When asked why he had come to Xiamen, he said some people once thought he had come to make big money. "This is ridiculous," he said. He already had a big house and was making money in Fuzhou. And his newly-married wife, he said, remained in Fuzhou. If he wanted fame and fortune and the company of his wife, he did not have to travel so far from home to find them.

When asked what had caused him to take such a seemingly absurd transfer, Liu said that in his business contacts with some foreigners, he found China was often looked down on because of its lack of technical expertise. He was encouraged by a strong sense of responsibility to defend the nation's dignity, and to win credit for China, he added.

So far he has been true to his words. His company has produced 150 North Star brand microcomputers since it started up in 1984 and has logged in profits of 480,000 Yuan ($160,000) in 1984 and 2.5 million yuan in 1985. This year, his company plans to produce large Chinese language terminals and small programme-controlled telephone exchanges in co-operation with the Shanghai Post and Telecommunications Equipment Research Institute.

Another young Xiamen upstart is Zeng Zeng. Formerly an official in charge of technical and management affairs in the Xiamen Electronics Industry Corp., 37-year-old Zeng was asked in 1984 to be manager of the Xiamen Supertronics, Ltd., an independent Hongkong company in Xiamen.

A sober-minded sort, Zeng said money was very important in a commodity economy. Without money, one could not live; to live well, he had to make more money. In a socialist society, however, money is something, not everything, he said. To live was not just to make money, but rather to contribute one's part to the construction of a prosperous country and help others to lead a good life. Therefore, Zeng said, he would do as a real Chinese does - run the company well and attract more foreign businessmen to invest in Xiamen.

The Xiamen Supertronics, Ltd. produces, among other things, touch-button telephones, recording telephones, wireless telephones, other telecommunications equipment, as well as electronic products and their components. Since it began operations in August 1984, the company has made much headway, pushing its daily output to 3,000 telephones and 6,000 electricity transformers. The quality of its products is completely up to the standards of the United States International Telecommunications Association, and its productivity ranks first on the mainland.

Zeng is putting to good use the advanced management experiences of foreign countries and Hongkong. While doing ideological and political work among his employees to keep them in high spirits, Zeng has built up a series of efficient management techniques that won him the recent accolade of "businessman of the new generation" by Xiang Nan, secretary of the Fujian Provincial Party Committee. And Hu Qiaomu, member of the Secretariat of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee, recently called Zeng the "pace-setter of enterprise reform."

Even younger still is 29-year-old Bai Lang, an electrician for the Xiamen Cigarette Factory. In 1981, the factory imported some equipment from the US Camel cigarette producers to manufacture cigarettes. According to the contract, the American side was to send in technicians to give Chinese workers technical guidance in the installation of the equipment. But Bai found some mistakes in the blueprints. He showed them to his American counterparts, who, believing Bai was educated not well enough to clearly understand the blueprints, disregarded his opinion. Only a later check made the Americans change their minds. The American quality control supervisor said, "I have been to many countries, but I have never seen people as brilliant and studious as the Chinese."

Asked what he thought of this remark, Bai said, "Only learning a great deal can one make a good deal for the country."

Working for prosperity

In recent years, "What Is the Purpose of Life" has been a hot newspaper topic discussed among young people. Some have answered the question just by giving lip service, but the young people in Xiamen have given the question a profound response by contributing all they can to invigorating the nation's economy and modernization.

"Money" was once seen as a synonym for "capitalism." The issue of money only made the Chinese nervous. On top of this, the old distribution method that theorized everyone should get a fair share from the same pot, regardless of performance, made it unnecessary to persevere in one's work to make money. Things have greatly changed. "More work, more pay," and "getting prosperous by the sweat of your brow" have become the order of the day.