Qirong Chen, China
I had no idea my life would take me so far from my small village in Northwest China. Now I am a 23-year-old graduate student in Germany. But as a boy I was perpetually fatigued and would fall asleep in class. I was then diagnosed with heart disease. At that time I never imagined that I would one day go away to graduate school in Germany. Now I can run and play sports, and still have the energy to study hard. Without heart surgery, I wouldn’t have this life.