Lonesome lives

Du Wenbo (middle) and his grandparents.[Photo by Zhu Lixin/China Daily]

In the Houyuan area of Fuyang's Wuli village, Zhou Peisheng and his wife, Liu Guilan, have been raising their granddaughter since the past three years. The couple's daughter and son-in-law are respectively a waitress and a chef at a restaurant in Nanjing in Jiangsu province.

"It's no trouble taking care of her, she isn't naughty," Zhou says of his granddaughter, Ni Yuting, aged 9.

Her parents keep long working hours, which is why Ni can't live with them in the city of Nanjing, he says.

Ni wants to see her parents more often and for longer periods than just during the weekly annual holidays. She also wants to know "what gifts they will bring for me".

In Zhou's neighborhood, most working age couples have migrated to Hangzhou in Zhejiang province, where the G20 Summit was held last year.

Earlier, Zhou was a crop farmer who worked part-time at rural construction sites in Fuyang. Today, he appears among the better off people in his locality, with income coming in from growing vegetables. His daughter sends money home as well.

For Song Jinlan, a 55-year-old resident of Dongzhou area in the same Wuli village, life is slightly harder. The widow has been looking after her grandson since his birth six years ago. Her son drives trucks in Hangzhou that carry construction material and her daughter-in-law works at a textile unit in that city.