56-Year-Old Millionaire Fails China's Toughest Exam For 27th Time
NDTV
Mr Shi, a self-made millionaire, has taken the gruelling "gaokao" exam dozens of times over the past four decades.
After failing to achieve a high enough score on China's dreaded college entry exam for the 27th time, 56-year-old Liang Shi is beginning to wonder if he will ever make it to his dream university.
Mr Shi, a self-made millionaire, has taken the gruelling "gaokao" exam dozens of times over the past four decades, hoping to earn a place at top-tier Sichuan University and fulfil his ambition of becoming "an intellectual".
By most measures, Liang has had a successful life -- he worked his way up from a menial job on a factory floor to establishing his own construction materials business, making millions of yuan in the process, but his university dreams have so far eluded him.
In his quest for a prestigious higher education, he has put in 12-hour study days, abstained from drinking and playing mahjong, and endured the media mocking him as the "gaokao holdout", as well as online suspicion that it is all a publicity stunt.
