On a bustling Beijing footpath, sharply dressed young men and women assemble in a formation three ranks deep, standing at attention with backs straight and eyes fixed forward.
Spidermen are indispensable for the 492-meter Shanghai World Financial Center, the tallest building in China.
The elderly women sit on a step by the side of the road and sew by hand. Their weathered faces are maps of smile lines and crow's feet, their hands and chatter lightning quick.
On a factory floor near the edge of Beijing, Xu Libo peers into the coiled and convoluted innards of a partially-built bus, shouting to be heard over a cacophony of tools and machinery.
Pulling his cab over to a taxi rank, Hao Haixu climbs out, stretches his legs and yawns after six hours straight behind the wheel.
Yuan Laifen has lived in Hangzhou for 11 years. Her job is collecting used newspapers, paper boxes and other waste door to door and selling them to recycling factories.
Shen Xiaohua's high-pressure workday begins when she rises at 6 am. The 44-year-old domestic helper then has just 50 minutes to wash, gulp down breakfast and cycle to her employer's home 3 km away. She then starts preparing breakfast for the family she works for, a couple with two children.
The concept of the Chinese dream resonates in Africa more than anywhere else as the continent looks for inspiration
Is Africa now dreaming the same dream as China? Xi Jinping, in one of his first major speeches as Chinese president in Dar es Salaam last year, took the opportunity to draw a parallel between the two.
Doreen Wang, deputy managing director of Millward Brown China
In China, the Chinese Dream stirs hopes and sets expectations; internationally, it provokes questions and elicits concerns. Here I look outside China - exploring attitudes, suggesting responses and warning of the dangers of self-fulfilling prophecies.
The Chinese Dream put forth by President Xi Jinping has captured the hearts and minds of people in China, and to a large extent in Africa. The fervor to embrace the Chinese Dream is understandable, as it seeks to provide a life of prosperity for people in which they can become whatever they choose to be.
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