Wednesday, May 28, 2008 (Beijing time)

 we will have 3 major works to support disaster victims:

 1) Continue sending materials
 2) Set up psychological support team
 3) Help the families with children to return to normal lives

I had the idea of “Help disaster victim families with children to return to normal lives ” when I was in Wenchuan. Many families lost family members, lost houses and almost anything; they are in extremely difficulty situation. For example, the day before yesterday I said that a family, grandmother and mother all died in the quake. If we could help the father of this family find a job, the whole situation of this family will be changed. Therefore, we help this family in the same time we also help the children of this family. We are still thinking about the way how to “help disaster victim families with children to return to normal lives”

The work of Psychological support team will be a long-term work. In fact it may take 6 to 12 months for doctor to diagnose some children's psychological stress problems. Therefore, psychological support must uphold for a long time. This work also requires a lot of experienced volunteers.

     Material management is very complicated and arduous work. We must send out the material on time to the places where the disaster victims need.

Now we still need volunteers:
Among them, “material management” needs 2-3 volunteers, “help disaster victim families with children” needs of children 3-5 volunteers, psychological support team needs 10-15 volunteers.

We hope that these areas of interest in the work of the volunteers to contact us.
To be psychological support team volunteer, the candidate must have psychological counseling, or kindergarten or school teaching experiences. We will be able to train volunteers to provide psychological counseling.

For some of the requirements of the volunteers:
1) Can bear hardships.
2) Can continue working for at least one week;
3) Can follow the volunteers rules.
4) The fee of travel, hotel, and food must be covered by volunteers themselves;
 

Tuesday, May 27, 2008 (Beijing time) Now that I am back to Chengdu being able to use my own computer, I can send the pictures of the children one by one in the next several emails. The director of Wenchuan orphanage( also known as Aba Orphanage, they are the only welfare home with children in the entire Wenchuan area), Mr. Lang called me this afternoon telling me they finally had light at night on the 25th, using the generator we took to them.  The children were all delighted!    Director Lang and his children in Wenchuan orphanage, he is called Daddy Lang by every child.   children of Wencuan orphanage This 18 year old , Min Chuan has brittle-bone disease.  She was sent to the orphange when she was one.  I want to ask a friend in Beijing who has twins with brittle-bone and has lots of knowlege of it, if there is anything we can do to help her. They are three biological sisters, the oldest sister is Zhuoma but she is not here today.  The youngest is 13 year old.   This little girl is so sweet, she tried to feed cherry to Officer Zhang, who came with us in his own SUV.   Officer Zhang later decided to sponsor her himself and gave me the money before I left Wen Chuan.  We soon will add names to each picture I took of the children and then offer the opportunity for sponsorship to everyone who wants to help them.  I have visited Deyang and WenChuan orphanges and took picture of each child I saw that is available for soponsorship through CHI.    twins   Wangli is a sweet 6 year old.  She missed the little toy bus I gave out and went back to her room to cry.  My friend Lirui than gave her all the food in her bag and made Wangli smile again.    This is the tents for girls.  They went back to the orphange to get beds and other items inspect of the danger and rush back.     supplies we brought       Boys ready to be sponsored.  I realized after visiting the orphanage in person that they don't have 20 children under 2 years old.  It must be the dialect director Lang speaks that confused me.  However, I am still very glad we made the trip to bring the supply to them.  Especially after seeing the condition they live in.      The children gave us cherries to say thank you.    ***** It took us one whole day on the bus, from 7:00am  26th,yesterday from Wenchuan to get to Chengdu this morning  27th around 7:30am. We sit in this position for 24 hours.  We also had to change buses in 4 places during the trip. Like Olympic torches, the drivers each drove one part of the trip so we passengers traveled non stop.  We arrived in Chengdu finally People come to families to look for a new life I was so happy to sit by my computer in my Chendu hotel room. Ms. Liao & Li Rui Ms.Liao the hotel owner was one of the volunteers went to Wenchuan with us.  We are so happy to see her again.     I wrote on the road, in the morning of 26th as we left Wenchuan: "Goodbye Wenchuan, the city got to be known by the world on the day of May 12th, 2008. I will remember you forever after being with you for the last 4 days.  I will remember the ruins, the tears, the loved ones who left this world and the love you showed to each other and to everyone.  I will be back, I promise, as long as you will remain exist.  Director Lang, Captain Zhang, the brother who lost the mom and the wife, the children in the orphanage.  I will get started to help  you as soon as I get back to Chengdu and Beijing.  Be safe!"

Monday, May 26, 2008 (Beijing time)

Leaving from Wenchuan to Chengdu, I would like to quickly join Chengdu, Mianyang and Beijing's relief work.

