After the medical license exam score came out, Chasu City Hospital loudly proclaimed to all the other young doctors that Zhang Fan passed with a very high score. Basically, what the hospital meant was that if he could pass with a score of 533, how come some of you couldn’t even pass and reach the 360 point benchmark? The hospital also gave Zhang Fan a bonus of 1000 yuan. 533 was the single highest passing score in all of Chasu City. Even when counting the veteran doctors, there had almost never been anyone who passed with a higher score than Zhang Fan before.
Zhang Fan spent one month in the hepatobiliary department, but only got to perform some surgeries in the last few days. After the doctors’ rotation in this department was finished, the hospital gave all the medical specialist doctors three days off. It was far too tiring for the new doctors. To give an example of the medical specialist doctors in surgery, they would typically need to check up on the patients in the morning. At Chasu City Hospital, one doctor would be responsible for approximately ten patients on average. Checking up on the patients would typically take half an hour. Giving medical advice would also take half an hour. Having the patients sign all the necessary documents also would take half an hour. Changing the patients’ medicine would vary in time depending on the scale of the surgery, but it would also take half an hour on average. Writing the medical reports would typically take two hours. The permission forms for leaving the hospital or new patient hospitalizations would typically take one hour each.
This would add up to six hours already, not to mention this work was typically done between other work. The main work would still be surgeries. A doctor would work on three surgeries per day on average. Including the surgery and anesthesia time, as well as when the patient was lucid, this would typically take up another five hours per day. All of this work would typically require working overtime to complete, and if any sudden unexpected situations occurred, it would be common for the doctors to need to stay late into the night. Moreover, it was common for any hospital to have many unexpected situations. It would be unusual for a hospital not to receive patients who needed emergency treatment.
It was also common for the veteran doctors who taught newer doctors to have many patients. A newer doctor wanted to go home on time? Dream on! At most, a new doctor would be allowed to nap for a little in an empty room. If you didn’t want to work hard, sure, then you would be fired. Although the hospital had nominally given the medical specialist doctors three days off, the doctors weren’t truly allowed to do as they pleased. All of the medical specialist doctors were new doctors who had just joined the hospital one or two years ago. The great majority of them was still single. There were also many young and single female nurses. The Communist Party organizations and other hospital organizations were waiting to pounce on this opportunity when the doctors were given time off.
Even if you weren’t a registered member of the Communist Party, it was likely that you would be a member of some other organization, and even if you weren’t a member of any organization at all, you would still be young, which meant that you would be under the management of the Communist Party Youth League Committee. The secretary of Chasu City Youth League Committee was a young man in Chasu City Hospital’s administrative department. With his access to information on young and single people from many workplaces, he organized giant arranged date parties where more than 200 people attended. Zhang Fan had no interest in this previously due to wanting to study for his medical license exam, but now that his result was out, and he would be obtaining his medical license in March, he felt much less pressure, and felt that it would be good for him to partake in Communist Party activities.
Wang Yanan, Li Hui, and Wang Zipeng had all participated in these arranged date meetings. Each table at the arranged date meeting had three men and three women, and just about everyone was from a different workplace. Watermelon, drinks, and candy were provided. Everyone here was young, and this was a workplace-sponsored event. It didn’t take long for everyone to start chatting and get to know each other. At Zhang Fan’s table, one man was from the Bureau of Education. He was quite eloquent, and kept telling funny jokes that all three women laughed at. Meanwhile, Zhang Fan had no idea what to say, so he simply sat there in silence and listened. When it came time for dancing, Zhang Fan felt even more incapable. He had been too busy selling instant noodles during college to support himself, so of course he didn’t know how to dance.
A nurse from Chasu City Hospital invited Zhang Fan to a dance, but Zhang Fan truly didn’t know how to dance. He still had to give her face as so many people were watching, though, so he forced himself to try and dance.
He danced as carefully as he possibly could as he was afraid of stepping on the nurse. After the song was over, he was covered all over in sweat. Zhang Fan felt like dancing was even more tiring than performing surgery. He had no advantages whatsoever at a large group arranged date like this. He had only an average appearance, without a particularly handsome face. His clothes were only average as well. The only valuable thing he had was the borrowed car from Li Xiao, but he couldn’t exactly show off by mentioning that, now could he?
From start to finish, only some of the nurses from Zhang Fan’s workplace showed interest in him. However, they all laughed really hard upon seeing how tense, nervous, and covered in sweat he was. After the arranged date meeting ended, Zhang Fan didn’t even wait for Li Hui and the others as he ran off by himself first. He truly couldn’t get used to this.
For the three rest days, the first day was reserved for the arranged date meeting. On the second day, since Superintendent Ouyang had just started her new job, she wanted to host a Spring Festival party filled with various programs from the doctors in order to express that hospital’s culture and improve the employees’ spirits. Since of course the older doctors wouldn’t be going up on stage to dance, the programs would have to be hosted by the younger doctors. So, Director Li of the hospital’s general affairs department led the medical specialist doctors in rehearsing for various Spring Festival programs. Those who could put on their own programs were free to choose what to do, while the others who had no specialties were all trained for singing in a large group together.
