Volunteers at the Sichuan earthquake in China
Trip Start
Jan 30, 2007
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Trip End
Dec 31, 2011
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Chengdu,
Sichuan,
China
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Here are some of the stories from the zone and also info about opportunities.
1. Int'l humanitarianism shines in rescue efforts for China's quake
www.chinaview.cn
Special report: Strong Earthquake Jolts SW China
By Li Bo
BEIJING, May 24 (Xinhua) -- In the monumental rescue efforts following the 8.0-magnitude earthquake in China's Sichuan province, the international community has demonstrated a highly commendable spirit of humanitarianism by extending helping hands, materials and sympathy.
Foreign rescue teams from Japan, Russia, South Korea and Singapore joined their Chinese counterparts in searching survivors and their professionalism was highlighted by their defiance of danger, around-the-clock work and scientific ways of rescuing.
Also heart-warming are the performances of international volunteers, many of whom are studying or working in China. They rushed to the earthquake-struck areas on their own to offer medical and other kinds of help, supplementing the rescue and relief efforts carried out by the Chinese government, army and people.
The heroic deeds of foreign rescuers and volunteers have so impressed the Chinese people and their leaders that Chinese President Hu Jintao took time after greeting visiting Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Beijing on Saturday to meet Russian rescuers and express his appreciation to them on behalf of the Chinese people.
Disaster unites Chinese
While inspecting the disaster scenes in Sichuan shortly after the earthquake, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao also grasped the hands of international volunteers to express his gratitude after encountering a group of members of the U.S.-based aid organization Heart-to-Heart International.
To help China overcome one of the worst natural disasters in its recent history, the world has immediately started a donation campaign.
By the evening of May 21, 15 countries and regions had flown to Sichuan more than 1,000 tons of aid materials, while cashes worth nearly 500 million yuan (72 million U.S. dollars), besides private donations, have been donated from abroad to China through diplomatic channels, according to official statistics.
International organizations as well as countries have been responding swiftly to China's appeal for help. Upon China's request, the International Maritime Satellite Organization has widened the wavelength over Sichuan, and some countries have shared satellite pictures with China. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of tents from abroad have been rushed to the affected regions.
Up to 17:00 Beijing time (0900 GMT) Friday, heads of state and government, parliamentary leaders, officials of international organizations and people from all walks of life from 153 countries visited Chinese embassies, consulates or missions to mourn the victims of the earthquake.
Ever since the news of the earthquake broke out, public opinions as well as media around the world, besides extending fullsympathy for China, have expressed their high respect for the rescue and relief efforts carried out by China itself.
Earthquake damage
All in all, such an unprecedented natural disaster as what happened in Sichuan has made people in the world care more for each other and humanitarianism, which is nature to us human beings, shines more than ever. Just as the lyrics of a Chinese song go, the world will be better off if everyone can give more care to others.
2. Red Cross updates
http://www.ifrc.org/what/disasters/response/sichuan-earthquake/index.asp
3. From the website Crossroads:
Sichuan Earthquake: How to Help
May 12th, 2008 by Rich
As you know by now, and Shanghaiist has updated 60+ times, Sichuan has experienced a massive earthquake and the damage (while still largely unknown) is sure to be significant.
If you are looking to help, I have a list of sites below of China’s largest charities that are typically the first responders. I have emails out to several friends in local NGOs catering to smaller villages, but for now I suggest:
China Charity Foundation - Partner with Red Cross
China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation
If anyone knows of an NGO active in Sichuan, and has a specific need, please feel free to post in the comments section below or email me directly.
UPDATE
For those who are looking to contribute to current aid efforts underway, you can now donate money to the Red Cross Society of China which has formed a disaster relief working group to be dispatched to the earthquake-stricken Wenchuan County in Sichuan.
They have also published an emergency relief hotline, along with bank account information to receive donations to assist their cause:
Account name: Red Cross Society of China
开户单位：中国红十字会总会
For those who want to donate in RMB: you can send money to the RMB account at the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China branch below:
人民币开户行: 中国工商银行 北京分行东四南支行
人民币账号: 0200001009014413252
For those who want to donate in foreign currency, you can send money to the foreign currency account at the CITIC Bank branch below:
外币开户行：中信银行酒仙桥支行
外币账号: 7112111482600000209
Hotline: (8610) 65139999
Online donations: Red Cross Society of China website: www.redcross.org.cn
4.
Sichuan
Story from the EconomistThe earthquake in Sichuan
China helps itself
May 22nd 2008 | JIANGYOU
From The Economist print edition
The government's relief effort is impressive; even more inspiring is what ordinary people are doing to fill the gaps
SOME 200 survivors of China's deadliest earthquake in more than 30 years line up for a handout of food. It looks good. There is rice gruel, braised diced pork, courgettes and hot steamed buns. There are also no officials. The Communist Party likes to be seen as society's main benefactor, but this is private aid.
