Letter from Christie Kliewer, who worked with SQR recently, to SQR’s Lucy.
Preparations
Four days in both Xi’an and Chengdu were dedicated to preparation. What we were supposed to prepare for was a vague idea, one that involved 12 American and British high school students and hundreds of displaced students from the Sichuan earthquake area. … Preparation was gruelling and began at a public park where my partner in crime for arts and crafts, Hiroshi Shinn, and I huddled underneath the umbrella of a table as rain poured down around us and through the holes in the overused fabric. Furthermore, three more hours were spent the next day navigating through the gargantuan wholesale market in Chengdu in which Hiroshi, Andrew (one of our fearless leaders), and I argued intensely about face paint which one vendor insisted that the one pack we bought (at another vendor and which was the exact same brand) was a fake and we should therefore pay him 4 yuan more for each of the 16 packs we were buying from him. We trudged back to our hostel with our arms full of 300 pieces of paper, a large roll of scroll paper, 16 packs of markers, 16 packs of face paint, and other miscellaneous art supplies. Two more hours were spent crawled up on our beds, outlining a generic body onto 200 pieces of paper which the children would draw themselves on the next day. Finally collapsing from exhaustion, our small arts and crafts group (one of three other group activities) settled into a well-needed rest to recouperate for the day to come.
Getting there
The next morning was started at a much later time than usual, and crawling out of our beds when there was actually light in the sky, we bounced down to the lobby with all our well-prepared art supplies, sports equipment, and games for the children of the first school we were visiting. We started our van ride not long after, one which did not involve seat belts (as per Chinese style) and did involve a no more than one foot wide stool in which I, the smallest of those in our van, was blessed to perch upon for the hour and a half overheated van ride. But, in hindsight, my sacrifice paid off, as while the other 5 in our van snuggled upon each other, I was blessed with the first blue sky in a week and a half, and amazing views of what all of us had been mentally preparing for- the rubble and reconstuction of Sichuan province. I was startled with … the paradoxical combination of the farmlands and the destruction in which people were living in, without much acknowledgement to what had been around them, and was now underneath them. Yet, as the minutes carried on and we drew closer to the school in Du Jiang Yan, I couldn’t help but make a mental note to remember the delighted smiles I received when I’d wave at them from my open window. Their optimism was astounding, and took me completely off guard to compare it to the differing reactions of other communities. Whereas it had taken almost a year for Katrina survivors to become hopeful, these survivors were not only smiling openly to this pale-skinned, blonde-haired wai guo ren (Chinese for foreigner), but hailling us down to the school we were heading to. But their optimism was overshadowed by the pure glee that was found in the faces of the 700 children who realized suddenly that 15 foreigners would be spending the day with them.
Mobbed
Despite the fact the headmaster seemed to be a little confused at the reasoning of our visit, we were welcomingly shuffled into an empty classroom until the class period was over. Of course, our interpretation of that was to wander out into what quickly became the huge masses of over-energized children excited with a mixture of adrenaline and sugary popsicles. One child quickly turned into twenty, which turned into fifty, which escalated to hoardes of diary-holding and pen-wielding fans who had us all autograph their notebooks. Not only that, but the moment they realized my camera was not just being idly pointed somewhere, but at them, more kids popped out of the woodwork to cheekily scramble into the frame, smiling brightly and sending hopeful peace signs to whoever would look at the images later. All of us were so caught up in signatures, photography, and broken Chinglish that we had to be hollered back to our stations which still had to be set up. Hiroshi, Andrew, and I diligently carried our supplied into the classroom of expectant students.
Language exchange
Despite the fact we accidentally forgot our 16 packs of face paint, our plans carried on without a hitch, and we were all astounded with how creative the kids were with what were generic outlines of a body. Similarly, some of the students even wrote short descriptions of their characters in English, explaining (in English which was as grammatically incorrect as our Chinese was) that their character was “a sporter” or “a super hero”. Others spent almost half the class period pondering what exactly to draw, lest their drawings not be suffice to bring home to their families. Only when they had finished their drawings did the real insanity ensue. We had brought three large pieces of scroll paper for them to outline their handprints and write their name within it. But, to the realization that I did not have a Chinese name, two girls sat me down and stared intensely for a few minutes before giving me Bo Sijing. Of course, as I had never taken Chinese before this trip, when students insisted on my signing their papers with both my English name and my Chinese name, it took three times the time for me to carefully copy the characters onto their papers, mind you, not in proper stroke order. After three students re-drawing the characters onto my hand, Andrew finally took pity on me and had me practice my stroke order on the black board, only after he had finished making fun of my incompetence.
Reflection
As we rolled out of the school an hour or two after arriving, I could see the content smiles of accomplishment on the faces of our group, even as we piled into our respective vans, and I back onto my tiny stool. This sense of accomplishment carried on through the rest of the day as we visited a memorial site to the earthquake where I was explained that my Chinese name meant “reflection”, and then back to our cozy hostel where more work awaited us in preparation for the next day, and two schools we would visit. Hiroshi and I (along with a larger band of troops this time) outlined 200 more bodies and made sure we packed the face paint for the students the next day, long into the wee hours of the night. Despite their hours of aid in the arts and crafts prep, both Hiroshi, and Emma Sagan (along with 4 others) packed and prepared for a two-day-long trip into Beichuan to survey the villagers for aid they needed.
