From China Daily 21/5

Love - and life - in the time of flu

Bao Xueyang should have been on his honeymoon now - instead, he is reassuring residents of his hometown in Sichuan that he is doing fine.

"I feel well and my temperature is normal," is the standard reply to people in Neijiang inquiring about his condition.But he refuses to talk about his wedding.

Bao, 30, a graduate student at the University of Missouri-Columbia in the United States, was confirmed on May 11 as the Chinese mainland's first H1N1 flu patient; and discharged from the Chengdu Infectious Disease Hospital in Sichuan on May 17 following a week's quarantine.

He left the US on May 7 to come home and marry his girlfriend Tang Juan."His wedding would have been held on May 15 if he had not fallen ill," said Jiang Xuefei, secretary to Neijiang Party chief Tang Limin.

Jiang, who accompanied Tang when he visited the patient in the Chengdu hospital, told China Daily that Bao had not yet made any new wedding plans as he had just recovered.

       Bao refuses to talk to journalists about his marriage plans because he considers it a private matter.But what really hurts Bao is netizens accusing him of deliberately carrying the virus to China.

Some said he knew he might have had the infection, for he bought a thermometer before heading home from Beijing, and took a taxi to the Sichuan provincial hospital directly from the airport after arriving in Chengdu on May 9.

Bao refuted the claims, saying he had booked his ticket more than 20 days before his departure. "I was all right in Beijing. After I felt my throat was sore when I landed in Chengdu, I decided to have a check-up," he said.

His roommate in the US, Alex Chen, said Bao showed no symptoms before he left.But Bao does have a sense of guilt for causing some 100 people to be quarantined. Before leaving hospital on May 17, he told journalists he had caused inconvenience to those people.

And when he returned home on the afternoon of May 17, Bao sent a red rose to Tang Juan - who said it was the first rose from her boyfriend.Maybe Bao will be talking about his wedding soon.

 

 

A matter of course

It seems to be a golden rule during the economic downturn not to quit a job unless there is a better offer. Yet the rule doesn't apply to risk-takers, such as Sun Xiaonan. When he resigned weeks ago, Sun, 27, in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province, had five years' sales and marketing experience in two foreign "Fortune 500" IT companies.

Financial crisis looms, education market booms. Young people invest in further education to prepare for their future careers.

"The global crisis has indeed imposed great pressure on industries in South China. Companies are cutting down budgets and projects worth of tens of millions of yuan have been canceled. This may relate to the economic models here in the Pearl River Delta, which are underpinned by processing and export industries," he says.

Sun decided to re-skill and has enrolled in a one-year full-time MBA program at the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business starting in November.He's excited about returning to school and hopes to land an internship related to finance and trade beforehand in order to widen his practical experience ahead of studying theory.

The education industry might be one of the few beneficiaries of the downturn. Many private schools and institutes have reportedly witnessed an increase in the number of white-collar workers driven by an urgent need to diversify their skills.

The companies Sun worked at often arranged weekend training and encouraged staff to take part-time courses at a nearby university. "But under those conditions, people still have their work to worry about. Going full-time will enable me to commit wholeheartedly," he says.

Sun also expects his degree to open up more career opportunities. He had been in the IT industry since graduating from university but has confidence in China's fledgling business community and wants to work there. Hopefully, he will one day start his own company.