During the National Day golden week holiday, 2014, I travelled on a package tour to the capital city, Beijing.

On the first day, our itinerary was disrupted by the weather. It suddenly started to rain. Our tour group were waiting at a bus stop for the coach from the tour operator. A middle-aged woman on an electric tricycle came over, peddling all manner of souvenirs. Obviously, she had trouble walking normally. None at the bus stop showed any interest in her things, though.

A bus pulled in and stopped. Off the bus came a foreigner in sunglasses, with a briefcase under his arm. Navigating her tricycle over, the woman tried to hawk miniature national flags to him. “Five yuan each,” she said in awkward English. The foreigner, looking her up and down, handed over 10 yuan, but he did not take the flags. Turning around, he was about to go away.

Perched on the tricycle, the pedlar hailed the man from behind and insisted on giving him a couple of little Chinese national banners. However hard she was trying, the foreigner would not take them. The pedlar tried to make herself heard in very simple English.

Seeing that the foreigner still was not keen on the merchandise, she refunded the ten yuan to him.

I was deeply impressed. Despite her disability, the pedlar still lived a positive and proud existence. She earned my respect and admiration then and there.