Millions of impoverished rural labourers from inland provinces see Guangzhou as a kind of eldorado. But in recent days, cold February rains have made the city feel more like 'an ashtray full of damp cigarette butts', as one resident puts it.
That has not deterred record numbers of job-seekers from flocking to the city to tao jin (pan for gold). Between January 27 and 30, 3.17 million workers travelled to Guangdong, according to statistics released by the Guangdong Labour Bureau.
Most - about three million - are migrant labourers, with a further two million expected to arrive before the post-Spring Festival travel period officially ends on February 17.
Most are returning to factories at which they were employed last year. But hundreds of thousands are coming to Guangdong for the first time, without jobs lined up.
Officials from the provincial Labour Bureau's employment administration office have warned newcomers that 'they must not come blindly to Guangdong in search of work. New arrivals to Guangdong need to understand that the employment situation here is as tight as it is elsewhere in the country'.
That is not strictly true, as Guangdong's labour market is clearly more favourable than those of Hunan or Sichuan, for example. But provincial authorities want to save as many new job openings as possible for the more than one million Guangdong natives who will either be laid off or will enter the labour market this year.
Provincial rules forbid employers from hiring any new 'outsiders' for a one-month period beginning immediately after the Spring Festival holiday.
