Reality of migrant workers' sexual needs--Temporary couples

（People's Daily Online）  10:26, May 20, 2013  

Edited and translated by Gao Yinan, People's Daily Online

Living far from home to earn a living, China's migrant workers can bear tough jobs and shabby accommodation, but it seems they can't ignore their primitive desires. To relieve the sexual repression caused by long separation from spouses, many migrant workers have "temporary husbands or wives”. One may be very surprised at such a quasi-conjugal relationship just like I do when I first heard of it.

However, “It has become more and more common among the whole group of migrant workers,” said Liu Li, a migrant from central China's Anhui province who is also a deputy to the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature. According to Liu, the temporary couple phenomenon has led to many social problems, for instance, increasing rates of divorce and extramarital affairs in rural areas, and the impact on the next generation.

The real life of migrant workers and their partners in Zhengzhou is recorded by Hu Guoqing with camera.