Dear All,
I'm certainly not a professional reporter, but I would like to bring
you to this experience through my own
eyes and my honest words...
Last night, after a long flight from Chicago to
Shanghai, then catch a domestic flight to
Chengdu, my
home city, also the base for the disaster relief
effort. I finally arrived Chengdu 2 hours later than
the original plan.
My luggage was total 21 lbs over the weight limit. But
as soon as they heard I was going to Chengdu, they let
me go without saying anything more.
At Shanghai Pudong Airport, flat TV screens are placed
all over the waiting area. They were all playing 24
hours news coverage of the disaster relief effort.
(Pic: SHairport 1 & SHairport 2 -- The passengers were
all watching.)
As I was waiting for my transfer flight from shanghai,
I got to watch part of the #9 live news conference
held in Chengdu by Sichuan Provincial government
(apparently, they started this TV series since the day
one of disaster). T
he head administrator of each
department within the provincial government answered
questions reporters from all over China. Some of those
questions were:
1. What's the long term plan of the government for
those bilateral (both) lower extremity amputee
orphans?
2. "What's the single item that's most needed at this
time?"
--- Answer is "Tents"! "Despite of the fact a lot of
Chinese manufactories have already been working over
time day and
night, they still couldn't match with the
needs. So, the government has already been looking for
buying from foreign countries..."
3. A reporter from Hu Bei Province aske, "when the
wounded could be sent to Hu Bei as they're looking
forward to take care of the patients from disaster
area?"
4. "What's the answer to some private companies and
individual who volunteer to donate their office space
and private homes to accommodate the refugees?"
5. "What's government's thought regarding that some
individuals and companies would like to adopt orphans
left after the disaster?"
--- The related administrator listed the procedure
process and criteria for adoption in China. In the
end, pointed out it's n
ot allowed for any business
entities to adopt orphans.
6. A reporter asked if the specific reason which
triggered this huge earthquake is because of building
irrigation engineering project in the upper level...
...
From the window, I can see boxes of boxes full of
supplies were carried to our plane as shown on the
photos "SHairport 3, 4, &5".
When I got on Sichuan 3U airline to Chengdu, I picked
two local Chinese and 1 English newspapers (China
Daily). The ne
ws and stories of earthquake covered
every pa
ge of all three. Tears companied me during the
entire 3 hour-flight after that. The forefront and
last pages of C
hina Daily of May 21st were the entire
photos as in the attachment na
med "China Daily 1&2".
(If I recognized it correctly, the last photo is from
a German Photographer's photo album, called
"Himalaya"...)
May 19-21st: Three day National mourning period.
The flight attendant's initial greeting after all the
passengers sat down has changed to "Let's mourn for
all the victims in WenChuan earthquake..."
Among the passengers, there're at least 4 volunteers
going for the disaster relief: three for setting up
water purifier equipment, wearing a white band on his
arm (photo "VTCDairport"), 1 for delivering medicines,
some others I wasn't sure.
The first night, I stayed at my parent's place. At the
side of the bed, I saw something "strange", two empty
beer bottles were placed upside down in vertical
line.... ??? What's that?! Later, I was told it's my
father's home-made earthquake alarm system -- see
photo "Homemade". :-) I hope it brings you a little
smile. I kind of doubt if it works properly as it fell
to detect a small aftershock last night.
Most of today, May 22nd, I spent on watching TV news,
newspapers, and searching on Websites. I found some
very moving stories and photos, which I will send on
Ping's Report (2).
Thanks for reading.
No comments:
Post a Comment