Chen Guanming has been carrying his home with him, literally, for the past seven years. He has done everything a man would to make it cozy, only that the comfort elements he has added are boards, awnings, an overhead frame and gunnysack curtains.

The 53-year-old farmer has spent the hottest summers and severest winters eating, cooking and sleeping in his mobile home: a rickety tricycle.

Chen began his odyssey on the three-wheel rickshaw from his native Jiangsu province in 2001 after hearing the news that Beijing had won the bid to host the 2008 Olympic Games.

Of course, he did not forget to take his ID card, sundry important documents and some clothes before setting off on his mission.

Mission? What mission?

"To promote awareness on health and the environment, just like what the Games has been doing," he says.

It may sound boastful, but make no mistake that Chen is dead serious about it. "I'm a poor farmer and I can't do much. But I have a healthy body. I want to use it to show the strength of the Chinese people and the spirit of the Olympics."

He would have covered all of China, save for Taiwan, when he reaches Beijing tonight.

He speaks animatedly about his experiences in all the provinces, regions and municipalities on the mainland, especially about an incident in Chongqing in August 2003.

"I was riding up a slope and my brakes failed my rickshaw began sliding down and overturned," he says.

He had three broken ribs and a large gash on his shin but did not go to a hospital.

Instead, he used cigarette ash to cleanse the wound and herbs to stop the bleeding. And he lay quietly for some days for his ribs to rejoin.

Looking at the man, you wouldn't want to believe he has crossed so many mountains and valleys in his tricycle. But you look at the piles of evidence and become a silent admirer of this gritty soul.

Among his meager possessions are precious photographs and notebooks filled with approval permits and stamps of sports administrative units across the country.

His older photographs make you realize the battering his body has taken during the seven long years he has been on the road. Gone is the crown of black hair, the full face and the chiseled body. His hair has grayed all over and his now gaunt face rests on a thin, but still sturdy, frame.

He has retained the glint in his eyes, though. And despite the rough and tumble his body has taken, his enthusiasm has only grown by the day.

From last year, he began holding banner-signing ceremonies to encourage people to do their bit for the success of the Beijing Games. And among his green acts is picking up cigarette butts from the streets.

"Modern society should make us smarter, healthier more active to protect the environment but people have become more lazy and sick," he says.

Judging from the number of good wishes and supportive signatures on his mobile home, it seems his messages have driven home their point.

But he has one regret, and its cause are the people closest to his heart. "My parents say I'm not a filial son and I'm mad."

Chen says his parents do not understand what the Games has to do with them.

But he is wrong, for a phone call to his home yields a slightly different view.

Chen's brother Chen Guanyi, 41, says that initially they did feel he was ignoring the family. "But after seeing what he has done we are really proud of him."

(China Daily July 17, 2008)