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If you are a Chinese university graduate born in the 1980s, working an unstable job that pays less than RMB 2,000 per month, living in a shared RMB 350 apartment and spending over two hours a day traveling to and from work, then you"re officially a member of the "Ant Tribe"!
A recently published anthropology book in tite of the "Ant Tribe" is making waves. It describes China"s post-80s generation: university graduates from rural China who dream of a better life in big cities yet struggle with low-paying jobs and poor living standards.
It"s estimated that in Beijing alone more than 100,000 young graduates fall into this category.
So, how do they cope?
Today, let"s follow Damin to meet some of the "Ant Tribe" members and see how they are fighting to make the dream match their reality.
Meng has been working in Beijing for more than a year. Coming from another province, she rents a room to live. Meng"s monthly salary is no more than 2,000 yuan, or about 300 U.S. dollars. The salary is dwarfed by Beijing"s soaring rent costs, where a single room costs on average no less than 1,000 yuan.
But Meng managed to find a place with an acceptable price.
"It"s cheap here. The rent is barely 200 yuan a month."
However, with the low rent, came a price. The room Meng rents is barely 10 square meters, but it is cramped with four bunk beds. And Meng shares the room with seven other girls.
Harsh though the living conditions may seem, Meng seems handle it well.
"It"s a little crowded and we have no privacy at all, but it"s not a problem for me. It"s the same back to the days in college when we lived in the dormitory. The only difference is that we were studying and now we are working."
Meng is not alone in "surviving" such living conditions.
In Beijing alone, it"s estimated that more than 100,000 young graduates are living in such conditions. They are all college graduated coming from other areas in China, poorly paid, living in extremely cramped spaces, struggling for a future in the metropolis.
In Beijing, these "ants" live in roughly seven compact communities, including Tangjialing, Shahezhen and Xiaoyuehe where Meng lives. Most landlords in those communities have renovated each room and made it sufficient to accommodate a maximum of eight people. The rent for each bed ranges from 200 to 700 yuan per month, based on different conditions.
Meng says the reason why she still remains in Beijing is that she believes the capital offers a better chance for her career.
"I think about this all the time, actually. I thought about it just now on my way back home on the bicycle. It"s incredible that I"m now living in Beijing and working here. You know, I"d been dreaming of that since childhood, and now, I"m basically realizing that. There are more urgent things to worry about than the living conditions. What I"m really afraid of is whether there was a good chance to develop a career that I didn"t seize."
Li Liang chose to come to Beijing for the same reason. Upon graduation, Li and seven other boys in his school came to Beijing together. That was four months ago. Li says the software industry in Beijing is much better than in their hometown, a second-tier city named Zhengzhou.
"There are many giant software firms which are headquartered in Beijing. If a person can enter those companies and work there for one or two years, that would be a very rewarding experience."
He says what now lies between dream and reality is not the harsh living conditions, but that they can"t find a good job.
"It"s already the end of year and we still cannot find a proper job. That"s our first concern. Even if we only find a job as an intern, that would be great. Anything else does not really matter."
Unlike other people who want to settle down in Beijing, Li Liang does not plan to stay here for long. He says he may just work in Beijing for five or six years, and then he would move back to Zhengzhou or another smaller city. He believes the living conditions there are almost at the same level, but the commodity price is much lower.
Whether to stay in Beijing or to leave is the question that confuses not only members of the "Ant Tribe", but also undergraduates who are still on campus.
Chen Yazhen, an undergraduate from Beijing City University, tells reporters her thinking.
"If we stay in our hometown and with the care of our parents, life would be easy and comfortable. But a person needs to have some guts to strive for a better life. Though that"s pretty much like taking chances, you"ll never succeed if you never try. And when you get old, you"ll regret that you"ve never tried to make a difference. I think I"ll choose to stay in the capital after I graduate."
According to the recently published anthropology book entitled "Ant Tribe", all people who fall into the category were born in the 1980s. That means most of those people are the only child in their families. All of them were educated in colleges and college graduates used to be considered the elites of the society. But when reality unfolds itself before them after their graduation, they need to adjust a lot to cope with the fierce competition.
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