Local residents light candles during a candle vigil of donation activity for the relief to the earthquake tored Sichuan Province in southwest China, in Changsha, capital of central China's Hunan Province, May 15, 2008. 

This shows China's top leadership has not given up hope, although the "golden 72 hours" for survival defined by many experts is over.

"If only there is the slightest hope, we will spare no effort; if only there is one survivor in the debris, we will never give up," Premier Wen Jiabao said over the debris of a collapsed school building where hundreds were buried.

From top leaders to men in the street, from sweaty rescuers to dying victims, the entire Chinese nation is praying for miracles.

Since Monday, thousands of lives were taken and as many were saved.

My eyes blurred with tears when I saw on TV the survival of a 65-year-old man after 70 hours in the rubble of his home in Dujiangyan City near the epicenter. A People's Liberation Army soldier carried him all the way to the nearest ambulance, followed by his daughter who cried out hoarse thanks to everyone.

No one cares about the man's name, or whether he is a peasant or a professor. All we care about is that he's back in the land of the living.