Zhang Xiaoling may have just worked her last Spring Festival Eve in a freezing booth on the side of a major highway. Wang Keju reports.

Railway employees remove ice from a train track in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region in January, 2020. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)

Editor's note: Every year, China's Spring Festival travel period sees the biggest human migration on the planet. It was estimated that billions of trips would be made by road, rail, air and water during the 40-day period this year, but that was before the coronavirus outbreak. Below, our reporters profile people whose hard work helped those who managed to travel.

While millions of Chinese moved at full speed ahead on the road in order to make it home for Spring Festival Eve family reunions, Zhang Xiaoling, a toll collector in the northern province of Shanxi, spent the night alone in a small booth.

Chunyun, the Spring Festival travel rush, is the busiest time of the year for the 29-year-old toll booth operator, who collects fees from about 3,000 motorists per day during the 40-day period every year.

Having worked in the booth for seven years, Zhang knew what to expect. The job is not easy, and while her 5-square-meter station has heating and air conditioning, they have little effect because the window is always open so she can inform drivers of the toll fee, collect cash and provide change.

As soon as she sees a bank note in a driver's hand, her right hand scoops up one of her prepared piles of change. She uses two fingers of that hand to take the note and simultaneously give the change to the driver, while she prepares new piles of change with her left hand. The whole process only takes about 10 seconds.

"I have to sit on the bench for more than 12 hours and put on my best smiling face in front of drivers the whole time. After a day's work, the muscles in my cheeks are contracted," she said.

Zhang Xiaoling collects a fee at a highway toll booth in Taiyuan, Shanxi province. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)

To avoid being late for her 7:40 am shift on Lunar New Year's Eve, she chose to spend the night at a dormitory near the toll station instead of going home. Four days on duty earned her one day off.

During Lunar New Year's Eve 2019, she stuck to her post as usual and did not have a chance to return home, even though it is only a 30-minute drive away.

"Despite having the company of my colleagues, we all have to stay in our own booths and are not allowed to chat with one another," she said.

While other people were enjoying reunion feasts, playing games of mahjong and poker or watching the New Year Gala on TV, the road lay largely empty. To keep herself busy and stay awake, Zhang picked up a broom to clean the road outside her booth and then checked all the facilities.

"Seeing the eagerness and happiness on the drivers' faces caused by coming home, I felt all my loneliness was not in vain, and I had a sense of fulfillment from working as a toll collector," she said.

The Ministry of Transport has spared no efforts to push forward electronic toll collection machines, which enable drivers to pay motorway tolls automatically without stopping. Though the devices have been installed in about 90 percent of the country's registered automobiles, the ministry still kept a few manned toll booths open during chunyun.

As most of Zhang's colleagues have been transferred to other posts, this could be the last time she will collect tolls during Spring Festival.

"I'm out there in the cold and the heat. I'm breathing in fumes. I work during holidays. Sometimes I put up with abuse. Despite all that, I love my job," she said.

Contact the writer at wangkeju@chinadaily.com.cn