Just you wait, I am definitely going to write over a thousand words today!

It is simply hard to describe the experience of this entire day; it feels just like a dream. After waking up early and squeezing onto the subway to get to Peking University (PKU), I felt like I hadn’t quite woken up yet, so I decided to wander around first before the “Hundred Clubs War” (club recruitment) started. The mandarin ducks and magpies by the Weiming Lake were cheering, and the black and white swans bobbed their heads along, making me doubt even more whether I had come all this way just to shoot birds. I took out my phone wanting to do some Geocaching at PKU, only to tragically discover that I had forgotten to bring my power bank. In a flash of wit, I pulled out my laptop to charge my phone, which barely saved my life. Under such pressure, I regretfully failed to find any hidden treasures. I’ll come back next time!

After the booths opened at 10:00, I met the staff of the Puzzle Association and was surprised to learn that off-campus people could also join! Thus, I, Zhuge Tianyao, became a proud off-campus, non-enrolled member of the Puzzle Association! (Applause) (Cheers) (Jumping all over the place)

Right after that, I got the “Zhouyou” puzzles (it’s clearly “Shetuan Xunyou” [Club Cruise], but why does everyone pronounce it as “Zhouyou” [Tour]?). I started a thrilling puzzle-solving run, rushing all over the place. But before that, the hourly puzzle was released on time at the booth. After staring at each other blankly and being stuck for 20 minutes, the staff remarked that this puzzle might be flawed, saying, “Even Teacher Yichen couldn’t solve it.” Me: “?!” Then I looked at the person next to me: “Are you Teacher Yichen? I’m your fan!” Immediately, I received free postcards and stamps! (To give everyone some background: he is the operator of the official WeChat account “Lilac Puzzle” and a famous event organizer in the community.) I immediately took out my “Fish Puzzle Poker” (a puzzle merchandise, a deck of cards with puzzles hidden on them) and decided to collect signatures from big shots in the community while collecting stamps (although I didn’t get many in the end, I’ll definitely see them again later. By the way, does this count as philately/collecting?).

But before that, I had to finish the “Zhouyou” puzzles first.

I’ll write a separate Write-up for the detailed solving process, but in short, I solved all the puzzles before my teammate finished their shift and returned to the booth. In the final lucky draw, I was fortunate enough to draw the King of Hearts (comparing with others, it seemed like I got the grand prize, hehe). Later, I met my teammate with whom I used to play Hunt! He turned out to be a top student in the PKU Physics Department (at least that’s my guess) and a veteran of the Puzzle Association (although the association was only established last year). He knew almost everyone on-site, and I successfully got to know Teacher Winfrid, Teacher Wuyue, and Teacher Fivero, who are all community big shots I had only heard of in QQ groups. Among them, Winfrid is the organizer of P&KU, a large-scale domestic puzzle event, and the guardian angel (?) of the Puzzle Association. Will communicating more with them in the future make me smarter?

When I was looking around feeling “friendless and out of place” (meaning everyone was a PKU alumnus while I was an outsider), I happened to meet another off-campus student who had just finished a Sudoku puzzle (another activity at the booth). After helping him pass a few words, we successfully hit it off, and I proactively took him with me to keep running around (actually, it was because I wanted to collect stamps from various booths but lacked the courage; once there were two of us, I became much bolder). While he was stuck on a puzzle, I successfully collected stamps from 36 booths, summoning the divine dragon! I was able to go to the service desk to exchange them for a small PKU souvenir, and I chose a cable organizer (my messy dorm room really needs this little gadget!).

Afterwards, the two of us off-campus Puzzle Association members splurged on hotpot at the PKU canteen. Midway through, he finished the “Zhouyou” puzzles, and I broke the Sudoku (using some website bugs to easily crack it, leaving the people on the other side who relied on brute-force with nothing to say). In the afternoon, after exchanging our prizes at the booth, we hurriedly left PKU.

PKU is really a great place, and it’s so huge that one morning is not enough to explore it all. It wasn’t until I was sorting through photos in the evening that I realized I was so focused on solving puzzles that I hadn’t taken any photos of the booth (I quickly asked Winfrid, and he said he would send me photos as soon as he got them)! Experiencing this morning really made me deeply appreciate the vitality of university life and the joy of puzzle-solving. I hope there will be more offline activities like this in the future! I’ll participate in them as much as I can while I’m in Beijing!

In the afternoon, I told my classmates all about my morning experience, only to discover that the promotional flyer also had hidden puzzles! As of writing this post, I haven’t solved it yet, but I should have it figured out by the time I write the Write-up (sure of it). In the evening, we roasted some mutton at home, had a wonderful meal, and watched other group members solve today’s on-site hourly puzzles online, only to find that there were more onlookers than active solvers in the group (

I really received a ton of freebies. Although I’ve never been to an anime convention, this felt pretty similar (?). The lively atmosphere on-site is truly indescribable. If I had to describe it, I’d say I’ll probably never forget this day!