"By the way, have you been very busy recently?" Xu Nian’an asked.
Xu Nianhua looked uncertainly at Xu Nian’an. Lou Fan had recently introduced her to a few factories that needed translations, combined with her store visits, Xu Nianhua was indeed extremely busy every day.
It was only today that she had finished her tasks earlier and had stolen a moment of leisure.
"Big brother, is there something you need my help with?" Xu Nianhua asked.
"Well..." Xu Nian’an looked somewhat embarrassed as he said, "Our school just got some new equipment, but the manuals are all in English. The teachers at our school can’t translate them. We tried to find a teacher from your school, but no one has gotten back to us yet. But I need to finish an experiment very soon, so..."
"Sure, but would your school’s teachers let me take a look?" Xu Nianhua thought it wouldn’t be a problem, but since she was still just a student, wouldn’t others be distrustful?
"Our advisor is really nice." Xu Nian’an grabbed her and ran toward the school. These last few days, the advisor had been anxious and frustrated since they had better equipment but couldn’t use it because it was all in English.
Meanwhile, their school’s teachers happened to be away in Beining and wouldn’t return until next week.
"Just to be clear, if your teacher doesn’t allow it, I won’t translate," Xu Nianhua reminded him as Xu Nian’an pulled her along, sprinting through the school, which left her inexplicably gasping for air.
Running was what Xu Nianhua was worst at; she would get winded quickly.
"Little sister, I’m sorry. I... got carried away and forgot." Xu Nian’an looked at his little sister, who was struggling to catch her breath, and gently patted her back. In his excitement and urgency, he had forgotten about his little sister’s difficulty with running.
Xu Nianhua took a few deep breaths to recover and then said, "Let’s go."
They made their way to the laboratory, where Xu Nian’an greeted a teacher in his forties holding a manual and an English dictionary.
"Professor Fang," Xu Nian’an respectfully greeted him and introduced, "This is my sister, Xu Nianhua, a student from the Foreign Language Department at Beining University."
"From the Foreign Language Department?" Professor Fang’s eyes lit up, and then he turned to see a young and beautiful girl. A hint of disappointment crossed his eyes; the girl looked young, and the manual contained specialized vocabulary that a student might not understand.
"Yes, I’m from the Foreign Language Department," Xu Nianhua, sensing Professor Fang’s skepticism, didn’t explain further. She walked up behind him, looked at the English instructions in the manual, and felt confident. Then she started to translate it into Chinese.
At first, Professor Fang listened to the crisp and pleasant voice, thinking not only was the girl pretty, but she also had a lovely voice. However, as he listened, something seemed off—she was talking about what was in the manual...
"You, can you understand this?" Professor Fang incredulously looked at Xu Nianhua.
Nowadays, not many people were proficient in English. Even though Beining University had a Foreign Language Department, it had only slowly started after investing heavily to hire a foreign professor to teach at the school, coupled with a few existing teachers.
But for a specialized manual , they would either wait for a vendor’s representative to come and interpret or wait for the foreign professor to look at it. However, that professor was not in Beining at the moment, so they were still waiting for the vendor’s representative.