Home alone in rural China
The lonely life of 12-year-old Xie Xiang Ling.
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| The benefits of China’s booming economy have yet to trickle down to the millions left behind |
China is a country on the move. Millions have left their homes in the country’s rural interior to seek work in the booming cities.
But not all of them can afford to take their children with them.
Xie Xiang Ling is one of those who has been left behind. Here she tells Al Jazeera her story:
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My parents work in the city and I take care of myself.
Sometimes they come home at the weekends; sometimes they don’t come home for a month. I call them and ask them to come home.
I’ve visited Hefei – the city where my parents work selling fruit, seeds and nuts.
There are so many people there!
There are so many cars too – at night I can’t go to sleep it’s so loud.
Sometimes it’s hard to wake up in the morning and then I get up I don’t want to go to school.
But when I get up I’m motivated again. I just want an alarm to get me up.
For food sometimes I reheat leftovers from last night, or I cook up some cabbage and then have some fruit.
My aunt sometimes asks me to help on their farm. I pull the vegetables or dig holes and plant the seeds.
At school I love language classes and maths, but I don’t like English class – that teacher always screams and hits the students.
I want to go to college, attend the best university, and make lots and lots of money.
But my family won’t have any money to pay for college, so I might just move to Hefei when I’m older to work there.
I miss my mother and father, and that’s where they are.
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