They come to hear the words of the guru they call 'teacher'. He's a self-made millionaire, from selling Amway, short for the American Way: the door-to-door sales of American cosmetics. It's a typical pyramid selling scheme, which relies on the quasi-religious faith of its salesmen. At something akin to a spiritualist meeting, we see thousands of Chinese cheering and singing in an unusually demonstrative way. These people don't just want to be rich, they want a whole new way of life: to care for their parents in their old age, to travel abroad, to live in luxury today. That quest for a better life has boosted Amway's China sales to more than a hundred million dollars. As a brick in the Amway pyramid, salesmen earn thirty times what they used to in the Red Army. And through meetings that look more like self-help groups than pyramid selling, the word is spreading fast. At a time when nothing in China seems certain, these people are looking not to the State but to themselves to find satisfaction: "Since we started working with Amway we dare to think, to dream and to have"

Produced by ABC Australia