By Grace Ng, China Correspondent

BEIJING, CHINA: A recently retrenched young woman in Beijing has put her 42C cup-sized assets up for grabs to earn cash - though not for anything too sleazy, mind you.

'I'm prepared to rent out my beautiful chest, which attracts a lot of attention from men, to any company,' she wrote on an online forum in February. She did not give her name.

'Companies can photograph their logo sandwiched between my assets. Monthly rental available. Please offer me a price.'

With jobs hard to come by in these economically depressed times, the woman has joined young Chinese who have flooded online forums since February with offers to lease a part of themselves for as little as 20 yuan (S$4).

Efforts to contact the well-endowed woman were unsuccessful, but fresh graduate Zhang Shuqi was not shy about taking off his shirt when offering himself on a 'For Rent' Internet website to earn some spare cash, and talking about it.

The buff, tanned 23-year-old is completing his studies at the police academy in Hunan province this month.

He said he hopes that the bare-chested photo will help him stand out from the 80 'Rent Me' ads posted by people across 37 Chinese cities in the last month alone.

'Touting my martial arts skills and a good body appear the best way to find part-time work while searching for jobs in this difficult time,' says Mr Zhang.

The young people are putting everything up for rent - well, almost anything: their time, skills such as their fashion sense, humour, willingness to walk the dog and cook up a storm.

Other than chests, they also advertise their listening ears, cuddles and self-proclaimed 'radiant smiles'.

Most of them are under the age of 30 and are grappling with a severe economic downturn for the first time in their adult lives. Some, like former engineer Wang Ning, 30, recently lost their jobs.

'I have a lot of spare time while looking for another job, so I'm willing to lease out my time to do everything and anything - as long as it is not illegal,' he told The Straits Times.

Mr Polo Wang, 28, holds a day job as a salesman. Having studied in Japan for seven years and learnt to speak Japanese fluently, he is looking to top up his recently reduced pay cheque by renting himself and his car out as a bilingual driver and translator to expatriates in Beijing. His price - 500 yuan for eight hours.

Nobody has contacted Mr Zhang since he posted his ad eight days ago but he is unfazed: 'There are so many rich people in China nowadays, so I am confident that there will be people who will contact me to make an offer.'

He does not have a fixed price in mind for his services, noting that 'it's all up for negotiation with the customer'.

But others, such as 27-year-old Li Chun, who describes herself as 'good-looking, respectable, 1.6m, 60kg, with no criminal record', go into great detail about hourly rates.

Ms Li trots out a long list of activities for which she will lease out her spare time from 6pm to 1am. To accompany you for a meal - 30 yuan per hour; having coffee - 20 yuan; flying kites together - 20 yuan; touring together for two days - 1,000 yuan excluding all travel expenses.

She draws the line at dates with married men and underage boys.

While the supply of 'rent me' applicants is abundant, the takers appear few so far. Only one of the five people interviewed said he had received a call.

'The woman just wanted to know whether I would be willing to do all the housework, gardening and shopping for 20 yuan per hour,' said Mr Wang Ning.

'I refused as the price was way too low. Even the ah yi (domestic helpers) charge much more.'

As for potential customers, Ms Lili Mao, 31, a secretary at a state-owned company in Beijing, said that she 'doesn't trust strangers who lease themselves out on the Web'.

But businessman Feng Jin, in his 50s, is open to the idea. 'I may consider hiring a pretty girl to chat and go shopping with,' he said.

'The younger generation do not seem to feel embarrassed or worry that they may bring shame to their parents by renting themselves out,' he added. 'The economic downturn has brought out a new side of young Chinese people.'

This article was first published in The Straits Times.