Yesterday I mentioned a story in The Guardian about Liu Han Hope Elementary School, whose students all survived the earthquake thanks to reliable construction (e.g. the use of building-grade concrete) and to their teachers, who led them on an overnight hike over the hills to a nearby city.
I’ve found a translation of what I think is the original Chinese article (blog post?) about Liu Han Hope Elementary. It has quite a few more details about the entire ordeal…and calls the school by a different name–Long-Han Elementary School.
According to the translated article, 483 students in total survived the earthquake, and it was a group of 71 students and ten teachers that made the hike to safety. Students on the hike were as young as five years old(!), and the teachers kept them going by promises of candy. After coming out of the mountains they were actually refused help by two households, the residents of which I’ll hopefully see in hell:

I asked how they encourage the youngs. “bite your teeth together!” Most students had never been to Mianynag city, the biggest twon arround here. “We will get to Mianyang and all the goodies are awaiting!” “Icecreams, cakes, coca colas!” ” and the uncle policement are waiting for you with all that in their hands!” All kids knew that uncle policemen are nice people and fun to be with. They all look up to their heroism of helping people. They passed two big housed, sadly, the residents in the house refused to help. The uglies.

The article also gives more details about the the problems that plagued the building process (bad cement, stolen funds, needless delays) and one man’s scrupulous inspections that forced the contractors to be honest:

I learned there had been a sponsorship group named Long-Han, they raised fund for building up this school named Long-Han good Hope Elementary, back 10 years ago. Their boss named Liu-Han, top manager Sun XiaoDong. He was the person overseeing the project back then.
Now people all know the value of a solid building and thank Long-Han. I found one of the a top person at Long-Han. He want to be called Mr.X. – he did not want to get anyone, and himself in trouble by letting his name known. I learned from him:

1. 10 year ago, Liu-Han and Sun said to X, We will not let schools fall short, you have to tightly control the project. If it is not the best quality, you are the first to go.

2. One day, 10 years ago, They found the cement quality was bad. Too much mud mixed in. Mr.X. onec worked in a cement factory and had gone through big projects with tens of thousands of tons of concrete processing. He was an expert, he knew about the cement quality. He found mud in the material, and he found the pebble stones were not all round ones. Flad pebble stone can weaken the structure, he said. So he was very angry with people. He ordered that all mud must be washed away, and pebble stone resorted and changed.

3. At one meeting, he found some people did not dare to look into his eyes. He chased to the root: funding was intercepted by some middle men – it happened often that time. He chased and traced the all banks bitterly. So all people got the good pay and could work well.

4. When it was almost done, the final build of the middle P-E square (where the 483 kids first collected together), was delayed and delayed, he was furious again. After some fight, that was finally done on time.

Mr.X insisted if I write, I should quoted the words “fight”: he did not want it to be seen as a serious fights. Someone may get into trouble.

Needless to say, the government needs to go after the profiteers.

The entire article is interesting and well worth the read. I’ve put an unedited copy of the full text of the translation up below the fold, just in case the original goes down.
Continue reading →

American Jewish World Service, my charity of choice, does not have a program set up in China, and is referring donors to InterAction.org and Charity Navigator to find charities.
Before donating to any charity, please check it out first through Charity Navigator so you can see exactly how much of your donation will actually go to help people and how much will be wasted on overhead. Every penny counts.
EastSouthWestNorth continues to have the best English-language coverage of the aftermath (physical, social, and political) of the Chengdu earthquake, and The China Beat has had some interesting posts about the history of disasters in China and the Chinese Red Cross.
Foreign bloggers have written interesting articles about surviving the quake and the nation’s mourning process.

A more upbeat story can be found in The Guardian (who have a special China Earthquake section) about a school that was built properly and didn’t collapse:

While other schools disintegrated, [the Liu Han Hope Elementary school] stood firm. Even the three-storey glass wall remained intact. When the slopes around them began to threaten their safety, staff marched pupils as young as five out of their remote home on an all-day, all-night trek.

The school’s proper construction apparently is due to the dillegance of one righteous man:

A Chinese blogger and TV commentator, Li Chengpeng, said he had spoken to the project manager. The man, who did not want to be named, said his bosses had stressed the importance of safety – but also recalled the battles that had involved. On one occasion he had to force builders to replace substandard cement. On another, he had to fight officials who had intercepted part of the funding.