What does a promise across the sea look like? Meet Zhang Xuejing, a long-term care worker in Qingdao, Shandong Province. Since late 2022, she has been traveling to an island to provide essential in-home medical care for older people with disabilities. Her work goes beyond healthcare: Through compassion, dedication and trust, she has forged bonds that have turned strangers into family. As China rolls out its nationwide long-term care insurance scheme this year, Zhang's story offers a glimpse of what the policy means in people's everyday lives.