MaErKang is the capital of Aba Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. The escort team leader is a Tibetan young man. His beautiful Tibetan folk songs take us back to the normal people pragmatic attitude." Leaving from Wenchuan, I would like to quickly join Chengdu, Mianyang and Beijing's relief work.

"In the past few days, every morning, more than 100 buses leave Wenchuan. The buses sent the victims out of here. The first groups were students. But more people or fewer vehicles. Linked to our hard-won only four seats , The ride back to Chengdu, which is to send their children to evacuate the scene Wenchuan. I do not know when such a separation can be reunited. "
 

Goodbye, Wenchuan!
"May 26 at 7:20am, we left Wenchuan. Goodbye! Since four days ago I came to Wenchuan, people’s tears, the broken buildings, the love of alive people and the  Spirit of dead people, all of those will blend into my life forever. I must come back. Mr. Lang, (Note: director of Aba orphanage), children, Mr. Zhang  (Note: Meishan in Sichuan Armed Police Corps Detachment), and Xiao-Wei Di (note: who lost mother and wife), I will soon contact you to help you all! "

Sunday, May 25, 2008 (Beijing time)

At 8:00pm, we received Melody's call:

Today is a very smooth, very good day. The volunteers who visited Wenchuan orphanage now became the best friends each other. The four persons are Li Rui, the female reporter of Jing Newspaper, Zhao Qian and Huang Jian-feng, reporters of Chongqing Television Station, and me.

According to our experience of driving in the earthquake area, it will be OK to drive in the morning, but the road is dangerous in the afternoon due to falling stones caused by strong wind. So this morning we got off at 6:00am.

It is about 40 kilometers from Wenchuan to Maoxian. It would take not more than one hour normally. However, because of poor road conditions, landslides, we tried twice but failed to go through. 5 team members gave up. Today, 4 of us tried again. We have to stop driving to wait for road repairing. It is very dangerous to park on the road in the mountain. You don’t know where the rocks would be falling down - the rocks above our heads as if the sword of Damocles.

To be honest, my experience in the disaster area, what I saw, the difficulties I met, are over load. I almost can’t stand. Yesterday, I had great emotions. Sorry about that. But one thing has been supporting me, I have been very grateful to have such an opportunity here to help the people of Sichuan, to have such a chance to share my love.
Today, I am particularly happy on the road and I have a feeling that we would be successful to send the material to Wenchuan orphanage. We felt so comfortable that Isome of us even fell into sleep in the car!

When we took two vehicles (a military truck, a Jeep) loaded with supplies to Wenchuan orphanage, the director of the orphanage Mr.Lang was too excited to say anything. The orphanage has 31 children and six elderly people. I took pictures for each child. I will send those pictures to our office when I find out Internet service. The supplies we took here piled up like a small hill: include a generator, children's products, daily necessities and even the toilet paper.

Tomorrow, I will return to Chengdu. I will discuss with Mianyang and Chengdu’s colleagues about the next plan. I have some preliminary planning and thinking, the basic point is that as a private charitable organization, we really need help local people during their most difficult stage; when everyone's attention gradually shifted to the normal lives we really need set up a long-term program to help the children affected by the earthquake.

Now the most important work should be resettle the people in the disaster areas. A lot of people mainly rely on self-help, but for them, it is very difficult. The private charitable organization and agencies can do something in the resettlement for the people of disaster areas.

Yesterday, I mentioned a family; the first name of this family is Tang. Their mother and grandmother were dead. Only father and two children are alive. It is a typical victim’s family after the earthquake. The sister-in-law of this family is pregnant for 6 months. She doesn’t have enough food and have no clear water to take bath.

The father of this family can drive, I think if I took him to Beijing he may find out a job. Anybody who saw the sad situation in the disaster area, really want to do something to help those victims of disasters.

                                                                                   *****
This morning at 6:30am, Melody and the team started to drive to Mao County. They finally arrived at the orphanage at noon.

photos from Melody last night：

the situation of road May 24th morning


people going home on foot

Saturday, May 24, 2008 (Beijing time)

At 10:16 pm, we received calls from Melody. Following is part of the contents:

I am calling to you from the Information Centre (voice not clear).

Yesterday our team stayed in the army camps. Today We visited some of earthquake victims with the soldiers. One of the families, mother and grandmother were killed in the earthquake, The father and two young children have nothing left beside clothes on their bodies.

Tomorrow, we decided to go to Maoxian, to send food and the other things to Wenchuan orphanage - I promised to the director of Wenchuan orphanage that I would visit the orphanage. Wenchuan orphanage is located in Maoxian. From the first day of the earthquake, the orphanage has no water and power, we cannot imagine how bad situation it is now.

