Last Updated on May 1, 2025 by stlplace
Below was written on 05-24-2008, 12 days after 2008 Sichuan earthquake.
When the Tangshan earthquake (Wikipedia) happened 32 years ago, I was still a pre-school kid. But I remember my mom took us (the kids) to sleep at neighbors home one night, presumably she thought that is safer place. After I grew up, when I read Qian Gang’s book titled Tangshan Earthquake, I had the opportunity to grasp the magnitude of the disaster. One thing puzzled me is China refused all international aids at that time: becaue China was pround of self-sufficiency.
Thirty-two years has passed. China has changed a lot, especially in economy. She has gone from nowhere to No. 4 economy in the world (is closing in No. 3 Germany). For me I have grown up as an adult, witnessing the whole event from the other side of the globe, with my heart and emotions touched…
Some thoughts
1) Progress made in goverment: it’s all about saving lives, from pulling the survivors out of rubble, to taking stranged villagers, miners to safty; from sending troops, firefighters quickly, to accepting domestic volunteers and international help; from dontations of material, money and blood, to dedicate three days of mourning;…all these are unprecedented.
2) Openness of media, esp. the Internet. Many good critism came from the ordinary people, such as the mis-use of donated material and monitor use of the funds; the construction quality of schools. The openness in turn helped people outpouring the love and hopefully we will have more strong sense of community and more target non for profit organizations, to help the survivors of the earthquake, and help other dis-advantaged people in China.
Problems
1) Poverty, imbalance. The earthquake is a natural disaster, but it showed the problem China faced and still face these days: over-population, some of the area are not really human friendly, due to the geological character (mud slide in mountains). Not to talk about industry. Western media has been focusing the development in China these days, e.g., NPR was going to do some stories in Chengdu when this happened. Later Melissa Block and Robert Siegal did a fantastic job reporting both the earthquake and ordinary people stories in Chengdu.
2) Rank people or company patroism according to the money donated?
3) Intolerance on Internet (Wang Shi comments).