Student travels 8,800km weekly between China and Australia for classes

Tu Guangli, a Chinese student studying at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, has been traveling 8,800km weekly to attend his final course. Between August and October 2024, he completed 11 round trips from Shandong, China, to Melbourne to avoid living alone abroad.

Each 72-hour journey involves flying from Jinan through transit hubs like Xiamen or Chengdu, arriving in Melbourne on Tuesday morning, and returning to China by Wednesday afternoon. While the weekly travel cost of approximately 6,000 NDT (roughly 23.3 million VND) is comparable to his previous monthly rent in Melbourne, he noted that the money is spent more effectively in China due to lower living costs.

Despite the high cost and physical exhaustion of 10 to 13-hour flights each way, Tu chose this arrangement because he found living alone in Melbourne lonely after his girlfriend graduated and returned to China.