Huang Qiping (l) and Su Chunxi (r).

While she was in Beijing, her photo was taken for various projects, including a 1981 photobook of all of China's ethnic groups. It was only in 1983 that she discovered that one of the photos was used as the basis for the 2-jiao engraving.

The experience has brought her quite a bit of recognition over the years; following a profile in overseas media in 2000, people began to send her letters with 2-jiao notes inside, asking for her autograph on them.

The two girls on the note were photographed separately, so Huang could only guess that the girl on the right was an ethnic Korean who had also been involved in the anniversary celebrations in 1979. And later last week, NCV located the model, Su Chunxi, originally from Yanbian autonomous district in Jilin Province but who now lives in Beijing with her Hui husband. Unlike Huang, she knew when her picture was taken that it was for the RMB note, but the news did not pass beyond her immediate family and the governor of the district.

Su, just 17 at the time the photo was taken, later attended the Central Nationalities University and Peking University, and worked for a while in Korea. She now runs a foreign-language training school.

A third model, Mr. Wang De'an, who appears on the left of the fourth-series 1-jiao note, died three months ago at 83. He served as a local leader in a prefecture in Guizhou. Perhaps the most famous model on early RMB issues, Liang Jun on the third-series 1-yuan note, currently lives in Heilongjiang and is the subject of periodic media profiles. She is 75.

Models for the fifth series of RMB notes are not at all hard to identify - all of the recent issues feature chairman Mao on the front. According to NCV:

Illustrating the notes with famous figures from Chinese history was considered at one time. However, it is better when the common people are more familiar with the images on the notes, since small changes to the images (as in counterfeit notes) would raise an alarm. So after some back and forth, Mao Zedong's image was still the best, since everyone was very familiar with it.

Photos of Huang and Su are available on the pages linked below.