HAILED in headlines as the "most generous grandma" in Shanghai, 64-year-old Shen Cuiying has made it her mission in life to help survivors of the Sichuan earthquake. When most people would be relaxing in retirement, Shen's still going strong.

The retired teacher of the hearing-impaired, now a successful businesswoman, auctioned a 4.5-million-yuan (US$658,260) apartment in Xujiahui and recently mortgaged another in the same area for 4 million yuan.

Her total cash donation has surpassed 8.5 million yuan to build an earthquake-resistant primary school, help children and set up a company for Shanghai distribution of farm produce and foods from Dujiangyan. The city was devastated in the earthquake on May 12 last year.

Shen, a native Shanghainese, continues to visit the area, following school construction and trying to determine how best she can help. She has formed a charity, the Shen Cuiying Special Fund, for the construction. Completion is expected in September.

Early this year she received an award for her charity in a ceremony in Chengdu, capital of Sichuan Province.

"I was shocked by the rows of corpses, especially the students' bodies lying in the playground."

"I was so moved when all the lovely children called me grandma," Shen said. "I hope the smiles on their faces can be with them for the rest of their lives."

People were stunned by one elderly woman's generosity when they heard in June she had auctioned a 148-square-meter apartment in Xujiahui commercial center for 4.5 million yuan. The money went to the Shanghai Charity Foundation for earthquake relief and school construction.

Shen, an average-looking woman, told Shanghai Daily that she felt she had no choice.

"I was shocked by the rows of corpses, especially the students' bodies lying in the playground," she said of the first time she saw images of the devastation. "I was especially sad because I had been a teacher for many years."

For nearly 20 years, until retirement in 1991, she taught at the Shanghai No. 1 School for the Deaf. Then she went into business and benefited from profit-sharing and the real estate boom.

After the quake Shen and her son, Zhou Xichen, who owns a retail clothing company, immediately donated 12,000 yuan for emergency relief.

"Words and images on TV pale in comparison to the reality of the staggering disaster."

Shen's mother and five sisters (she has no brothers) at first couldn't understand why she donated such a valuable apartment. "So I took them to the disaster area. Words and images on TV pale in comparison to the reality of the staggering disaster.

"At last they all agreed and joined my team to help victims."

Shen's son and daughter-in-law were onboard from the start. "Maybe people thought mom had to struggle to persuade her family. Actually, it only took 10 minutes," said Shi Yan, Shen's daughter-in-law.

Shen herself lives very simply but she is generous in giving and that deeply moved her entire family, said Shi.

Without knowing her, many people think that to be so generous she must be super-rich and always enjoyed a happy life.

Actually, "the most generous grandma," as newspapers call her, had a very tough childhood of privation.

Shen lost her father when she was only eight years old. Her mother had to support the whole family through factory work.

"As the eldest daughter, I had a responsibility to share my mother's burden," she recalled.

After school, little Shen would go to vegetable markets to scavenge produce and take the discarded outer leaves of vegetables, such as rape seed to make rape seed cakes.

"We didn't have enough to live on, so I had to come up with more new ideas to keep us going," she said.

She recalls that she and her mother occasionally had to borrow money from a kind neighbor.

"I never forgot us sitting on the cold ground to wait for the couple to return home after work, so we could borrow 10 yuan or 15 yuan to stay alive," Shen said, tears rolling down her cheeks.

"I still appreciate that couple since no one was doing well in those days and every household was less well-off. Ten yuan or 15 yuan was precious, especially for my family."

Someday, she thought then, she would help others when she was able - and she would ask nothing in return.

She kept her promise, first teaching hearing-impaired children for nearly two decades.

After retirement in 1991, she and her cousin's husband started a company that manufactures and sells high-speed maritime engine parts. She was the office administrator. The salary was not extravagant, but the economy was taking off and she benefited greatly from profit-sharing.

She bought two apartments in Xujiahui in 2001, one for 990,000 yuan (today mortgaged for 4 million yuan), the other for over 1 million yuan (auctioned for 4.5 million).

"Getting back into business is crucial in disaster areas."

Last July, Shen and her son Zhu went to Chengdu and met Director Zhou of the Dujiangyan Industrial and Commercial Administrative Bureau. He was making a TV appeal to help local enterprises resume production and open new markets. They wanted to help.

Mother and son talked all night and the next day decided to become a general agent in Shanghai for Dujiangyan farm products.

"He gave us a list and then we contacted eight enterprises," Shen said. They formed a distributor, Ju'ai Industrial Co Ltd - "ju'ai" means "gathering love."

It distributes beef, farm products, snacks, wine, candy and other items. They are available at Carrefour and Shanghai No. 1 Food Store.

"Financial assistance isn't a long-term solution," Shen said. "Getting back into business is crucial in disaster areas.

"That's why I established this company and tried to open a new channel for Sichuan enterprises to enter the Shanghai market."

Shen has pledged 30 percent of her company profits to the Shanghai Charity Foundation to help earthquake survivors go back to school.

Three months after Ju'ai Industrial Co was established, it had helped 20,000 Sichuan farmers and others sell products in Shanghai. Ten processing plants in Dujiangyan were back on their feet thanks to Ju'ai.

"I don't think I did anything noble. I just did what I really wanted to do," said Shen. "I hope I can carry on with charity as my second career till the end."