Last month, Wuhan University announced that anyone with a valid ID could walk into its campus. The cherry blossom season — the campus is known for its cherry blossom trees — was over and, yet, people flocked to the university campus as they used to before the Covid pandemic made universities, like everything else, off bounds.
In 2023, everything else opened up but universities remained inaccessible without a ‘reservation’. Visitors had to reserve slots online, which naturally led to only a fixed number of people being allowed to enter. Interestingly, such was the demand that soon a black market sprang up for Beijing’s most famous universities — Tsinghua and Peking — managed by a network of students, administrative staff and touts.
China’s old university campuses are beautiful. But among these, Tsinghua (founded in 1911) and Peking (1898) hold a special place in Chinese hearts. Ranked first and second, respectively, they are every urban parent’s dream destination for their children — usually an only child — given the competitive nature of Chinese education. Many take their children to visit these universities just to imbibe the experience of walking inside the hallowed campuses.
It took this diarist an hour to walk around a part of Tsinghua University’s sprawling campus with its awe-inspiring arched gate, its lotus pond and courtyard. This was long before the university closed its doors to outsiders. Until recently, universities across China were open not only to local visitors but also to foreign travellers, many of whom considered a university visit an essential part of exploring China’s major cities.
Among the most memorable ones this diarist visited is Kunming’s Yunnan University. Established in 1922, its aura was unique. A plaque with a quote of Einstein and a board listing its ongoing research projects were juxtaposed with the well-preserved homes of its former directors. Nearby were halls where budding mandarins sat for their Imperial Exams (these exams ended with the 1949 revolution). In Guangzhou’s Sun Yat-Sen University, founded in 1924 by the founder of the Republic of China, the red-brick buildings and the century-old trees transport you to a world far away from the bustling metropolis outside its gates.
The Sun Yat-Sen University has campuses across South China. Expat kids studying in Zhuhai, bordering Macau, would go to the Zhuhai campus, situated on a lakeside, for Kung fu lessons conducted by a staffer on an open ground near the tennis court, then be escorted by him into the university cafeteria. Nobody bothered to ask their parents, waiting a distance away, why they were there.
It was two students who this diarist accidentally met one evening in Nanjing University who offered to show her and her family around their 124-year-old university campus. It was too dark to make out anything but the tall brick North Tower that defines the campus, the low grey buildings with their traditional Chinese roofs, and the huge tree-lined boulevards have stayed in my memory.
Today, such an impulsive gesture would be impossible. Other universities are unwilling to follow Wuhan University’s example, even though many academics have argued passionately about the damage caused by shutting campuses off from the public. Among students, fears have built up about imaginary security threats emanating from ordinary people; among the people, resentment at being kept out leads to the perception of a university as an elite institution rather than a vital public space. In the pre-restrictions era, the worst that happened was overenthusiastic hordes shaking and even climbing up cherry blossom trees in the Wuhan campus; or, students having to struggle past visitors at Tsinghua’s famous gate or in Xiamen University’s campus, regarded as the prettiest in China, situated between the hills and the sea.