In this year’s English subject of the national college entrance examination in mainland China, a familiar figure, “Li Hua”, has made a comeback, sparking heated discussions on social media.
In the English essay topic of the Beijing college entrance exam, candidates were once again asked to play the role of high school senior “Li Hua” and write a letter to his foreign friend. This made many netizens, especially those who have experienced the college entrance exam, exclaim, “Why is it you again?” “After so many years, are you still waiting for everyone on the exam paper?” Some even humorously joked, saying, “I wrote all the essays for you, you definitely won’t get into college.” The related topic quickly became a hot trend and surged in search rankings.
For Beijing examinees, the appearance frequency of the name “Li Hua” is particularly high. Over the past 30 years, Li Hua has appeared in more than 80% of the English essays in Beijing college entrance exams, covering over ten types of writing genres such as advisory letters, invitation letters, research reports, etc., forming a stable proposition pattern. Although some provinces (such as Shanghai and Guangdong) have gradually reduced the use of Li Hua in recent years, Beijing test papers still adhere to this “veteran protagonist”.
According to reports from mainland media, the 2025 Beijing college entrance exam English essay topic continues the nearly 30 years of “tradition”, with the fictional “Li Hua, a senior high school student from the Red Star High School”, once again becoming the subject of the writing task. In this exam question setting, candidates need to pretend to be Li Hua and reply to his foreign friend Jim’s email by providing suggestions for the United Nations’ initiative to solicit ideas for global youth.
Looking back, Li Hua’s “presence” has been frequent: last year (2024), Li Hua had to write a letter to his friend Chris introducing himself going to an art class in the park; in 2023, Li Hua was dissatisfied with the grouping for the oral practice for two people and needed to write a letter to the professor to express his opinions.
“Li Hua” first appeared in the English essay of the college entrance exam in 1995. The question that year required candidates to ghostwrite for Li Hua, inviting a friend named Peter from the UK to have a picnic in the People’s Park. In the following years, Li Hua’s role occasionally changed to a job seeker or college student, but for the vast majority of years, he was a high school student who frequently “transferred schools”.
There is even a “magical” rumor circulating about Li Hua’s identity in the community: he is jokingly referred to as the classic “golden duo” of English textbooks – the child of Li Lei and Han Meimei.
From 1995 to 2019, “Li Hua” appeared as many as 108 times in the college entrance exam questions alone. As for why the name “Li Hua” is frequently used, a teacher who participated in the college entrance exam proposition explained that the main reason is that this name has a strong “popular” characteristic, which can make a large number of candidates feel familiar and comfortable, making it easy to integrate into the writing context.