Wish for success: Gaokao students received real sunflowers or flower-like balloons and handicrafts (手工艺品) outside the exam halls. In this context, the Chinese character for “sunflower” shares the same pronunciation as kui in the phrase yijuduokui (一举夺魁), which means to win the top prize. So sunflowers symbolize wishing students great success. As China’s largest annual exam, 13.42 million students participated in the gaokao this year, according to the Ministry of Education.