Chapter 82 Going Abroad Isn't Playing House

  "Guiyuan Temple is truly my lucky place!" Chen Chufan thought to himself as he stepped into the clubhouse. Indeed, for two consecutive days, he had left Guiyuan Temple in a good mood. Of course, Chen Chufan was not an ungrateful person and naturally remembered the kindness of the old monk at Guiyuan Temple.

  With a good mood, Chen Chufan directly walked towards the manager's office of Liu Ayi. The temple was originally supposed to leave on time, and now it was also the agreed time with Liu Ayi.

  "Aunt Liu!"

  "Come, sit down!" Liu Xiaoting, who was busy in front of the case, stopped her work and pointed to the chair in front of the desk when she saw Chen Chufan coming in, indicating for him to take a seat.

  "Are you sure you've thought it through?" Liu Xiaoting asked seriously, looking at the young man in front of her.

  Chen Chufan nodded definitely and said: "Yes, Aunt Liu, it's a rare opportunity, I think we should seize it."

  "Once you've made up your mind, there's no turning back. The agency will help you contact foreign schools and handle the study abroad procedures, but this isn't child's play!" Liu Xiaoting continued to emphasize, after all, this was a relatively major decision that couldn't be taken lightly.

  "Ah! I understand, Aunt Liu, don't worry!"

  "Alright, since you've decided, the operation will begin! By the way, how's your English level?" Liu Xiaoting quickly got to the point after hearing Chen Chufan's affirmative response.

  "It's like a second native language!" Chen Chufan said confidently. In fact, English had always been Chen Chufan's weakness, and apart from simple greetings, he could hardly read longer sentences. But now he was very confident in his abnormal memory, and even Buddhist scriptures that he had only read once he could recite fluently. What's the big deal about English? It's just a matter of memorizing words and grammar, and for Chen Chufan, problems that could be solved by rote memorization weren't considered problems at all.

  "Oh? Then have you taken TOEFL or IELTS?" Liu Xiaoting looked at the young man in front of her with some surprise, as if he could always give her unexpected surprises at a certain moment. Having learned from Liu Yuyun that this young man was proficient in many musical instruments, she was already surprised and had a higher evaluation of him, but she didn't expect his language ability to be so outstanding.

  "No!" Chen Chufan shook his head, but in his heart he was thinking that his second mother tongue still needed to be practiced by memorizing dictionaries and listening to tapes.

  "Oh!" Liu Xiaoting responded with a tone of uncertainty, "Chen Chufan, you'd better tell the truth. If your language proficiency is not up to par, it will be very troublesome to go abroad. And if your language skills are still lacking, we'll have to arrange for you to take a language class based on your grades!"

  "Don't worry! Language is absolutely no problem!" Chen Chufan continued to say with a solemn oath.

  "Alright, that way it's much less trouble. Then I need to record a video of you playing the piano, I heard you can play other instruments too, pick one you're good at and we'll record them together, then send it to schools abroad." Seeing Chen Chufan so confident, Liu Xiaoting ignored this topic and continued on to the next step.

  "Well, then everything is settled for today!" Chen Chufan nodded, and this made it even more unquestionable.

  "Just go ahead with the others, don't worry about anything else, let the club handle it! However, before that, you need to sign two contracts, they have already been prepared for you, take a look and sign if there's no problem."

  Liu Xiaoting handed a stack of contracts on the office desk to Chen Chufan, and continued to explain: "The first one is the power of attorney, which means you authorize the club to arrange for your study abroad, including choosing schools and other matters. It needs to be notarized at the notary office. The second one is a cooperation contract with the club, and the club will fully sponsor your expenses for studying abroad, including tuition fees and living expenses. The club will investigate local prices and formulate a relatively suitable standard for living expenses after investigation. Your obligation is that after you have achieved academic success, you need to give priority to serving the club."

  Chen Chufan carefully browsed the contract in his hand, mainly looking at the rights and obligations of Party B: "I'd like to ask, Aunt Liu, this clause states that if Party B accepts this sponsorship contract, it is necessary to cherish this opportunity during overseas studies, study hard, and strive for success. If Party B does not behave properly during overseas studies, leading a decadent life, Party A has the right to terminate this contract at any time and reserve the right to hold Party B accountable. How do you interpret this? How do you define whether I am behaving improperly or not?"

  "This will be specifically stated in the additional clauses later. Once your school and major are confirmed, a detailed list of courses you will study will be provided, based on your grades and evaluation by your school counselor. Don't worry, since we're sending you abroad, of course, we hope you'll achieve something, and won't intentionally make things difficult for you. This is just to ensure that after going abroad, you can cherish this opportunity even more and study diligently." Liu Ayi explained.

  Chen Chufan nodded, since the standard is based on academic performance, there's nothing to worry about. The reason for asking specifically is that he was afraid that this would not be clear enough and might cause trouble later. There's nothing else to say, basically after graduation, you have to serve the club for three years as a priority, if you become famous, you need to unconditionally cooperate with the club to complete at least three promotional activities planned by the club, and some other exchange terms.

