While some college students have started to adopt personal computers and digital videos as their new playthings, there still exists a group of students struggling to find the basic necessities of life.

They may be found rushing around streets doing market surveys for various companies while their more fortunate classmates are enjoying surfing online. This also means they will probably be buried in books while others are enjoying themselves at parties.

Great Helper

The rise of annual tuition fees to 5,000 yuan (US$603) three years ago posed a great burden to Wang Xianrong, a student from a peasant family from southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. However he has not had to worry about it due to a study-supporting loan he has received since the beginning of his campus life.

"The loan is of great help. Without it, I am sure my life would have been much harder," he said.

He has not even complained about the rise in tuition fees: "It was just a change in the nation's policy. The most important thing our society and school can do is to provide a much wider space for us to bring our abilities to full play," he said.

Wang is very confident about paying off the loan. He has decided to find a job as a teacher immediately after graduation and thinks paying back 6,000 yuan (US$724) a year will be no problem.

Standing on Own Feet

The loan has paid for his tuition, but who will pay for his living expenses? Wang hoped it would be himself. During the past three years, he has been a private tutor, a translator and a market investigator.

He still remembers the day when he got his first job as a private tutor.

"You know, how I excited I was when I knew I could do something to put an end to my hardest days on campus. The first thing that came into my mind is that I would work hard as long as they didn't give up on me," he said.

Now he is no longer in such strained circumstances - and he has tasted the life of the outside world.

"Sometimes I have to be thick-skinned and restrain my own frankness. It taught me how to deal with different people while at the same time making me realize the world can be a rough place," he said.

However he is still grateful for his jobs and will never abandon them. He thinks that when confronting problems he should just examine the situation, then adjust and adapt himself to an imperfect world.

"But I will always keep my honesty and I won't flatter anyone for the sake of money," he added.

During the last summer holiday, he took a job as a translator in an insurance company where he came across many wealthy and successful men. He didn't envy them but still admired them and took them as examples. He always kept his self-esteem.

Every spring, since entering university, he has bought presents for his grandparents, parents and brother with the money he earned. Fortunately, the whole family is happier and their economic condition is improving, yet he still felt proud that he is not a burden on them.

Rich in Spirit

Life, for Wang, is joyful and fulfilling and he never stops searching for free time to enjoy it. Over the past three years he has been to many places in and out of Shanghai, such as Wuxi, Nanjing in Jiangsu Province and Hangzhou in Zhejiang Province, as well as reading many literary works - his favorite pastime.

"The most enjoyable thing is to do what I want. I don't want to feel poor just because I am lucky enough to have the loan. I needn't feel guilty, because everything else is paid for by myself," he said.

Compared with Wang, another student surnamed Peng is even luckier. She never worries about her tuition and living expenses, because she is supported by a company, lifting the burden from her poor family, from a mountain area. However the support money is still safe in the bank.

Like Wang, she also takes several part-time jobs. However she doesn't even have to spend this income, except for some living necessities.

"I don't like to buy things that I don't need, even though I can afford them," she said.

At present, she is preparing to further her study in economics. If possible she will spend the money she is accumulating in the bank on the tuition fees for her graduate study.

"I really admire her great willpower, but I can't see any reason why she makes her life so hard. She needn't, actually," said one of her classmates, surnamed Yuan.

"Happiness can be reached in different ways. I don't care much about clothes or food. For me, devotion to my books and feeling good about myself is the most important thing," Peng counters.

Shadow of Poverty

Loans and part-time jobs, to some extent, solve such students' living problems, but they do not always suffice to wipe away the shadow of poverty from their minds.

Xiao Li, a student from Wuhan in central China's Hubei Province, recently gave up the scholarship of 900 yuan (US$108) per year, provided by a public welfare organization, simply because he didn't want to reveal the poverty of his family, a Wuhan evening paper reported.

This phenomenon is not unusual among poor university students, who quite often refuse to accept the "green path" of funding from their school.

"After all, poverty is not an honorable thing, and to receive financial aid from school is humiliating. With strange looks all around me, I find it hard to keep my mental balance," Xiao was quoted by Wuhan Evening News.

"This kind of self-abasement by poor students is well grounded," said Ye Bing, the director of the Psychological consultative office in East China Normal University.

The first reason is study pressure, especially in foreign languages. According to Ye, a student from Sichuan Province, majoring in English, felt all her confidence evaporate after the first year of her campus life when she found she had many more problems with pronunciation than her classmates.

She wanted to catch up with them, but found it hard to cope with the pressure. In addition her part-time job as a tutor occupied most of her spare time. This led to depression and reluctance to speak in public.

Secondly, social pressures can add to the problem. A new student at East China Normal University revealed that she was afraid to return to the dormitory at night, because her roommates had many delicious snacks to offer her, but she lacked the financial capability to reciprocate.

Looking at the psychological problems faced by poor students, Ye said that in addition to loans and financial study-support, they are also trying to increase the confidence of such students, bolstering their belief that they can change their situation at university.

(Shanghai Star October 23, 2003)