How much does it cost to get a day’s meal in Beijing?
I remember reading an article before talking about different cost of living in various countries and has been always curious how big is the difference in Metropolitan city like Beijing. A recent visit to Dandelion school gave me some idea.
Dandelion school, as mentioned by Pairu in previous post, is a school for children of migrant workers. The day we visited the school to donate dictionaries there is no power in the region. So they have to cancel the donation event and we are lucky to get a different view of the school in our tour with some luxury on time.
We learned that without proper power, they have to buy meals for students from the street, which is more expensive than they prepare food in their own kitchen. So how much does three meals for a day cost? 6 RMB per person per day. So, 2 RMB per person per meal. Just had my lunch at QuanJuDe (the Peking Duck House) tells me that we spent at least 100 RMB per person and my kid might still complain and refuse to eat. You do not have to grew up in the city to tell that 2 RMB is definitely way below average living standard now days. However, walking around the campus, I see so many happy faces. Indeed, these kids are lucky ones, even at 2 RMB per meal, because at least they get a chance for proper education. There are so many migrant worker’s children that cannot get proper education after elementary level in big cities. I hope we can all learn to appreciate what we have now.
Dining Hall and Happy students
A school grow with love
Yes, compare to many other migrant worker’s school, this school gets a lot of attention from the society. I doubt the school can survive a year without donation from all the loving and caring friends. This is a school completely funded by donors and the school recognizes this with plates in front of the school.
You can see the change brought by the society from the bulletin board. This is a lucky school and it needs everyone’s help to be lucky!
Build by students
The school is built by students and stuff. The main building’s rainbow top design below is designed by students in an art class.
All the decorations are designed and pasted piece by piece b y student.
Transparency
I am surprised by the financial details posted by the school in their bulletin board. I wish all the government agencies can do that!
Who are the people make this come true?
Of course, the school benefit tremendously from the society. But from my tour, I think the people we should thank most are the teachers. It takes a lot of courage and love to accept a long term, underpay job with no healthy benefit, no government recognition, no chance to stay in Beijing legitimately longer term.
