We’ve prayed and sympathized with those who lost everything in Superstorm Sandy (and some of you reading this may have even been affected). Living through a disaster is a hard experience.
Today I’d like to introduce you some people who have suffered through two earthquakes and landslides in China’s Yunnan Province. The quakes, measuring 5.7 and 5.6 on the Richter scale, leveled homes and buildings, followed in October by landslides that did even more damage. This double whammy left some 750,000 in dire need of emergency food and shelter. The area is home to a large number of the Maio ethnic minority, including numerous elderly people. Many here live in deep poverty. The rugged terrain and lack of roads are blocking relief efforts.
FH is partnering with Cedar Fund and local churches to distribute badly-needed emergency supplies, including delivering a one-month food supply to 6,000 quake-affected households in 15 villages.
I hope you can hear the voice of our guest blogger, an eyewitness providing the report, telling this story across the miles.
26th Oct., 10 a.m. We arrived at the distribution place, a flat place along the river where there was a building under construction. I was trying to explain how to register and asking them to prepare their ID cards.
People came very early. Since this place was near a busy road, they had to sit there beside the road. Their houses were on the top of a mountain and it took them 2 hours to get here. This was the closest distribution point to where they live.
People waiting.
Women waiting with baskets to carry home the food.
Tarps protect oil and rice that are awaiting distribution.
My job is to do the registration. I first check their ID and help some of them write their names since most of them don’t know how to write. We don’t have a table, so a rock is the only choice.
Going home, another two hours walking in the mountains.
A local boy came to help us.
Going home happily.
