'Actually I'd never even thought of becoming a volunteer at the Beijing Olympics before. To be honest, I'm really not that interested in or good at sports,' the cheerful 17-year-old said with a shy smile at the rehabilitation centre on Tuesday, before leaving for Luoyang.

'One day, suddenly, I was told that I would be a torch-bearer at the Paralympics,' she said. 'I'm very excited and wanted to try volunteer work in Beijing, too.'

She has been in a wheelchair since losing her right leg and seriously injuring her left one when Dongqi Secondary School in Hanwang town, Mianzhu , collapsed like numerous other 'tofu' schools in the May 12 quake.

After being trapped under the rubble for three days, Jingwen saw a rescue worker approaching. She told the woman: 'Auntie, be careful, it's very dangerous here.' Her words of concern for the rescuer's welfare soon spread, and she has become a celebrity of sorts in the community.

Millions of children returned to school on Monday after their summer vacations, but Jingwen was not among them. She described her days at the rehabilitation centre very simply: 'eating, training [such as physiotherapy], sleeping'.

'The most terrible moments were when it hurt so much when I tried to turn over [in bed] or sit up. At least now it doesn't hurt that much,' She does not yet know when she will be able to be fitted with a prosthesis.

Coupled with the physical agony are painful memories she just wants to forget.

'I've lost most of my good friends. I just don't want to think about it, because every time I think about it, I just feel so bad,' she said, turning her head away.

These days, what she misses are the lessons given by the volunteers, who have already left for the autumn term at university.

Indeed, the thing foremost in Jingwen's mind is when she can go back to school.

'You see, now that I've become like this, going to school and studying hard is my only way out,' she said.

But she has heard nothing for many days about going back, not even from her own teacher.

'One day, our teacher came here, but he didn't even mention anything about when I can go back to school and things like that, and he left very quickly. I just don't know what to do.'

Her hopes of getting out of the rehabilitation centre any time soon seem slim. Doctors originally said she could be released by late November, but experts later said she would have to stay for at least half a year given the severity of her condition.

Jingwen's only consolation is that she is not alone. Every night, her parents sleep in a portable bed in her ward, which is shared by another patient. Both her parents are migrant workers who were in Hangzhou , Zhejiang , when the quake struck - which fills them with regret for not being at her side at the time.

Although the hospital has paid all the costs of Jingwen's treatment and food, her parents do what they can to buy nutritious food for her.

'Now we just want to stay with her and give her love,' said her father, Qing Liqi , 45. 'I just hope she can recover in tranquillity, and that she can get into a good university in the future and lead a good life.'

And Jingwen is just as determined: 'I have to do more exercise, I have to walk, and I have to go to school.'