"Life Is Elsewhere" is a famous line by Arthur Rimbaud, a talented 19th century French poet, and the line was used as the title of a Czech-language novel by Milan Kundera. It is very touching and beautiful as literature, but in reality, it describes quite a cruel situation.

Life for most people is down to earth; they worry about trivial – sometimes even boring – daily activities like school, work and social security. As we are in the midst of an important transitional time in our society, the thing that people are most concerned about is how they could protect their way of life from unforeseen circumstances.

What is the most harmonious state of relationship between state affairs and people's daily life? It is a tough question. Many people felt tremendous confusion about it with two recent events in the national spotlight: the launch of the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft and the national college entrance exams.

In recent years, China has made a series of scientific and technological achievements, including its Shenzhou and Chang'e space missions and the Jiaolong submarine setting new diving records. Both have far-reaching implications for our national defense. Besides, it can also enhance China's international strategic standing as well as break ground for our future space exploration.

However, after they finished looking up at the sky, people level their sights and return their attention to practical matters that would affect their lives, such as the implementation of the program that would improve nutrition standards. After all, as the glorious moment of the successful docking of Shenzhou 9 and Tiangong 1 passes, problems in people's daily lives such as healthy meals for children in rural regions, the quality of school buildings and families' economic burdens still go on.

There was a very popular comic online and it showed a group of ragged children sitting in a ventilate cottage. An also ragged teacher arranged a writing topic: "The launch of Shenzhou 9 has moved a step forward for our space industry, so please write a discussion story about it." The comic was titled "Contradictious feelings and the reality." A large amount of netizens have similar feelings too, as shown by the huge amounts of reposting of the comic. The launch of Shenzhou 9 should be rejoiced by people across the country. But more importantly, they also hope that they can enjoy the benefit of this national prosperity in their daily life.

Besides, a lot of people also hurt by the college entrance examination. A very long Weibo post titled "The poor shouldn't have children" attracted heated discussions on the Internet and was forwarded by over 10,000 people. The post said that many parents were acting out as they waited in front of the doors of examination rooms, and they blocked people and cars from getting close – some even poisoned and killed the frogs in the area – in order to keep the area quiet for their children to have the best testing environment.

From the outside, this can be seen as parents spoiling their children. However, the fact is that they regard their children's lives as the continuation of their own and force their children to realize their own dreams.

This act of forcing one's life on someone else is despicable. Although some people choose to escape big cities pressures from such places as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, they still feel it and lost themselves. They feel that their actual life is a far departure from one they hoped to live.

In the eyes of the above mentioned parents, they thought that if their children can enter a prestigious university and squeeze into big cities, their dreams can come true. However, it is also a fact the people in cities are overworked like ants and have unsatisfied lives.

The contrast between dreams and reality will make you feel the essential difference between survival and living. China's big space dream should also illuminate the less glamorous lives of the ordinary people.

(This article was first published in Chinese and translated by Lu Na.)

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

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