But he has been deeply concerned about the lives of the pupils in the county's Sanyuanli Primary School since he read about them and the tough conditions in which they live and study in that remote area in the December 12, 2002 issue of China Daily.

Early this month, Zheng donated 300,000 yuan (US$36,250) to the Beijing-based China Youth Development Foundation to finance the construction of a China Daily Readers Hope Primary School in the county.

Zheng said he hopes that a larger primary school with better conditions can be built as soon as possible for the children and their teachers.

According to the December 12 article Providing a ray of hope, 109 students and their teacher have their lessons in a classroom of just 30 square meters with no central heating system.

Every shabby meter-long desk is shared by five pupils, while their teacher writes on a cracked blackboard hanging on the wall.

Despite the harsh conditions, the Sanyuanli school and hundreds like it in Dongxiang County have provided a ray of hope for children from the families of these predominantly Hui people, one of China's 56 ethnic groups.

The county has a population of 257,800, most of whom make a living by growing wheat and potatoes and herding sheep. The annual per capita income is 776 yuan (US$94).

Water shortages have blocked Dongxiang's agricultural and industrial development.

Many children receive only five years of primary schooling, while girl students usually learn the Koran in nearby mosques for two or three years and then return home to help on the farm or with household chores and wait for marriage, according to China Daily staff member Xue Chaohua, who visited and investigated more than 20 local primary schools over a period of one-and-a half months late last year.

China Daily is working with the county, following a campaign launched in 1998 by the central government calling for public assistance in the battle against poverty in poor counties.

As education is a key element in the fight to eradicate poverty in that area, China Daily and the China Youth Development Foundation jointly launched the charity project "Caring for Dropouts: Donate to a Hope School" last November to help schools such as Sanyuanli.

Donations are collected either to build a new school or enlarge an existing school to ease crowded conditions such as at Sanyuanli.

About 200,000 yuan (US$24,160) can help enlarge and furnish an existing school and 300,000 yuan (US$36,250) can help build a new one.

Such aid has helped establish the China Daily Hope School, which opened in 2000 with nearly 500,000 yuan (US$60,400) in donations from employees at China Daily, the Gansu Association for Disabled People and local people.

The school has proved to be a great success and has attracted 386 students from four villages.

About 95 per cent of the area's school-age children are now receiving an education compared with the 1998 figure of only 47 per cent.

"Reading the Dongxiang story, I felt really sorry for these knowledge-thirsty kids. I decided to contribute my part to this charity project," recalled Zheng, who has worked as a teacher in Indonesia, Turkey and the Netherlands.

Zheng has been a regular reader of China Daily since he returned to the Chinese mainland in 1985 to live in a simple apartment on Nanhua Road, close to Xiamen University.

Zheng was born in Semarang in Indonesia's Central Java Province in 1925. In the early 19th century his great-grandfather moved the whole family from Xiamen to Taiwan. In 1864, the family moved from Taiwan to Indonesia.

The Zheng family used to earn a living in the construction business.

However, Zheng said he did not inherit any fortune from older generations but accumulated some money by working hard and living a thrifty lifestyle.

"Since we do not need too much money in terms of living expenses, it is better to use it for the good of society," Zheng said.

A mathematics major of the University of Indonesia, Zheng began his teaching career in 1946. Teachers were then in great demand as many local teachers had died in the concentration camps of the occupying Japanese army.

This is not the first time Zheng has donated to the foundation.

Last year, Zheng gave the China Youth Development Foundation 200,000 yuan (US$24,160) for the construction of a Hope Primary School in Xi'an, capital of Northwest China's Shaanxi Province.

"Now I am looking forward to attending the opening ceremony of the China Daily Readers Hope Primary School in Dongxiang," Zheng said.

Thinking of the children, he added: "I hope to see big smiles on their faces."

(China Daily January 15, 2003)