To China's children, astronaut Yang Liwei symbolizes pride, history and the stuff of which dreams are made.

 

But to one kid at Beijing's Zhongguancun No.1 Primary School, he's just "Dad."

 

And that reality has all the youngsters attending classes at the local campus greeting each morning's news much like 8-year-old Yang Ningkang, the astronaut's son, always greets his father happily.

 

There's an eye-catching red banner hanging at the school's gate, celebrating Yang's safe return.

 

In fact, both Yang Liwei's son and Zhai Tianxiong, son of China's second-leading candidate for space travel, astronaut Zhai Zhigang, study in a third-grade class at the school.

 

Li Hongyan, their teacher, told China Daily the two astronauts' sons are enrolled at the school along with six other children whose parents also work for the space program.

 

"The successful launch of Shenzhou V has inspired children's dreams of working in the future for space exploration," Li said.

 

Wang Luya, 8, who used to want to be a doctor after growing up, now wants to be a space flight surgeon. Her classmate Ji Jiang said she wants to be a researcher, and study items returned from space.

 

As for boys interviewed at the school, most have changed their occupational dreams after seeing the launch and Yang's safe return. Now, they say, they want to fly to space and return as heroes.

 

Having talked with Yang Liwei a few times, Li said the lieutenant colonel impresses her as "a simple and low-key person".

 

"When I knew he was trained to be an astronaut - and exalted the importance of his job once in a phone conversation - he said in a calm tone that he was just doing a job as ordinary as mine," the teacher said.

 

Parents like Yang Liwei working for the country's space project are busy with their jobs most of the time, and usually leave caring for their children to their spouses, Li said.

 

Zhai Tianxiong said he can only see his father once or twice per week.

 

Yang's son Ningkang is not a child who causes parental headaches, and is good at writing, publishing a story about his father in a newspaper.

 

Like many other boys, he is clever and sometimes naughty, the teacher said.

 

The astronaut's elder sister, Yang Lijun told People's Daily that her brother was diligent and brave as a child. One of Yang's primary school classmates Chen Suixin said the pilot saved his life as a child when Chen fell in the water. "If it were not for Yang Liwei's cool mind and bravery, I would not have survived.''

 

Yang Yuhua, the flyer's teacher in northeast China's Liaoning Province, said Yang Liwei had organized many activities in school.

 

"When I sent him to get a physical exam for his pilot recruitment, we even joked about me taking a plane when he would be the pilot flying it," the teacher recalled.

 

Now the joke has turned into reality, and what's more exciting is that Yang has become China's leading astronaut.

 

"When I heard Yang Liwei and the spacecraft were successfully launched, I could not hold back my tears," the teacher said.

 

(China Daily October 17, 2003)