The party has mobilised its own forces on a huge scale in response to the disaster on May 12th in the south-western province of Sichuan, which has left more than 74,000 dead or missing, 247,000 injured and 5m homeless. More than 100,000 troops and police have been deployed to help survivors and to rescue people trapped by rubble and landslides. Hopes of finding more are fast dwindling. But the scale of non-governmental involvement has been just as striking.
The food handout in Jiangyou, a small city 115km (70 miles) east of the epicentre, was being carried out by volunteers from an ad hoc group of private catering companies from another province. The recipients were refugees from the nearby town of Beichuan, which was all but flattened by the earthquake. Their appetising hot meal contrasted with the instant noodles and biscuits offered at other food stations.
Even had it wanted to, it would have been difficult for the government to keep relief efforts in the hands of its usual instruments: military and civilian officials, the Communist Youth League and the Chinese Red Cross. The disaster struck at a time of nationalist fervour fuelled by a widespread feeling that China was being unfairly criticised for its handling of unrest in Tibet. Sentiments were further aroused by blanket coverage of the earthquake in the state-controlled media—a departure from the party's usual tongue-tied approach to disasters.
Responding to the mood, the government declared three days of public mourning from May 19th. Disasters do not normally rate such attention—the last day of public mourning was 11 years ago, on the death of Deng Xiaoping. In Beijing thousands of people gathered in Tiananmen Square to observe an official call for three minutes of silence. They also, spontaneously, chanted slogans and punched their fists in the air, shouting “Come on China!” as police looked on warily. In Chengdu, the provincial capital, on May 21st a police car shadowed about 100 unofficial relief workers who marched through the streets after dark, carrying candles and chanting patriotic slogans.
A fast-growing middle class with money to spare on travel and, as it now seems, on charity, did not wait for official encouragement to help out in Sichuan. Thousands of volunteers headed to the disaster zone, from businessmen to Christian youth. Their cars, some bedecked with flags and slogans, ply the expressway between Chengdu and Jiangyou.
Hundreds of taxis helped ferry the injured to hospitals in the city. At Mianyang, a big city close to Jiangyou, police erected barricades on an approach road to a stadium sheltering some 20,000 refugees, to prevent its being clogged by volunteer vehicles. A government plea for unofficial volunteers to stay away from the disaster zone and concentrate instead on activities such as raising money and donating blood has fallen on deaf ears.
The government seems little inclined to deter the volunteers more rigorously. It knows that public opinion is mostly on its side. The prime minister, Wen Jiabao, appears to have earned considerable kudos by rushing to the scene and staying there for five days to direct relief operations, at one point in tears.
Inside the stadium grounds, which are guarded by militia in camouflage uniforms, stalls set up by volunteer groups offer the refugees services ranging from psychological counselling to the (seemingly more popular) charging of mobile-telephone batteries. An American nurse at one stall helps doctors examine children. In the town of Shifang, south-west of Jiangyou, Buddhist monks say prayers for victims in a temple where the government has settled hundreds of refugees.
The combination of government and volunteer effort appears to have had good results. In refugee camps on the periphery of the disaster zone, tent areas appear clean and orderly, with adequate supplies of food and clean water. There have been no reports of serious outbreaks of disease. Most refugees seem in reasonable spirits. Tents, however, are a problem. Officials say there are still far from enough proper ones. Many refugees are sheltering under makeshift tarpaulin structures. Some Chengdu residents, fearing aftershocks, have taken to sleeping in tents. Demand has pushed up the cost of a small tent fourfold, residents complain, despite government orders to retailers to rein in prices of relief-related materials.
Much of the volunteer effort has involved individuals or small groups. China is still wary of large NGOs and has none that is truly independent of the government specialising in disaster relief. But in recent years the party has begun to acknowledge more openly that there may a role for them. Official press coverage of the earthquake, although careful to highlight the party's contributions, has also paid rare tribute to the unofficial volunteers.
The government has been encouraging firms to give more generously to worthy causes. From this year it has increased tax incentives for corporate donations to charities. But this applies to only a small number of government-approved organisations. For the sake of earthquake relief the authorities are letting down their guard. But the government gives little encouragement to new NGOs and often treats the small existing ones as potential germs of political opposition. The response to this disaster might ease its fears.
5. From the NY Times
May 20, 2008
Many Hands, Not Held by China, Aid in Quake
By JIM YARDLEY and DAVID BARBOZA
LUCHI, China — Hao Lin had already lied to his wife about his destination, hopped a plane to Chengdu, borrowed a bike and pedaled through the countryside in shorts and leather loafers by the time he reached this ravaged farming village. A psychologist, Mr. Hao had come to offer free counseling to earthquake survivors.
