China's grassroots heroes

The deeds of 10 (extra)ordinary individuals and groups have moved people across China, and their stories could also move the world.

The 10, who were selected by members of the public through an online vote, were named "People Moving China in 2014". They include a student, a courier, disabled singers and a farmer-turned director.

Sangye Drolma, a meter reader in Golog Tibet Autonomous Prefecture in the northwest province of Qinghai, has spent 12 years working in the remote plateau, which has an average altitude of 4,000 meters.

She rides a yak and often has to cross dozens of kilometers a day in freezing weather.

"Once I came across a wolf pack in the mountains. I was really scared and hid with my yak behind a huge stone," said Sangye Drolma.

Not only being responsible for meter reading and repairs, she also volunteers and looks after many elderly people that have no family, bringing them food, medicine and love.

Tang Zhengyun, head of the Longquan community in Yunnan's Ludian county, is enough to make the most stone-hearted among us cry.

He lost eight members of his family in a magnitude-6.5 earthquake in Ludian this August, but he had no time to grieve or even attend their funerals. As the village head, he had to organize the relief work and help distribute supplies to his displaced residents.

Tang and his colleagues rescued 17 villagers but he could not save his cousins and nephews, who lived slightly further away.

He slept less than five hours a day during the relief effort, and being busy, he said, helped him temporarily block out his grief.

Other recipients of the accolade were the "Mountain and River Orchestra", the members of which are handicapped young people; Xiong Guilin, a courier who has helped old people for free for 24 years; and Liu Yunxia, a rural woman known for writing and producing a TV series on the tradition of rural arranged marriages several decades ago.

"Great humanity is seen in these ordinary people," Internet user huerdao commented on the the twitter-like Weibo.

Us young people should learn from their spirit. Let's give them a thumbs-up," another user, shishangneiyishenghuopu, said.

The online selection was initiated by Xinhua News Agency in 2010, to promote ordinary people's deeds and improve moral awareness.