Visitors to Zhang Hua's workshop in downtown Beijing may easily overlook a big poster hanging behind the door.

It is for an 18-series documentary called Sisters, which was shot between 2000 and 2003 and portrayed the life of five migrant women in a small beauty salon in Shenzhen of South China's Guangdong Province.

"It is me," Zhang pointed at the centre figure on the poster.

Wearing a bun, the girl looked worried and depressed. It is hard to associate such an unhappy face with the upbeat and vigorous woman at the workshop.

As an independent documentary producer in Beijing, Zhang Hua travels a lot.

Unlike many counterparts who work with a large crew, she does everything all on her own. She collects resources, makes a plan, visits interviewees across the country, and then finishes the postproduction in her workshop.

No light director, no log keeper. All she takes along is a video camera, dozens of video tapes and her luggage. Some may say Zhang works more like an amateur digital video (DV) enthusiast.

Yet her friends would argue that Zhang presents a strong professional spirit when she plunges herself into filming.

She was merely an ordinary migrant worker years ago. She filled her days with rants about the irresponsible ex-boyfriend and destiny. She has finally made a bold but rewarding choice to jump into an unknown field. The job has already turned her into a positive and self-confident woman, some observed.

Zhang agrees with that, particularly when she won the gold prize at the First CCTV DV Contest last year as the producer of The Secret of Kuang Dan, a DV stroy about Kuang Dan, a middle school girl and her father, a bicycle repairman.

"The moment I first touched the camera, a door opened and I saw a different world," she said.

Life as a migrant

The third of four daughters in her family, Zhang came from a village in Quzhou, East China's Zhejiang Province.

Like most rural girls, she graduated from middle school, then worked for shoe and clothing manufacturers and hairdressers in towns nearby.

She moved to Kunming, capital city of Yunnan Province, in 1990. She helped her sister with her little barber shop there.

In Kunming, she met a man who captured her heart. They lived together and soon had a daughter. They had been together for six years before breaking up.

"We broke up, but his mother insisted on taking care of our daughter," she said. "I gave in. I didn't want my child to be hurt."

Zhang reunited with her parents and sisters later in Beijing, an eight-hour train ride from her daughter.

A phone call from her ex in 1999 led Zhang to Shenzhen.

"It seemed that he found a job in Guangzhou, and my daughter was with him," she said. "I actually thought that we might be together again if he married me."

Zhang lost contact with the man after the call, yet decided to stay in Shenzhen.

She learned how to manage beauty shops, and tried to build up her own career. Unfortunately, her business was unsuccessful.

"I experienced two pretty awful years there," she recalled.

Twist of fate

One winter's day in 2000, Li Jinhong entered Zhang's beauty salon.

"I got to know him in a coffee shop we frequented in Beijing," Zhang said. "He once ran a clothes factory, but ended up bankrupt. He was then a destitute writer in Shenzhen."

Li asked to stay in the shop so that he could shoot a short film of Zhang's small business.

It was a hard decision to make for Zhang.

"First, he had no clear idea of what his film would be like. And there were another four girls in the shop my sister and three employees. It would be great discomfort for us," she said.

"Still, I agreed. There was no place he could go anyway. Most importantly, I trust him."

Li's Cannon camera did scare away many customers. Quarrels often occurred between the girls and Li.

"But gradually, we felt connected like a big family," she said. "We five girls opened our hearts to share with Li our sad past. He was our big brother. He made us feel safe."

Zhang, though, couldn't see any future in Li's film project. She often asked him, "Will you make money by doing that?"

In May 2001, Zhang accompanied Li to Hengyang in Hunan Province, the hometown of A Mei, one of her employees. A Mei needed to take care of her sick child.

Zhang helped Li in keeping video records of A Mei's life in the remote village.

"There would be rumors if A Mei took home a strange man alone," Zhang explained. "That was why I should be there with them."

During the trip, Li for the first time informed Zhang of his project to film a documentary of all the five women who worked in Zhang's beauty salon.

"I was puzzled," she said. "What was a documentary? I thought it was something similar with a TV series."

Zhang afterwards helped Li to shoot more films of the other women. They paid several visits to Guizhou, Zhejiang and Sichuan provinces.

"I closed my shop earlier in 2000," she said. "Li assured me that I could have a try myself. He had all the complicated functions set. I just pressed the open/off button, and recorded worthwhile shots."

It was a fruitful journey. Zhang brought back 20 hours of video recording.

That trip also inspired her interest in DV filming. She started to learn about photography and documentaries.

"I find it more interesting and challenging to shoot films than to do hairstyles."

Sometimes, she also recorded people's weddings to support herself as well as to practice. She later undertook the last recording of A Mei's part on her own.

"Li revealed that it was a test to determine my future on whether to be his co-producer or not," she said. "It made me quite nervous."

Zhang smoothly completed the task.

"A Mei looked even more natural before me this time than she was months ago," she said.

With the help of his friends with the TV station, Li set up a workshop in Beijing in 2003, and invited Zhang to join in the postproduction of the documentary entitled Sisters.

The 18-series TV documentary Sisters premiered at the Shanghai TV Station in January 2004. It was then broadcast through the education and science channel of the Zhejiang TV Station before the Spring Festival that year.

"I saw on the television screen that night five girls struggling for a better future in a tiny barber shop," she said. "And I recalled those unstable and miserable moments in Shenzhen. I feared and wondered whether people would look down on us, or show understanding."

Zhang and her sister returned to their hometown days later to find many people gathering at their flat.

"'It is unbelievable that you lived such a harsh life,' they said. I felt totally relaxed. The documentary released all my pain," she said.

A new start

Zhang believes that Sisters has closed the book on her aimless past, while The Secret of Kuang Dan opens up her career as a producer.

After Li finished the postproduction of Sisters in November 2003, he suggested Zhang make a documentary independently.

But when Zhang arrived at 16-year-old Kuang Dan's dark and cramped home in Guangzhou, her mind remained blank.

"I got no clue," she said. "I just knew the girl's mother."

Zhang lived with the migrant family from rural Sichuan for one and a half months. She got up as early as Kuang Dan's father, followed him to his bicycle stall under the flyover, and recorded his routine at work as a bicycle repairman.

"He even persisted at the stall during typhoon days," she said. "He was the family's backbone. And he took great pride in his daughter who studied at a prestigious middle school. He behaved so optimistically and was kind, which changed my long-time prejudice towards men."

That didn't satisfy Zhang though. She even considered giving up for there was nothing unique or exciting in the art of perfecting the shot.

Then when the Kuang couple decided to return to Sichuan, Kuang Dan wanted to say goodbye to her schoolmates.

"She made a speech at class, uncovering the secret that her father was a migrant bicycle repairer and she felt proud of that," she said. "I was astonished that none of her teachers or friends knew the fact. For a long time, they thought she was a happy city girl."

She concluded her first documentary with Kuang Dan's heart-warming speech, which moved both the jury of the First CCTV DV Contest and the television audience.

"I never expected to receive the prize," she said. "I am an amateur. Yet I definitely love shooting documentaries. It enables me to observe other people's life and inner world."

Zhang has been recently busy producing a series of documentaries about 13 women.

"They are quite ordinary," she said. "Some have suffered from severe illness, some are mentally isolated, and some undertake huge burdens in life. It is my obligation to set the focus on them and build a bridge between this disadvantaged group and the mainstream world."

(China Daily November 4, 2005)