Recovery
With five of us parting their ways, the remaining ten of us woke up early the next day and once again, piled into our vans to drive top the further village of Mianzhu. While I did not have to sit on the stool again, I did happen to wake up half way through our drive and stare at the complete juxtaposition between the city we visited the day before, and the city we were in now. Acres and acres of what once were farmlands were now covered by the multi-colored roofs of tent-housing in which the displaced villagers were now calling their home. The drive was eerily different, rather than seeing the pricey CAT machines pulling rubble from demolished sites, I saw the very villagers who once lived there, sorting bricks and rubble into piles which had to be discarded and piles of re-usable bricks which would be used in their own reconstruction of their towns. Even through what we considered misery, the smoldering heat that was contained in our van, we all began to overlook our complaints and stared, jaws-dropped in awe at what we were now witnessing- the recovery of a whole province.
Mind-boggling statistics
Even on the driveway leading up to the first school we were visiting, our minds were not on what we would be teaching to the students, but to the landscape that was left by an 8.3 earthquake. Only now were we really assessing the statistics of the earthquake, that close to 20 million buildings were damaged, making 5 million homeless even after tens of thousands were killed and hundreds of thousands were injured. Out of a country of around 1.5 billion people, we began to realize just how many people could be affected by a natural disaster. It was only because 40,000 soldiers were pulled from the area the day before that our small group was truly able to visit these schools. We were all so startled by the views we saw on our trip that when we arrived at the school, we suddenly realized our huge mistake. We had forgotten all the supplies at the hostel.
Smooth moves
Thankfully we weren’t expected to teach the students algebra, and we all quickly decided to play English games with them. After a failed attempt at teaching them “the itsy bitsy spider” we successfully taught them “head, shoulders, knees and toes” before following it up with an intense, laughter-filled game of ‘Simon says’. These games were quickly overshadowed by, at their request, American rap music and dancing in the makeshift school yard. It was hilarious and beautiful to see these odd-looking white Americans beside all these shy Chinese children crypt-walking and break dancing. As usual, nothing brought the kids together with our own group as “the cha-cha slide” a song so simple anyone who has a basic understanding of English could follow. It was no surprise that as we were told that our time was up, and we had to head to the next school, that kids were clinging to our legs exclaiming cries of “zai jian!” (goodbye in Chinese) as we piled into the vans, waving ecstatically and wishing us to come back soon. Despite the fact we knew we couldn’t, we left on a good note, happily heading off to our next site.
Mianzhu
Exhausted, we all woke up a half hour later to be stopped in the center of an almost deserted town with buildings left to rubble, and perfect views of the hillside, covered with the remnants of landslides. Standing in the middle of the square was a clock tower, stopped at 2:28, the time at which the earthquake had happened on May 12th. Once again turning our attention back to the larger picture of the earthquake, we were awed by the immense silence and desertion of the city. We ate our lunch there, in almost complete silence as none of us seemed to have the right words to express what we were thinking, or what we wanted to say. It was understood that we couldn’t quite word our words properly in the presence of such a site, and we continued this silence until we arrived at the next school.
Draw
Our silence couldn’t last any longer, as we were almost literally pulled from our cars to the school by eager children and volunteer students. My “I love China” shirt was no longer immaculate as the children discovered I was letting them sign their names on it, and I was immediately pulled down to their level so they could sign their names and doodle flowers, hearts, and butterflies onto the back of my shirt in indelible ink markers and colorful highlighters. Here I was more able to draw with the kids, and was quickly pulled over to sit in the middle of their drawing session as they excitedly chatted with me in Chinese, none of which I could understand except for generic words such as “hua hua”, “bi”, “xin zang”, and “wo yao ying wen mingzi!” (“draw”, “pen”, “heart”, and “I want an English name!”) More or less, my afternoon was spent at their own demands, drawing colorful hearts, flowers, and butterflies on the kids arms multiple times, watching them as they’d draw and describe what they’d draw, and giving them English names which then had to be pronounced on multiple occasions so they could read them to others later with delight in their smiles. One particular girl was at my side most of the time, drawing me multiple pictures to bring home and affectionately stroking the blond hair I had on my arms. Later, she was excited to tell others that I had given her the English name “Molly” which she cutely pronounced “mah-li!” and I was too giggly at her cuteness to correct her pronunciation. Her teacher on the other hand, diligently had her read her name aloud multiple times until she said it a bit more properly. Only a bit later did I learn that her “Lao shi” (teacher) was my same age. We all were similarly shocked to learn that the teachers were not only merely 18, but were dedicating their summer to volunteer their time to teach these kids instead of living in Beijing or Shanghai. I was humbled by the sacrifice my peers were making through volunteering when i considered my work, a mere two days spent with children, was a big thing.
I discovered that, as I was ushered to the front of the school to help with miming the shapes of the English alphabet with body parts for the kids who would eagerly mimic and exclaim the letter, that I loved the two days spent in the earthquake region more than I loved any other specific part of my trip thus far. I had enjoyed all of our adventures and misadventures, but the extreme contentment I found in myself as we headed home was warming. While I had always loved the presence of children in any other situation, the opportunity to truly brighten their lives after such an event as the earthquake humbled me and made me force myself to remember these days until I die. We were the only group of teenage foreigners of our size to ever visit the earthquake up until then, and it wasn’t just a “community service” project that I was involved in. It was a small part of the large reconstruction of millions of Chinese who had been affected by the quake. I have more to prepare for, the final weeks of my trip in China, the twenty days I have before I have to ship of thousands of miles away from my family to my new university, and then the imminent unknown of college, and life to follow. Regardless I’m left with a final thought, a quote I found in the small spiral notebook Dragon’s gave to each of our instructors containing thoughts to reflect on regarding the pure joy I found in playing with these kids. “When you recover or discover something that nourishes your soul and brings you joy, care enough about yourself to make room for it in your life.”
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