He had company. A busload of volunteers in matching red hats was bumping along the village’s rutted dirt road. Employees from a private company in Chengdu were cleaning up a town around the bend. Other volunteers from around China had already delivered food, water and sympathy.
“I haven’t done this before,” said Mr. Hao, 36, as he straddled his mountain bike on Saturday evening. “Ordinary people now understand how to take action on their own.”
From the moment the earthquake struck on May 12, the Chinese government dispatched soldiers, police officers and rescue workers in the type of mass mobilization expected of the ruling Communist Party. But an unexpected mobilization, prompted partly by unusually vigorous and dramatic coverage of the disaster in the state-run news media, has come from outside official channels. Thousands of Chinese have streamed into the quake region or donated record sums of money in a striking and unscripted public response.
Beijing is instinctively wary of public activism and has long maintained tight restrictions on private charities and religious, social and environmental groups that operate outside government control. The public outpouring is so overwhelming that analysts are debating whether it will create political aftershocks and place pressure on China’s authoritarian state to allow more space for civil society.
When the quake struck, party officials initially assigned oversight of private relief efforts to the Communist Youth League, the political base of President Hu Jintao. But many individuals, corporations and nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs, simply rushed into action to supplement what they say is an overburdened Chinese Red Cross or to help with the rescue, according to representatives of some private citizens’ groups.
Faced with the potential for a grave humanitarian crisis, officials loosened their grip. They have since begun warning volunteers to stay out of the earthquake zone, citing safety concerns. But thousands are already there.
In Chengdu, relief volunteers have formed a command structure called the NGO Relief Action Group to coordinate 30 organizations. They have collected donations of instant noodles, biscuits, rice, medicine, clothes and bedding.
“We realized that this is such an unprecedented crisis that we must join together to make some substantial contribution,” said Xing Mo, 39, a veteran organizer of nongovernmental organizations and president of the Yunnan Institute of Development, a school that trains volunteers.
Most volunteers say they approve of the way the government has handled rescue and relief efforts so far. Some experts believe that party leaders could channel that enthusiasm to bolster their authority, just as they helped stoke nationalist anger after the outbreak of ethnic Tibetan unrest and foreign protests against the Olympic torch this spring.
Even so, Chinese leaders generally treat unscripted public involvement in civil affairs as a threat to stability. The reaction to the quake in Sichuan Province shows how rising wealth, cellphones, text messaging and mass transportation now make it much harder for the authorities to control popular reaction to a major event.
The public’s spontaneous rush to volunteer is a piece of the same defiance in which media outlets collectively defied an initial ban by the party’s Propaganda Department on firsthand coverage of the quake.
“This is a significant turning point for China,” said Bao Shuming, a senior research coordinator for the China Data Center at the University of Michigan. “This is going to dissolve some boundaries between the government and the common people. People are becoming more educated and organized, and society is becoming more open.”
For many Chinese, the public reaction is simply a natural outpouring of grief and a desire to help, reflective of a society where more people are now rich enough to give back. Even as traditionalists deplore modern China’s moral drift and embrace of materialism, a catastrophe projected to claim 50,000 lives, including thousands of children, has struck a deep chord.
“We grew up reciting Confucius saying that all men are born kind, but it takes a disaster like this to bring out the innate kindness of everyday human beings,” said Alan Qiu, 41, an investor in Shanghai. “People are touched by the scenes of children and also the value of life. We grew up in a society where people tend to believe that Chinese lives are of less value than foreign lives.”
Outside the earthquake zone in Sichuan, the public response has grown exponentially. Exact figures change daily, but donations from Chinese citizens and companies have already surpassed the $500 million allocated by the government, according to state media. Some donations have been big, with Run Run Shaw, a Hong Kong millionaire, giving $14 million, while schoolchildren have donated the equivalent of pennies.
Blood drives, cake sales, charity fund-raisers and art auctions have already been held. Other people have dropped everything and raced to the scene. Forty members of a private car club in Chengdu, Sichuan’s provincial capital, made multiple trips transporting more than 100 injured people out of the devastated city of Shifang. Others have filled their cars or sport utility vehicles with supplies and driven hundreds of miles to Sichuan’s mountains.
Public interest is being driven by images and stories of heartbreak in the Chinese media that once would have been banned. State television has replayed film of herculean efforts to save trapped people, while newspapers have also been allowed to describe the horrors and graphic details of the devastation.
“One of the most amazing things is to see 24-hour coverage,” said Anthony Saich, a China specialist at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. He added, “Given the heightened sensitivity to the Olympics and the nationalist pride pumped up with the events in Tibet, maybe there’s a heightened sense of patriotism that was easier to mobilize here.”
Mr. Saich noted that China’s younger urban generation had shown little interest before in the plight of people in the countryside. “But now they are really shocked by the conditions people are living in.”
