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Undergraduate Xiaoyun, 20, spends her nights talking to strangers to hone her counselling skills and to earn some extra keep.
The psychology major at a university in south-western Sichuan province started working part-time as a “pei liao” – or conversation buddy – in April 2023, a few months after China abruptly lifted its strict Covid-19 restrictions in December 2022.
She chanced upon the part-time job online after she noticed that many people around her were losing sleep after China’s abrupt policy change towards the pandemic.
The sudden lifting of restrictions had caused many of Miss Xiaoyun’s peers, who had started university life in a zero-Covid environment under the strict measures, to have difficulties adjusting to living with the Covid-19 virus, she told The Straits Times.