Out team only left 4 persons (the other 5 gave up), and we don't have enough vehicles to send goods to the orphanage. Mr. Zhang, an army officer find a car for us, and will escort us to Maoxian.

Our plan is, After visiting Maoxian, we will not back to Wenchuan, but directly go to Lixian. (Note: This two areas are the heaviest disaster areas. Because of bad road condition, relief supplies cannot to enter in large quantities)

This is the dangerous road - I am afraid I may not be able to call you in the next couple days.

***

We received SMS from Melody:

"May 21, and the day before yesterday, we drove overnight for 14 hours, yesterday morning (May 22) arrived at MaoEKang, arrived at Wenchuan in the evening. We decided to spend night there because of car problems and landslides. This morning (May 23), we tried to drive toward but we met too many landslides and waited for half day on the road without any moving. Finally, we decided to change our plan to drive on the road to Maoxian and went back."

                        
                       At 2:00pm on May 23, we decided to change our plan because of landslides

"Now in the earthquake area, people need medicine for skin problems, such as: Anti-itch cream and miconazole nitrate cream.They also need other urgent items: quilts, covers, pillows, pollow cases, shampoo, soap, toothpaste, toothbrush and so on."

Friday, May 23, 2008 (Beijing time)

Frightening Memories of the Treacherous Road to Wenchuan 

Despite our previous plan, we decided to pursue the quicker route into Wenchuan instead of the longer/safer way, saving us 200km in driving time. Everything was fine until 10:00pm last night, when a dense fog set in and visibility dropped to 3-4 meters. We were driving down a mountainside with a deep ravine on one side. This made us all very nervous. Our route took us over Mengbi Mountain, which is over 4314m tall; we were taking the same route the Red Amy took during the Long March 70 years ago.  Our driver  became worn out and so requested that we rest at about 2:00 am . We slept in a little inn at A Bazhou overnight, and continued our trip at daybreak. Despite our previous plan, we decided to pursue the quicker route into Wenchuan instead of the longer/safer way, saving us 200km in driving time. According to the Wenchuan Orphanage director we will be the first batch of people to help the orphanage specifically. We were eager to arrive.

last night Melody sleep in a army camp

Children in wenchuan

Near midnight, in a little county named Xiao Jin, a scene moved us. There were several Tibetans along the road, offering volunteers and victims donated food. They live in the mountains, and come down every morning to the roadside, making some simple meals for the people passing by, and do not return home until midnight. They gave us some food before we left, telling us to eat on the way and share with the victims if we see any.

Brainstorming on the Road... 

In the beginning, our rescue and material aid operation was centered around Mianyang and the most damaged city of Beichuan. Volunteer Mao Yuan from Beijing Medical University 3rd Hospital was with us dispersing material aid. Our nurse Zhao Xiao Nian was and is with a psychology team at Mianyang, counseling the children.  Children's Hope staff member, Shen Jia Yng , arrived on the 20th to join the counseling work in Mianyang. While Chen Hui , also with Children's Hope, is in charge of receiving and dispersing material aid.  

Now we are expanding our rescue area with the help of many volunteers, in many different ways. As of May 21, we began sending volunteers and donations to Qingchuan, Guangyuan, and Shifang to reach the victims there.  

My main task is helping the orphans in the orphanages and the children who have become orphaned from the quake. It is hard to calculate how many children have been orphaned; they are under government  protection and we can not become too involved at this point. What we can do is help the original orphans and build relationships with the orphanages, so when we can help the new orphans we will be able to do so as soon as possible.  

Our quake rescue team expands, as we are asking psychologists in our network to research the best way of aiding the children (and to create training lessons for the volunteers) and relying on contacts in Hong Kong for materials and lessons on major disaster interventions.  

We are cooperating with the Red Cross to design a poster, to be printed and issued to the public after government confirmation for epidemic prevention. 

A lot of charity organizations and NGOs are collecting donations, both cash and material. Children’s Hope has had an amazing response to material aid; many needed items reported from the front lines are met almost immediately from our different sources. The money we raise is used for the greatest need of children.  

I have a proposal now: I want to build a foundation with the money we have, a Growing Fund. This fund will help the children effected by the earthquake, specifically, for psychoanalytic consultation, education assistance, necessary medical treatments, and skill training and career assistance for the older children.  

As time goes by and people change their focus from the disaster, I wish this fund will bring professionals together to help and care for these children as they grow into adults. It is a big proposal, but together – we can do this for the children.