If you've heard that Vietnam's college entrance exams are notoriously rough, consider their effect on a collection of ancient stone tortoises at Hanoi's famed Temple of Literature.
Every summer before the exams, tens of thousands of students descend on the temple, site of Vietnam's first university, to rub the heads of the sculptures for good luck. But the ritual is wearing away the stone and damaging the tortoises, some of which date to 1484.
"Please don't touch the heads," call out student volunteers patrolling the temple. But armed only with megaphones, they concede their task is largely hopeless.
"There are just too many people and everyone wants to touch them," sighs one volunteer, Bui Xuan Quynh.
No one is quite sure how the head-rubbing tradition began. The tortoise has long symbolized learning and wisdom, and the temple's 82 stone figures are considered the most auspicious of all. Each one is inscribed with passages from ancient Chinese literature and the names of students who passed their royal exams some 500 years ago.
Today's students profess disbelief in superstition. Yet an estimated 60,000 of them, traveling by bus or by motorbike, made their way there this month, hoping that a little luck might rub off.
Why are they so desperate for a leg up? More than a million students take the entrance exams each year, but only one in five will be admitted. They know that their fate, and possibly their family's, is sealed by how well they perform on the tests.
So even if the power of the tortoise is just a myth, rubbing its head can't hurt. Unless you are the tortoise.
Comments
1. adolan - July 22, 2009 at 07:10 am
reminds me of the MIT tradition of rubbing George Eastman's statue. http://tech.mit.edu/V119/N33/col33plosk.33c.html