The third day was the only day truly given to the new doctors as a free day. Zhang Fan intended to clean up his apartment. The sunlight was quite good, and he felt that enjoying the winter sun would feel quite nice. But before he could start cleaning, head nurse Liao Juan from orthopedic department #1 called him. “Zhang Fan, what are you up to? Where are you at? I’m at the hospital entrance. Hurry here as quickly as possible.”
Liao Juan was the intelligent and direct type. Her way of talking was just like rapid gunfire, and she didn’t even give Zhang Fan a chance to respond before she hung up the phone call.
She had a very good friend who worked in the tax bureau. Her friend’s husband was a minor-ranking leader in the National Development and Reform Commission. The friend’s family was fairly well off, and they had a daughter who graduated from college two years ago. Their daughter worked at China Mobile with an official position that also apparently counted as a government position. She always stayed at home all day every day after work, which made her parents worry about her future romantic prospects.
Liao Juan was worried that Zhang Fan would be unwilling to come if she told him the truth, which was why she hung up immediately. Her good friend had pestered her for so long to watch out for an appropriate young and excellent doctor to introduce to her daughter. With Zhang Fan’s reputation in orthopedic department #1 and high score he passed the medical license exam with, it was clear that he had a bright future. That was why Liao Juan decided to set up an arranged date for Zhang Fan. She could tell that Zhang Fan himself didn’t have a rich family, but the other girl’s family didn’t mind. As long as the man was honest, loyal, and had a good job, it didn’t matter to them whether or not he had a rich family.
Zhang Fan hurriedly ran over to the hospital entrance, not knowing what was going on. Liao Juan glanced him over and felt that his clothes today were alright, so she went over and pulled on his arm. “There’s something good for you today that I’m helping you with. Come with me to eat some food and meet someone.”
“Whom are we meeting?”
Liao Juan kept pulling on Zhang Fan’s arm. “It’s an arranged date with a beautiful young woman. It’s already been arranged, and you’ve promised to help me, so let’s get going already. You can’t pull out on me now.” Zhang Fan had no recollection of ever agreeing to such a thing, but he couldn’t do anything about Liao Juan who was pulling him, so he could only follow her.
They went to Shanghe Restaurant, which was the only western food chain restaurant in all of Chasu City. The Uighur Muslims and H Country ethnic people here really loved to eat western food, so the business was excellent, and a reservation would be required to eat here. At the restaurant, the other party had already arrived. Not only was there a beautiful young woman, her mother was also attending. Everyone sat down after mutual introductions. The young woman was named Jia Suyue, and her family was from southern China. Her name contained her grandfather’s wishes.
Jia Suyue’s mother was quite satisfied with Zhang Fan. She felt that he appeared to be the reliable type who wouldn’t be fickle. Zhang Fan’s appearance was average, and his height was also alright. Jia Suyue’s mother and Liao Juan only stayed for a little while before finding an excuse to leave together. Before Liao Juan left, she even squeezed Zhang Fan’s arm and glared at him, implying that he needed to be on his best behavior, and could not cause her to lose face. Liao Juan had already told her friend everything she knew about Zhang Fan’s situation—that he was one of the elite doctors of the orthopedic department, really hardworking, had good reputation, and never went out drinking at bars or to nightclubs. Middle-aged women really cared about these things.
Zhang Fan felt really awkward after Liao Juan and Jia Suyue’s mother left. The beautiful girl across him completely ignored him, and Zhang Fan had no idea what to talk about. Jia Suyue previously had a boyfriend while in college, but that relationship ended when he went to study abroad. She never had any boyfriends again after that. Many people at her workplace were interested in pursuing her romantically, but Jia Suyue wasn’t interested in a single one of them. She was someone who was only interested in looks above all else. Since Zhang Fan only had an average appearance, she already had no interest in him. That was why she completely ignored him so as not to give him the mistaken impression that he had a chance with her. She was worried that Zhang Fan would be the clingy type who would be difficult to get rid of if she acted friendly towards him.
After a few minutes of silence, the food arrived. Zhang Fan felt that he was even more tragic. He hated eating western food! This meal truly made him so uncomfortable. It wasn’t like he could just leave, as no matter what, he had to give face to head nurse Liao Juan. So, he decided to simply suffer and wait for Jia Suyue to leave so that he could pay for the meal and at least tell the head nurse that he tried. Jia Suyue only ate without saying a single word. Although she was indeed quite beautiful, Zhang Fan no longer had any hope for starting any sort of relationship with her. It was quite obvious that she had zero interest in him, so why try? It would only make her dislike him even more.
Zhang Fan became quite accepting of his situation after coming to this realization. Since he hated eating western food, he decided not to eat at all. He simply waited in silence.
“How come you’re not leaving?” Jia Suyue finally spoke up for the first time. She was curious because she typically acted this way on all the arranged dates her family set up for her, and it had already scared away many potential suitors.
“I have to pay for the meal, otherwise the head nurse will kill me when I return.” Zhang Fan told her the truth, and explained things clearly to her. He wanted to let her know that he wasn’t the clingy type.
“What about if your head nurse wasn’t around?”
“Then I wouldn’t have come here to begin with.”
There was no more conversation until Jia Suyue finished eating. Zhang Fan felt truly pained as he paid for the meal, which cost more than 300 yuan. “Would you like to take a walk together?” Jia Suyue asked him.
Comments