SHENZHEN: Zhang Xini, a 15-year-old deaf girl from Shenzhen in South China's Guangdong Province, has published four fictions with 1.7-million Chinese characters, created three websites, and made two inventions.

Zhang Xini holds her latest book "If I am Helen" in a bookstore in Beijing. [China Daily]

As the youngest member of Shenzhen Writers' Association, Zhang has attracted attention in the Chinese literary circle with her latest fiction "If I am Helen."

She is compared by many to Helen Keller (1880-1968), an American deaf-blind writer and lecturer, who became a role model for millions of people.

Zhang said she does not complain although she has lost her hearing ability, as she believes fate actually brought her to a world in which she can develop all of her potential abilities.

"I feel blessed, as I have the most important sense my vision," the girl said. "Books enlivened my mind and taught me life skills."

Born in 1990, Zhang was a normal and vivacious girl and already developed a love for speaking and singing in the first three years of her life.

In 1993, Zhang lost her hearing after doctors injected her with ototoxic antibiotics to cure her measles and high fever. Her hearing loss also caused her to gradually lose her speaking ability.

"She is very enthusiastic in writing, thinking and inventing something," Zhang Shiping, the girl's father, told China Daily in a recent interview. "We never intended to train her in these areas."

Besides using body language and a hearing aid, writing is the best way to express her feelings.

When she was only 12, she had read more than 100 masterpieces in literature, and published a large number of essays in newspapers and magazines.

Zhang said she feels lucky that she lives in an Internet era, which brought her a virtual way to express her feelings and chat with others.

Despite her disabilities, she seems determined to solve all the problems and difficulties in her life.

She believes the electric lights during long hours of study caused her to become short-sighted. Thus, she is now working with a physics teacher to invent a new kind of vision-friendly light. She intends to apply for a patent if they succeed.

Zhang is studying in Shenzhen Middle School, the best-rated middle school in the city. However, it is not easy for her to adapt to a regular school life .

When she was old enough to attend classes, her parents sent her to a primary school specially for handicapped children. Zhang was in low spirits on her first day there.

"Her eyes told us she was unhappy in the special school," her father said. "So we decided to let her study under normal conditions."

With a hearing aid, Zhang can hear something loud enough. "But it is only sound to her. She does not know how to copy people's way of speaking, or how to speak in the right tones," her father said.

When her parents started to teach her girl how to speak, it was a long and tough process.

"We must correct her pronunciation by putting her tongue in the right places," Zhang's father said.

Even though Zhang still cannot speak clearly, she is always eager to communicate with her parents, teachers and friends.

As for the future, Zhang said she wants to study in the Beijing Film Academy and take up a major in directing movies.

(China Daily 05/09/2006 page3)