The housing shortage, corruption in high places, and misplaced official optimism are the targets of this lively and sometimes humorous look at contemporary Chinese urban life. Six families are crowded into temporary quarters, their hallway doubling as a communal kitchen while they await new apartments. As they watch funds for the new project being diverted to luxurious quarters for government functionaries and impressive hotels for tourists, they become discouraged and, eventually, mobilized. A realistic depiction of social classes and intra-class tensions, of generation and gender gaps, is woven into the chain of anecdotes that make up the storyline.