"I was open to various dance genres, including ballet, traditional Chinese dance and ethnic folk dance, which enabled me to know how my body works and how to control my body as a dancer," Xin says.

It was during her college years that Xin became aware of Martha Graham (1894-1991), the American dancer-choreographer who is considered the "mother of modern dance".

After graduation, Xin became a dance teacher at the Sichuan College of Culture and Arts. But her stable life in Mianyang changed after Sichuan was hit by a massive earthquake in 2008.

More than a decade later, Xin recalls the devastation. Xin was in a store buying a bottle of water when she saw people flooding out of their houses. The ground was shaking. The magnitude 8 quake killed more than 69,000 people.

In 2010, she applied to the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance in New York, a name she had learned from her college books. With the support of the Sichuan College of Culture and Arts, she passed an audition and entered the school in New York.

"I had never thought about studying abroad. The earthquake taught me that life is short and unpredictable. It motivated me to pursue my dreams," says Xin.