When 18-year-old Zhang Shan prepared to teach her classmates how to correctly use condoms, a huge gust of laughter burst out in the classroom. However, Zhang Shan continued her class regardless and finally completed it successfully.

Zhang Shan is studying medicine in a vocational school in Qingdao City, in east China's Shandong Province. In 2004, she became the only young person in her province to be chosen to attend a meeting to learn about HIV/AIDS prevention and sexual health issues.

Since returning from that meeting, Zhang Shan has been thinking about teaching what she had learnt to her peers. Now, the girl is working on setting up a "Youth Health Organization," which aims to help teenagers with all kinds of sexual problems via the telephone or internet. Zhang says she hope to help young people to release themselves from the anxiety and confusion of puberty and offer them knowledge about the prevention of HIV/AIDS.

(CRI September 7, 2005)