Behind one person’s success is often a village that has helped them along the way.
Recognising this, a man in Guangzhou, China, who is completing his doctorate studies, wished to celebrate this accomplishment with the owner of his favourite eatery.
On 25 June, the eatery owner shared about the unexpected yet thoughtful invitation on social media, where it quickly gained widespread attention.
Luo Na, the owner of a Hakka cuisine restaurant near Southern Medical University, posted a photo of the delivery order she received from the PhD graduate on social media.
The note on the order read: “I’m graduating soon. I’ve been eating at your restaurant for seven years, from my undergraduate to my doctoral studies, and I’m really going to miss it.”
Source: Jimu News
He then invited the owner to take graduation photos with him.
“When I saw the note in the kitchen, I was completely stunned,” wrote Ms Luo, who stopped going to school and began working as teenager.
She added that never imagined she would be invited to take graduation photos.
“I know medical students all work very hard. They would not invite anyone to their big graduation day,” Ms Luo said in disbelief.
The PhD graduate, surnamed Xiong, had placed his order through the food delivery platform, Meituan, with the university as the delivery address.
Upon seeing the address, Ms Luo immediately thought of the student who was a regular at the eatery and who had become “like family” to them, she told Jimu News.
Source: South China Morning Post
“He is usually very busy, but whenever he has free time, he will tell us what he wants to eat. We treat him and his classmates as family, and they treat me like their own older sister,” said Ms Luo.
She also shared that she initially thought the student had wanted her to help take graduation photos.
However, Ms Luo later learned that he wanted to have them taken with her.
“I didn’t expect him to invite us to take graduation photos, and I didn’t expect him to invite us in this way,” she expressed.
Ms Luo said she will attend Mr Xiong’s graduation with her husband and two children “to let the children experience the honour of their brother’s graduation”.
Additionally, they plan to give him a bouquet of flowers and a red envelope to wish him success in the future.
“We hope he will become a good doctor and take care of more people, but no matter how busy he is with work, he must remember to eat on time,” she said.
Meanwhile, Mr Xiong told Jimu News that he and his classmate have been regular customers at Ms Luo’s restaurant since the fifth year of his undergraduate studies.
Source: HK01
“We are very familiar with the owner, and it feels like we have a special connection,” he said.
Mr Xiong said he would sometimes go to Ms Luo’s eatery in the evening after finishing his experiments, Southern Metropolis Daily reported.
When he finds her family having dinner, they would invite him to eat and chat.
He shared that on 23 June, when they ordered food delivery, he and his classmates decided to invite the owner to take graduation photos “to commemorate the occasion”.
The graduating student expressed his well wishes for Ms Luo and her restaurant, but joked that he was worried he wouldn’t have any food to eat if it became too popular.
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Featured image adapted from Jimu News, South China Morning Post.