do you have a QQ number or WeChat number?"
Wen Qi shook his head.
Wu Pinyan asked: "Facebook and WhatsApp?"
Facebook and WhatsApp are both social software commonly used by international students.
Wen Qi denied that he had a social media account. He said coldly, "I'm going to do an experiment." Then he walked into a small room not far away - that was not a place for experiments.
Wu Pinyan approached Lin Zhixia and said cautiously: "Senior Wen Qi..."
"He's not good at socializing," Lin Zhixia quickly explained for Wen Qi, "He means no harm, don't be nervous, he's like this to everyone. I've known him for more than seven months, and he only speaks to me ten sentences a day at most, and that's his limit."
"Is this true?" Wu Pinyan was extremely surprised. "How can this be possible? Didn't he contact a psychologist?"
Psychologist
Lin Zhixia thought for a moment, "It seems not."
Wu Pinyan also thought of something. She stopped judging Wen Qi. She followed Lin Zhixia around the entire laboratory. Lin Zhixia handed her a printed document and asked her to do some simple exercises according to the instructions in the document. She couldn't help but ask, "Did you prepare these in advance?"
"Yes," Lin Zhixia said frankly, "When I was revising your article, I designed some simple experiments based on the calculation model you proposed, and also wrote an experimental guide."
Lin Zhixia's selfless kindness exceeded Wu Pinyan's previous imagination.
Wu Pinyan held the thick stack of documents, and a warm feeling surged in her heart. She couldn't help but think about Lin Zhixia. After hesitating for a long time, she asked, "If you teach students like this, do you still have time to do research?"
They stood beside a desk. Lin Zhixia opened the drawer, took out two printed papers, and handed them to Wu Pinyan.
Hearing Wu Pinyan's question, Lin Zhixia answered honestly: "Yes, I spend most of my time doing research. After I graduate, I want to return to China to be a university teacher. I prepared these materials not only for you, but also for myself. In the future, I will be supervising graduate students, and I want to be a good mentor."
Wu Pinyan held several documents in her hands and felt that they were heavy.
To liven up the atmosphere, Wu Pinyan joked, "Have you ever thought about going to a research institute? You train students... but your students may not be as good as you."
Lin Zhixia looked at her and said, "No one is born knowing everything. Often, students are not stupid, they just don't know. We give students a lamp, and they can hold it and walk on their own path, illuminating a wider world."
Wu Pinyan was inspired to ask: “Is this the ‘general interest’?”
Lin Zhixia's attitude became more serious: "Yes, it is written in "Meditations" - 'People have three kinds of relationships, namely, the relationship between people and external objects, people and other people, and people and faith or reason'..."
Before Lin Zhixia finished speaking, Wu Pinyan said, "I understand your beliefs."
Lin Zhixia smiled brightly.
At this time, senior sister Aishwarya walked into the laboratory with a cup of coffee.
Lin Zhixia lowered her voice and quietly told Wu Pinyan: "Senior Aishwarya is looking for a teaching position recently. She contacted the Indian Institute of Technology... I heard her say that when she becomes a professor, she wants to accept more female students."
"What about you?" Wu Pinyan paid more attention to Lin Zhixia, "Will you accept more female students in the future?"
Lin Zhixia admitted: "Of course."
She listed the data: "There are six times more male scholars in the fields of mathematics, physics, and computer science than female scholars [1]. Machine learning is an important branch of artificial intelligence. In the field of machine learning, the world's top female scholars only account for 2% of the total number of people. I feel that this proportion is a bit small..."
Senior Aishwarya was approaching them, seemingly wanting to introduce the experimental equipment to Wu Pinyan.
Lin Zhixia suddenly remembered that on the first day she and Wen Qi joined the group, it was senior Aishwarya who explained the laboratory regulations and various operating procedures to them.
Lin Zhixia extended a hand toward Wu Pinyan: "Come on, we will all grow up."
Wu Pinyan high-fived her.
Lin Zhixia vaguely remembered that she and Shen Zhaohua had made a promise in his laboratory nine years ago. So far, she has kept her promise.
Wu Pinyan is a very hardworking person.
Since that day, she has been reporting to the laboratory regularly.
Gradually, she was able to chat with Wen Qi.
Wen Qi is working with Lin Zhixia on a new paper.
In the month without the guidance of the tutor, they still maintained a steady progress. On the first day when the tutor came back from vacation, Lin Zhixia went to the tutor's office with a stack of documents.
The tutor had just made a cup of black tea and was sipping it leisurely. When he saw Lin Zhixia suddenly appear, a look of surprise appeared on his face.
"Good morning, today is the office opening hours." Lin Zhixia pointed to the schedule on the door frame.
In their school, university professors usually have an "office opening hours". During this period, any student can come directly to his office to find him. Of course he knew this. He exchanged a few words with Lin Zhixia and then began to look through Lin Zhixia's new paper.
The progress of this paper is obvious and it can almost be submitted directly to a journal.
Therefore, at the end of this month, Lin Zhixia submitted the paper. She waited for more than two months before receiving the news that the paper was accepted.
At the same time, Lin Zhixia also passed the first stage of the doctoral defense. The first year of her doctoral life is coming to an end. She said goodbye to her four students in her last undergraduate teaching assistant class. The students seemed very moved, and Han Guang even shook hands with her.
It all went very smoothly.
The only problem was that Lin Zhixia was not assigned a dormitory for second-year doctoral students. Dormitories were assigned randomly, and she was given a bye.
Lin Zhixia checked her emails and confirmed repeatedly...
Unfortunately, her fate with the student dormitory came to an end.
Lin Zhixia thought for a moment, picked up her phone, and sent a message to Jiang Yubai: "I don't have a dormitory next semester. I'm a teaching assistant at school, and I have money to pay the rent."
Jiang Yubai called her. The first thing he said was, "We have signed a rental contract, let's follow the terms of the contract. When are you moving in? I'll pick you up."
Lin Zhixia did not refuse. She said, "I'm moving at the end of the month."
"Okay," Jiang Yubai said calmly, "I'll clean up your room."
Lin Zhixia was still polite to him: "Well, thank you."
Jiang Yubai felt that Lin Zhixia was playing a "landlord and tenant" role-playing game with him.
After the call ended, Jiang Yubai immediately left the study and walked towards the room he had prepared for Lin Zhixia. He checked the wardrobe, desk, dressing table and bathroom again to make sure all the facilities were clean and intact. He thought that if Lin Zhixia lived with him, she would not have to cook for herself, and her three meals a day would be fully guaranteed.