  These conditions are understandable to Chen Chufan, unless it's his own family members, otherwise no one would be good to him for no reason. If there were no such conditions, Chen Chufan would have thought about whether this place had any other ulterior motives. So Chen Chufan signed the contract very quickly and handed it over to Liu Xiaoting.

  "Alright, leave me one of your phone numbers, and it's better if you can also leave a contact number for your family!" Liu Xiaoting looked at the contract, nodded, and continued to say.

  Chen Chufan wrote down his dormitory number and home phone number for Liu Ayi.

  "It's settled then. You left a copy of your ID card in the personnel department last time, didn't you?" Liu Xiaoting asked again as she took the contract into her hands.

  Chen Chufan nodded, "Yes, Aunt Liu. By the way, won't you be leaving soon? I still have some things to take care of and want to stay in the country for a while longer."

  "How long do you plan on staying?" asked Liu Ayi.

  "About a month should be enough!" Chen Chufan said with some trepidation.

  Liu Xiaoting gave Chen Chufan a strange look, "A month? Do you think studying abroad is like hosting a dinner party? Making a decision today and leaving tomorrow? It'll take at least three months to leave, and you haven't even taken the TOEFL yet! The May TOEFL exam has already passed, and you can only take it in August. After the exam, we'll contact the school based on your score. We also need to wait for the admission notice from the foreign school. Calculating this way, if everything goes smoothly, September is the earliest we can complete all the procedures. This is assuming your language skills are definitely not a problem. If you don't pass the language test, you'll need to take TOEFL or IELTS classes, which will take even longer!"

  Chen Chufan felt a bit embarrassed, as he had never thought about going abroad and naturally hadn't inquired about the necessary conditions and procedures. He couldn't help but blush at his own ignorance. However, this also made Chen Chufan determined to read more books, lots of books. He couldn't waste his gift of having a photographic memory, and even if he didn't become omniscient, he should at least be familiar with astronomy, geography, human relationships, and social etiquette.

  "Haha, I didn't know it was such a hassle to study abroad! Chen Chufan rubbed his head and smiled awkwardly, then continued: "And another thing, Aunt Liu, since we've decided to go abroad, I think I'll quit my part-time job here after the performance today. It's better to have more time to prepare!"

  Chen Chufan's resignation is based on two considerations. On the one hand, as he told Liu Ayi, since he is preparing to go abroad, he should cherish this period of time in China. On the other hand, it is because his arrival has taken away Xiao Liu's rice bowl. If the relationship with the band was a bit stiff, it would be fine, but now the relationship with the band is quite good, and everyone is very nice to him, especially when he asks them for help with composing songs, others don't hesitate to help wholeheartedly. Chen Chufan has seen all this and naturally feels embarrassed.

  "Well, you're going abroad soon, so it's time for you to prepare yourself. I'll go and make an announcement, and you can settle your salary with the finance department tonight." Liu Xiaoting replied readily.

  After saying goodbye to Liu Yi, Chen Chufan came directly to the band's practice room. As soon as he opened the door, he heard that the band members were playing the song he had created, and he couldn't help but feel deeply moved. Although they had only just met, they took his affairs very seriously and had actually arranged his song in one day, and everyone could play it together.

  "Brother Chen is here, everyone stop for a moment, let Brother Chen take the lead and start again." Huo Yuxing called out as he saw Chen Chufan walk into the practice room. The group stopped playing and collectively looked at Chen Chufan who had just entered the practice room.

  Chen Chufan casually waved his hand, which was equivalent to greeting everyone, and came to the practice stage. He took over a piano score handed to him by Huo Yuxing. "This is the piano accompaniment. Let's try it out together. You take a look too and see if you're satisfied!"

  "Thanks, Hao brothers!" Chen Chufan first thanked Hao Yuxing, then loudly said to everyone: "Also thank you all, I have something to do these two days, after finishing, please everyone for dinner!"

  "Brother Chen invited us for dinner, so we'll remember that. Hehe, okay, let's get ready and start!" After finishing speaking, everyone took their positions.

  It started with a short guitar riff, followed by the melodious sound of the saxophone. When Chen Chufan began to press the piano keys, he also found that faint sense of melancholy and began to sing his first self-composed song in his magnetic voice.

  The lyrics are a story of people who have feelings for each other but cannot be together, so the melody is naturally somewhat sorrowful. It just happens to match Chen Chufan's mood at this time when he has to say goodbye, and since it's his own song, he certainly has his own unique understanding of it. He grasps the high and low notes, strong and weak beats, pauses, and rises and falls very well, and after singing it once, it also makes everyone feel deeply moved. Chen Chufan himself is also immersed in it, unable to extricate himself for a long time.

  "Hey, Chen Ge, with this song alone, you might as well go mix with the pop music scene. Who knows, you might just become an overnight sensation! Don't compete with us for food bowls anymore." After a long while, Huo Yuxing let out a deep sigh and said.

  PS: Starting today, I'll resume updating twice a day, and there's still another update at 4 pm this afternoon!