Developing a robust civil society is considered a major step if China is to become more democratic, and some advocates are hoping the earthquake proves to be a defining moment that will inspire the public to push for more change in the future. As yet, though, nongovernmental organization’s are still playing a very minor role, and Mr. Xing of the Yunnan Institute acknowledged that merely being allowed at the scene did not mean that private groups were having the sort of impact they desired.
“The most frustrating thing is that transportation is a big headache,” he said. “We have so much cargo stuck on the way. We know thousands of people are in need urgently. But we simply cannot get to them.”
There are also a few emerging warning signals. Some companies are now requiring employees to make contributions rather than encouraging volunteerism. Bloggers have hectored celebrities, including the basketball star Yao Ming, whose relief donations are not deemed big enough. The torrent of contributions inevitably raises the specter of corruption and concerns about whether the money will be well spent. Government officials are starting to seek out experts on how to make rescue efforts more efficient.
For now, though, the huge public response, and its often chaotic, ad hoc nature, is evident in much of the earthquake zone. State media reported that the first private volunteers to arrive at the scene were a rescue team organized by the president of a Jiangsu Province investment firm. Since then, a passionate contingent of private citizens has steadily arrived.
Here in the remote village of Luchi, the local glass factory is a shattered husk while clusters of brick farmhouses are leveled. For Liu Lie, 67, a rice farmer, the situation is dire. He is sleeping with seven family members under a plastic tarp. Every wall of his home has been destroyed. But at the edge of his tarp, Mr. Liu pointed to stacks of bottled water, boxes of snacks and food and two bags of rice — all donations from volunteers who came here.
“They are coming because they love the Chinese people,” Mr. Liu said. “You have to understand the difference between the old society and new society. Twenty years ago, we didn’t have food to eat. Now people are bringing us supplies from Guangzhou and all over the country.”
Mr. Liu must still rebuild his home and restart his life long after the volunteers have returned to their regular lives. His wife, Guo Bihua, 63, is worried. “I’m worried about how we will build the house,” she said. “I’m old.”
Not far away, Mr. Hao, the psychologist, was just arriving with two other bikers, including Larry Wang, a Chinese who spent 30 years living in New York City. They had met in Chengdu and were riding through devastated rural areas to provide counseling. Mr. Hao lives in the teeming export city of Shenzhen and had two weeks of supplies stuffed inside a backpack.
He said he was excited to talk to survivors, especially children, and to help them cope. But do not tell his wife. “My wife doesn’t know I’m here,” he admitted. “She would be too scared. She thinks I’m in Guangzhou.”
Jim Yardley reported from Luchi, China, and David Barboza from Shanghai and Beijing. Howard W. French contributed reporting from Shanghai.
6. Earthquake diaries
http://www.worldvolunteerweb.org/?id=16390
7. Opportunities to volunteer
http://volunteer-boston.blogspot.com/2008/05/earthquake-in-china-volunteer.html
8. Story from the Telegraph
China earthquake: Beijing seizes on rescue for Olympic propaganda
By Richard Spencer in Beichuan
Last updated: 4:42 AM BST 24/05/2008
China's official propagandists have seized on the popular response to the Sichuan earthquake to portray a country united in its patriotism ahead of the Olympic Games.
A stampede of volunteers has travelled to Sichuan to join the relief effort, with some driving 1,000 miles from Beijing. Many of the capital's office workers left their desks last Friday and flew to Sichuan to spend 48 hours serving food in refugee camps. They returned by air on Sunday and were back at their desks on Monday morning.
All this has no precedent in modern Chinese history. But it was not just in the name of fellow human feeling. Wei Baoren pulled the bodies of his wife and five-year-old son out of the rubble of his home when the last great earthquake struck 32 years ago in Tangshan. This week, Dr Wei, 68, volunteered in Sichuan.
"I always wanted to pay something in return for my life being saved," he said. "I also received so much benefit from the government and the Communist Party, I wanted to give something back to them."
The Communist Party has responded to the disaster by mobilising its propaganda and political apparatus to unify the country behind its rule.
In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, there was some criticism even in the state media of the shoddy building standards, which seem to have played such a large role particularly in the deaths of so many schoolchildren.
Then Li Changchun, the party leader in charge of publicity, told reporters to present positive images of the relief effort. From that point on, China's television screens and newspapers have been filled with endless shots of soldiers parachuting from aircraft and grateful children holding up signs extolling the People's Liberation Army.
Even before the earthquake struck, the party had launched an all-out drive to stress national unity, a key rallying point since the regime abandoned egalitarianism. The rescue effort is seen as glorifying the modernisation drive that will have its crowning moment at the Olympics.
This national feeling culminated in patriotic demonstrations in Chengdu, the Sichuan provincial capital, and Beijing. Crowds of students raised their fists and chanted "Go! Go! China" and "Don't weep Sichuan".
