Early in July 2008, SQR blog caught up with Lynda Dyer, who has written ‘Good Grief,’ a book for children intended to help them cope with grief and bereavement. Here are extracts from the interview, with Lynda, and her friends and colleagues, Peng and Beate.:
LD: We landed on 12th May, and somebody mentioned that there had been an earthquake. The earthquake was at 2.28pm and we landed at 6.30pm. I was here teaching Neuro Linguistic Programming for a few days. We were here in town and so we couldn’t help but hear the news. On the TV we saw at the bottom of the TV screen that they were looking for coaches.
So we said, we can do something we are coaches, we coach coaches. So they kept asking us for coaches. The people were devastated and needed help to get through this, so I went back with this scathingly brilliant idea, we call it.
Peng was amazing, because once you give her an idea she flows with it.
She also has an incredible network of contacts.
We were flying off each other, bouncing ideas off each other, and I said, I don’t think we can do this on our own. So let’s look at the organizations which are going in there, and what qualifications they had.
She ended up doing a lot of the work in finding out what was happening.
And then it went from there we found people, well Peng did. Also, Beate would find organizations, and even when I went back to Australia, there were organizations we were then contacting, telling them we need money to get the books translated into Chinese, but the money wasn’t forthcoming at the beginning.
So we went ahead and got the books printed anyway, not even knowing how we were going to fund it. When I came back here in June, the books arrived, but we still didn’t know how we were going to pay for them.
There were various things going on, including a triathlon event.
Peng’s friend asked here, How about if I put it to the group tonight that we can fund the books?
The people were very generous, and the organiser started the ball rolling by putting 5000 rmb on the table, which was amazing.
Then I ran a values morning and people paid for that, and donated the money, and soon we had enough for the first set of books.
It just went from there, and more donors were found, and we decided that the minute we got money for the next 2000 books, we start printing.
…Every time we met somebody they were really excited about what we were going to do, because it was so positive, we had a book, we had something that they liked and the kids liked, and the parents liked.
If they didn’t like it, then OK, it was an idea, it could just fade out.
However, it was so well received, we kept on working on it.
We went up to the earthquake zone, to the epicentre.
We met the most amazing volunteers. We were told we would have trouble getting through the checkpoints, but we never had any problems…
We’ve had this trip this time, and we also came back here in June. Friday was amazing. We went up there we had no contacts. School had finished. A few kids were hanging around, and they knew we were the writers of the book. A teacher came up to us and asked us if we would come along to his school. We said we would, and the next thing we were in the school. The headmaster there is amazing, he really makes things happen. His school was educating students from the other schools that didn’t exist any more, and he now had 1200 students. He asked for 1200 books. We would also like to help him get the land for the school he wants to build.
So we came back and we had an order for more books.
We need at least 2000 books per school, so we’re looking to print about 10,000 books in the next run.
It’s a big order, but if these books will help kids, parents, and grandparents turn around from being in grief, then it’s well worth it.
We have also talked at length with SQR about how we can work together to make more things happen…
SQR blog: Today when you went up into the quake-hit area, you took part in a sports day.
What’s changed since June?
LD: We were with the right people who have permissions, which made things easier.
We helped set up activities. I was a soccer coach, we played soccer, volleyball, a big parachute game, shuttlecocks, and there were also arts and crafts…
Beate: Art and crafts: it was amazing. I didn’t know what to do. I started cutting paper hearts, and they all wanted to do this, and then one boy who was very creative started making bracelets.
It was wonderful to see how they help each other and how creative they are.
Then something else came up, which was face painting. They kept coming back. Other children kept coming over and they were happy to be doing these activities.
LD: There were many tables, with colouring in, giant jigsaw puzzle for older kids, a Winnie the Pooh puzzle for the smaller kids, and plenty of other things to do.
The people we went with today are from the Rainbow Project. They do an amazing job, they go up there every Sunday.
They take up around 20 people. Not everyone goes every week. Whoever wants to go can go. There is a little handout, and you put your name down for arts and crafts, dance, music etc.
Every Sunday they know to come to this spot for activities. The numbers of kids are declining because more housing is becoming available in more places, and it’s further to go for a lot of the kids.
The plan is to come back every month.
We’re also in touch with people in Sydney now, we’re looking to work with the government, and there’s a huge Chinese community there. Maybe they lost people here.
Distribution is done by 5 different organizations. Postage is becoming expensive, so we are looking to print locally here in Chengdu.
It’s been an overwhelming experience. Head of XL has invited me to go back to Australia via Hong Kong, so opportunities are coming. We will print as many books as are needed. The next run is 10000. We are paying all our way for everything. We just want the books printed, and we hope they help people.
[SQR blog: apologies to Lynda and her team for taking so long to post this]
Read Lynda’s account of her contact with earthquake victims
The collaboration was inspired in 2008, through Abigail’s volunteer work for Sichuan Quake Relief where she performed in ‘relocation schools’ with kids from pre-school to high school – most of whom were relocated from mountain villages to schools in new locations far from their families. “The children and teachers expressed intense grief at the loss of home and family,” says Washburn, a former Sichuan resident featured in Newsweek for her “weirdly wonderful” blend of Chinese culture and American-roots music. “I wanted to return and record their stories and songs in their own voices.”
