Profiles

A daughter to needy seniors

By Li Anna (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-02-26 07:18

Bankrupt businesswoman keeps alive dream of helping elderly people

Three decades ago, when Wang Xiaoying was 16 years old, her mother gave her 10 yuan ($1.5) to buy supplies for Spring Festival.

But she soon happened upon an aged man on the street. He was sick and dragging a pair of worn-out shoes. He stretched out his hands at her, begging for spare change.

Wang Xiaoying, a bankrupt businesswoman, helps a senior wash her feet at the home for the aged she and her husband set up in Tonghe county, Heilongjiang province. [File photo]

"I took out the 10 yuan and gave it to the grandpa without a second thought," Wang said.

She returned home with empty pockets, and told her mother what she did with the 10 yuan.

Her mother, Liu Jie, told Wang she did a good thing and "we should think about the poor".

Encouraged by her parents then, Wang decided to earn enough money when she grew up to support elderly people with financial difficulties.

Wang has been living that dream for the past eight years.

Now 46, the resident of Tonghe county in Heilongjiang province used up all of her savings to set up a home for the aged. She provides free services for elderly people who do not have dependants or income, and are unable to support themselves.

The 1.6-million yuan investment in the home has left Wang almost bankrupt, and has made it impossible for her to carry on her private cargo business, which shut operations last year.

Many say Wang, who also suffers from a heart disorder, looks older than her age because of the sacrifices she has made for strangers all these years.

Wang has supported 107 widowed elderly as well as six orphans in her home, called Hong Lin Shan De, which means "kind-heartedness and morality with unselfishness".

"I'd like to be a daughter to the elderly who are incapable of supporting themselves," Wang told China Daily.

Jin Yukui, an 81-year-old man staying at the home, said Wang has succeeded.

"Xiaoying is our daughter," Jin said.

Needless to say, life hasn't really been a walk in the park for Wang.

In July 1988, when she was laid off from her job at a plant in Tonghe, Wang and her husband went to their ancestral home in Jining, Shandong province, to look for direction.

They found out that transporting goods was a sound way to earn money and managed to build a cargo business with borrowed money.

With 480,000 yuan saved over the years from her business, Wang made her way back to her hometown to realize her dream of setting up the eldercare center.

Her husband, Zhang Fugui, said she was "determined to be engaged in charity and I wanted to give her my full support".

On April 30, 2002, Wang's Hong Lin Shan De opened, receiving 16 aged widowers and two orphans.

She provides opportunities for the elderly in her care to undergo physical checkups and encourages them to maintain good personal hygiene.

Zhou Zhenqing, an elder in Wang's center, said: "Xiaoying often employs barbers for us and helps us with personal hygiene."

There are full-time attendants for seniors who cannot take care of themselves and offer a wide range of services.

Nine eldercare attendants work at Hong Lin Shan De voluntarily and all of them are Wang's relatives.

Wang personally feeds and cleans 94-year-old Wang Dengrong, who is bedridden.

Eighteen seniors have spent their last few minutes in Wang's center.

"I mourned for them and treated them as my own parents," Wang said.

In the past eight years, Hong Lin Shan De has also received more than 100,000 yuan in donations and nearly every department from the Tonghe county government has donated food, clothing and money to the center.

But Wang's cargo business has suffered as a result of her focus on eldercare.

"Our business stopped last year and my husband came back to Tonghe to help me with the care center," she said.

Without funds from her business, Wang has been finding it tough to run her center.

"No matter what difficulties I come across, I'll never give up charity work," Wang said.

"These seniors remind me that they really led a hard life and I will devote myself to them."

"Every time when I'm worried about the daily expenses, the seniors show that they care. For instance, (62-year-old) Ma Rongfu often goes out to buy rice, wheat, oil and other daily necessities with his own subsistence allowances provided by the government, without letting me know," Wang said.

"I always tell the seniors that I will not take their subsistence allowances to run Hong Lin Shan De," she said.

"My biggest wish now is to continue my charity work and raise more awareness of support for the aged."