By Chen Ran

Social media helps Ya’an quake relief

“We got the folded beds and put them all into tents. Thank you so much!” said a phone call to vivian Li, 29, a housewife in Beijing, on April 28.

The voice at the other end was Xue Chunzhi, a teacher at Tianquan Middle School in quake-hit Ya’an City, southwest China’s Sichuan Province, some 2,000 km away from Beijing.Later that day, Li also received the pictures that Xue took on the scene.

A 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck Ya’an on April 20, leaving 196 dead, 21 missing and more than 13,400 injured.

It took Li and her friends six days to complete the relief mission—from finding Xue to con firming she had received the first batch of relief goods.

“What a relief!” Li told Beijing Review. “I hope the rest of the goods will be transferred and received smoothly, too.”

HELP FROM AFAR: Relief goods including tents and folded beds from Beijing are received by Tianquan Middle School staff in quake-hit Sichuan Province on April 28

point to point

Upon receiving the quake news, July Gu, Li’s high school classmate who has lived in Macao since 2011, donated 200 yuan ($31) to One Foundation initiated by Chinese movie star Jet Li. “Despite donating money, I still feel that I should do something for them,” Gu recalled.

Among the most needed relief goods including food, water and tents, Gu noticed that sanitary napkins are important but often neglected.

“I talked to vivian to see whether we could raise money from friends via microblogging sites or WeChat, a social messaging service,and then send it directly to the quake zone via express delivery,” she told Beijing Review.

Li agreed with Gu’s idea without any prior consultation.

In fact, point-to-point donation was not new to Li, who launched her very first relief mission last summer, after 79 people were killed by strong rain and landslides in Beijing.

Li and her friends raised money and used their vehicles to ferry relief goods including food, water, mosquito repellent and disinfectant directly to affected people in south Beijing.

“I started to realize that point-to-point donation was really helpful for disaster relief,” Li noted.

“A lot of friends supported her move lastyear. They prepared goods and worked very hard. It was very effective,” Gu said.

Gu and Li resorted to social media networks to raise funds for their quake relief mission. They had collected 9,180 yuan($1,445) in less than 12 hours as of the morning of April 22. Li went to supermarkets to purchase 28 boxes of relief goods including 18 boxes of sanitary napkins, three boxes of baby disinfectant wipes and seven boxes of diapers. It cost 5,776.7 yuan ($910) and left 3403.3 yuan ($535).

“Our friends are supportive. Some of the donors are friends of friends whom we didn’t know,” Li said.

She posted every step—the donation money, relief goods, packing and delivery receipts—online via social media. “We’d like to make this move as transparent as possible. We shall prove worthy of donors’ trust,” Li explained.

Soon after delivering the first batch of relief goods, Li read a microblog post by a former student of Xue, saying Tianquan Middle School in hard-hit Tianquan County needs relief goods. Tianquan was only 35 km away from the epicenter in Lushan County.The quake rendered 90 percent of its houses inhospitable.

Teachers evacuated more than 2,500 students at Tianquan Middle School to soccer fields and playgrounds within 90 seconds and no casualties were reported from the school,thanks to emergency evacuation drills. The school just finished a drill on April 18, two days before the quake struck. It is part of regular teaching activities held each semester ever since a 8.0-magnitude quake hit the province on May 12, 2008. Unfortunately, the teaching buildings could not be used due to cracks in the walls.

Staff members took out 46 tents from the warehouse that the school received after the 2008 quake, and set them up on campus for temporary shelters, but it was far from enough to accommodate all the students.

Li contacted Xue via his former student on April 23 to confirm the situation. “I was surprised that Li and her friends got my phone numbers. At first, they said they would donate relief goods anonymously,” Xue told Beijing Review. “But I insisted on getting their names because the local civil affairs department needs the donor’s information when delivering goods.”

The second round of fundraising was on the way soon after Li’s fact check. They collected another 8,250 yuan ($1,299), making the total to 11,653.3 yuan ($2,744).

Unlike the first round, Li purchased relief goods—100 folded beds as well as five 22-square-meter tents for Tianquan Middle School and 30 quilts for individual victims—from online shops to reduce costs. She also required every seller to send goods and delivery receipts to her via e-mail.

“At the very beginning, we just wanted to collect money among friends and send relief goods directly to the quake zone to offer some help. We never thought of the charity,” Gu said. “I didn’t expect feedback like this.”

“To be honest, I was stressed before receiving Xue’s call, because this was our first time to make donations in this way. I was afraid of any potential risks that could make the delivery a failure. If that were the case, I would feel deeply sorry for the donors,” Li stated.

In addition to donations from Li and her friends, the school received point-to-point donations from other cities across China. “I really appreciate their help,” Xue said.

Transparent charity

Besides individual donations, organizations also use social media as a tool to promote transparent charity for Ya’an quake relief.

There were more than 600,000 posts under the topic of transparent charity on the Sina Weibo microblog service after the quake struck.On April 23, the China Foundation Center, a legally registered public charity described in the regulation of the country’s Ministry of Civil Affairs, jointly launched a self-discipline alliance for Ya’an quake relief with several domestic foundations.

The China Foundation Center, which aimed to make philanthropy transparent, posted news related to quake relief via its ver ified Sina Weibo account, and also gradually revealed how donations worth 1.049 billion yuan ($165 million)were utilized.

Xue Manzi, a famous angel investor whose Sina Weibo account has more than 11 million followers, posted on April 30, “The era of everyone for charity has truly arrived with the rise of micro-charity.”

“All our moves came from trust among people, be it an acquaintance or stranger,” Gu said.

“I totally agree with the concept of One Foundation, ‘It starts with one,’ because charity is a step-by-step thing, you can’t push or rush,”Li said. “More people might be mobilized if we could accumulate our power little by little within the scope of our capabilities.” ■