IX Courage - Zhao Ying: I just wanted to see them.

Zhao Ying, born in 1985, grew up near the sea.

Everyone knows about the Sichuan earthquake; it was a very big earthquake. I feel that if I had never been to that place, I probably would have never in my entire life realized what a disaster it was. No matter what anyone said, I would never understand. It wasn't until the end of March 2009 that I, along with a few friends, took a trip to Sichuan.

We rode the train for three days. Afterwards, we arrived in Chengdu and from there, traveled to a few cities that had been especially seriously damaged. The first stop was the city of Deyang. To me, the environment of the entire city was especially unfamiliar. It had the same atmosphere as Hangzhou, but from what I could see, it was a pitiful place, with collapsed houses everywhere. In April I took another trip to Sichuan by myself. I stayed there for 25 days. I stayed in a city everyday, but went back and forth between many small towns and villages to see these schools, these students who were still alive, and those parents of the students who died. The goal was simple; I just wanted to see them.

I feel that the day of May 12, which is to say May 12, 2009, was a day that made Sichuan sad.

I couldn't get a ride, so I hired a motorcycle taxi, the kind that will take you wherever you need to go. Because there are a lot of those in the local area, you could go to a place in the outskirts anytime. That day I visited the cemetery in Luoshui. Afterwards, I went to the Luocheng primary school. I ended up there after asking around. The entire school had collapsed. Of course it was the force of the earthquake that caused it to collapse. Then someone leveled the ground. Now all that remained was a foundation, about one meter high, surrounded by weeds. At the time, there were twenty to thirty parents who arrived on motorcycles. They brought a lot of fireworks with them and formed a circle around the school. They set off fireworks to commemorate those children. When they were about to leave, I saw an elder sister who had a bundle of yellow and white flowers with her. I said to her: "Can I visit your home?" She said: "Ok." So she took the flowers and I helped her hold the papers. We then winded our way to the house. There was a very short stretch of railway. We walked past the railway, and after what seemed like a few acres of fields, we arrived at a slope. There was a fresh grave there, but a lot of grass had also grown around it. A few bricks marked it; there was no tombstone. We put the things down. She also placed the flowers to the side. Then we started burning papers. At first no one said anything. The weather in May was not cold. It started to get hot. The flames from the fire were starting to feel unbearable. I didn't know what to say.

When there were no papers left to burn, she told me that this child was an especially well-behaved little girl. She was not her biological child. She found her on a train when she was an infant. At the time the girl was still in swaddling clothes and tucked inside the fabric was a note that read, "A good-hearted person may adopt her," probably left by the mother. The elder sister had no children of her own so she raised this girl. She told me this girl was born with some physical disability. When she spoke, her pronunciation was not very accurate so classmates often ridiculed her. But she said the girl was very well-behaved and never complained about anything. She made a great effort to learn to speak well. She often asked: "Mama, how can I do it well?" She was always hardworking. At the time of hearing this, I was especially ... I feel that I was most affected by this incident in Sichuan. It was more ... than all that fear I felt in the unfamiliar city. I was a bit scared. I didn't know what to say. I thought she was great. I accompanied her home. They had a big yellow dog at home. She said that ever since the day the girl was gone, ever since she never returned home again, it stopped eating. It hasn't eaten much in a month. It keeps waiting for the girl to return home...