EIGHTEEN-YEAR OLD Xiao Ping makes no bones about it... She prefers to marry into money.
The waitress from southern Guangdong province has a very Shenzhen-esque attitude toward money and matrimony, saying she doesn’t want to struggle for the rest of her life and sees a healthy mix of romance and realism as the perfect recipe for a happy life and marriage.
Every fortnight NextInsight offers you a glimpse of professionals or aspiring professionals who call Shenzhen home.
Although as anyone who has been in this steaming, tropical, high-tech teeming southern Chinese metropolis for any length of time can tell you, concepts of “home” are very relative here.
That is because you would be very hard-pressed to find a true native Shenzhener in Shenzhen these days, with the vast majority of the 10 million denizens (though some even estimate 15 million due to transients and migrant worker numbers) calling disparate towns and villages across Mainland China their true “homes.”
In this installment, our lead character – Xiao Ping – is originally from Zhanjiang, a “small city” of seven million inhabitants (That’s equal to New York City!) on the sliver-like peninsula of land that juts out into the South China Sea, nearly touching the resort island-province of Hainan.
Ms. Ping is not yet a professional, having just entered the job market as a waitress in a Cantonese style café-restaurant.
She seemed flattered that someone from what she called “the foreign media” wanted to interview her on her life and career plans in Shenzhen, and when she at first demurred, suggesting I instead look for a native Shenzhener who might speak with more authority on the issue, I told her I knew of no true natives in the city, and she admitted that neither did she.
“I think the owner of this place is a native, but he is still off somewhere celebrating Chinese New Year,” she replied in Mandarin, and she seemed just as unsure of where her boss was as was I regarding how such a seemingly industrious city could thrive with management away on month-long getaways.
So I told her that I’d take my chances with her “outsider’s” views on Shenzhen and she agreed.
And all this without expecting a tip! Ahh... tipping... that is one thing, like imperial units (vs. The Metric System) that my native US stubbornly clings to.
“I only got four days off for the Spring Festival this year, but I am a lot luckier than most of my colleagues because I am just a four-hour bus or train ride from home,” she said.
And did she get home often, to her parents, two elder sisters and two younger brothers?
“Certainly not every weekend. But when I can put a few off-days together, I often head back. My parents understand that basic wages here are a lot better than in Zhanjiang, so they don’t consider me as being un-filial for wanting to make more money.
“But it takes time for outsiders to fit in here in Shenzhen, for sure. People back in Zhanjiang love to eat, play, rest, then eat some more. We are not so keen on working all day like in Shenzhen,” she said.
She of course was not planning to spend her productive years as a barista of sorts in Shenzhen’s equivalent of Starbucks, but had dreams of breaking out on her own.
“My parents know I can’t be a waitress forever, but they support me in this stepping-stone position. They also fully support my dreams of being a fashion designer, and have been very encouraging. But I don’t think you really understand people my age because you keep asking me if my parents support this, or that, or whatever.
“Actually, I think you have it backwards. My peers all decide what to do with our lives, and then our parents jump on board and support us – unless the plans are completely unreasonable or harmful. We college-aged kids, especially in big cities or living away from home, really are not under our parents’ control or authority in the least bit. But I admit, when I call home for money I will pretend otherwise,” she said with a grin.
Her reply did not come as a total shock.
I know that “older generations” in China, especially among the 400 million-strong “Chinese Netizenry,” regularly patrols the virtual world with a fine-toothed comb, on the lookout for miscreants, deadbeats and unpatriotic compatriots to criticize for the slightest perceived infraction.
In fact, when the infamous Netizens want to criticize the perceived excesses or lack of drive by today’s youth, they usually say: “Aye... those post-80ers,” meaning people born after 1980.
But Xiao Ping is well beyond this classification, being born in 1992.
So although she is a novice to the workforce, and is not quite a professional in her field, her attitudes to life and work give those either living in Shenzhen – or interested in working, investing or trading here – a valuable glimpse into things to come in the rapidly changing socioeconomic animal that is the People's Republic of China.
After all, she may be working for you in the near future, or with China's meteroic rise -- you could be calling her "boss" one of these days.
To get an idea of where her heart resided, I asked her what would make her parents happier: Being in a loveless marriage to a very rich man, or being mutually in love with her spouse forever while both of them just scraped by financially.
“Of course my parents would prefer the former. No one wants to see their children want for anything," Xiao Ping said.
But she wasn't done.
“And as for me, I would choose an Option 3: Being single all my life if that was the only way I could fully pursue my dream of being a fashion designer.
That being said, if both hypothetical husbands let me advance my career unfettered, then I would probably prefer a rich husband at the beginning, because he could help get me started with a studio, further studies, materials, staff, etc...
“And after I achieved some career momentum, if the guy still wasn’t willing to be the man of my dreams – if he could help it – then I could always exchange him for a poorer hypothetical husband that I could fall in love with. Because at that point in my career I wouldn’t be so interested in his money.”
See recent Shenzhen stories:
SHENZHEN Is 'Perfect Place For Aspiring Artists'
SHENZHEN ‘Not As Warm As Harbin,’ Says Newcomer From North
SHENZHEN EXPAT: Briton Walking On The Wild Side
