rat race

Yet the pressures - the ones that are pushing more Chinese youth to quit the rat race, "lie flat" and take their frustrations out online - remain.

Imagine this: After years of toiling in the Southern California rat race, you buy a parcel of land in the high desert.

Norway's Casper Ruud criticised the ranking system earlier this year, describing it as "a rat race", while Australian world number nine Alex de Minaur put his early French Open exit down to "feeling burned out".

Tangping, or “lying flat,” became a ubiquitous term for opting out of the rat race, not unlike the term “quiet quitting” in the U.S.

"Travelling really opened my eyes, we’re all stuck in a rat race here in the UK," she said.