Miscellaneous
From the epicentre
At 2:28 pm, on May 12, 2008, an earthquake measuring eight on the Richter scale hit the western Chinese province of Sichuan.Sanjeev Giri
At 2:28 pm, on May 12, 2008, an earthquake measuring eight on the Richter scale hit the western Chinese province of Sichuan. The epicentre, located at Wenchuan, a county located 80 kilometres north of the provincial capital of Chengdu, alone saw 6,000 casualties. According to the data from the provincial government, around 87,000 people lost their lives in the calamity and 4.8 million people were left homeless.
Cut to 2016. Eight-and-a-half years later, Sichuan is a region reborn. “It’s hard to imagine anything had happened here,” Bashir Samim Ahmed, a journalist from Afghanistan, said as he toured the Epicentre Memorial Hall at Yingxiu Town in Wenchuan, which commemorates the relief work, rehabilitation and the reconstruction that took place in the region following the deadly quake.
As we emerged out of the memorial hall, we walked into a panoramic view of Yingxiu Town—with beautiful two and three-storied houses landscaped with rich vegetation—that has now been developed into a major tourism hotspot.
“The reconstruction of a town that had been completely pulverised by the quake is in itself a fascinating sight for tourists who visit,” a guide escorting us around the town said. He added that while the provincial government had planned to complete the reconstruction process within three years, the project was completed in just two.
Currently, as many as 2,000 families live in this town—one of the closest to the 2008 epicentre. They have been accommodated in 2,380 houses. At the heart of the town is a school that was severely damaged by the earthquake. Fifty-five students, teachers and administrative officials died when the school building, built in 2004, collapsed. The rubble from the school has been left untouched as a solemn, if grisly, reminder of what has come to pass. A giant clock, with the hands frozen at 2:28, stands out front.
Shuimo Town, located in the mountainous area of south of Yingxui, is another impressive example of China’s speedy and holistic recovery from the 2008 earthquake.
Apart from accelerating the development of the tourism industry by focusing on ancient quarters of the town, such as Qiangcheng Street, this town has sped up the construction of ecological tea gardens, Kiwi orchards, plantations for medicinal plants, and poultry farms, further fuelling its economic development.
And as a result of Shuimo’s holistic approach to development, in April 2010, the town was awarded the Global Optimal Residential Environment Model in Post-disaster reconstruction by the UN Habitat.
Here, a number of residents have now turned into tourism entrepreneurs of late. “This has changed lives of general people,” Long Bo, secretary of Julung Community, a group-housing cluster of 458 homes constructed after the earthquake, said. “The average annual income of people has increased from RMB 8,000 to RMB 18,000”. Before earthquake, most residents in this town had been engaged in farming.
To accommodate tourists, most of whom are Chinese, locals of Julung have begun converting their homes into home-stays. A payment of RMB 100 facilitates a Chinese tourist with lodging along with the taste of local cuisine.
Payment of RMB 2,000 allows one to enjoy the facility for a period of a month.
Furthermore, the post-earthquake settlement plan has not just helped people to restructure their lives, but has helped create social harmony as well. According to Bo, the new settlements, that house families in clusters, have egged people to become more social. “Before earthquake, people used to live in their individual homes. Now, they live in a community. This has increased our collective approach,” he said. He adds that with the experience of hosting local tourists, the villagers aim to welcome foreigners in the days to come.
According to Yu Xin, director of market promotion division at Provincial Tourism Development Committee, in 2015 Sichuan province received 2.5 million foreign tourists, with increasing numbers now flowing into the earthquake impacted sites. The region, already popular for its natural beauty and for being the habitat of the Giant Panda, now is actively seeking to promote post-earthquake reconstruction sites as a tourist attraction.
According to Xiao Yonggang, deputy director of the Protocol and Information Division, Provincial Department of Foreign and Overseas Chinese Affairs, the local residents were encouraged to venture into the tourism industry post-earthquake to ensure that they found jobs locally. The move has also significantly stemmed any mass migration from the region, which is common after a large-scale disaster.
“Issues like ecological fragility of the earthquake disaster area, limited potential of the development of industries, and minimal impact on the ecological environment prompted us to reinvent these cities into touristic spots,” Xiao said. “Moreover, the diverse group of people in the region, such as local Tibetan, Han and Qiang ethnic minorities, provided abundant cultural resources that could be marketed as selling points.”
Strategically placed, Wenchuan County is located in the transitional zone between Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and the Chengdu Plain. With high mountains, deep valleys and meandering rivers, the region has long been celebrated as the natural habitat of the ubiquitously popular Giant Pandas. And now, despite the devastating effects of the 2008 earthquake, Wenchuan is playing to its strengths, ensuring that the region is not just rebuilding houses but is also rebuilding lives and communities—providing an important pointer not just to Nepal’s ponderous response to its own devastating earthquake, but to other communities around the world that have been hit by natural calamities and are striving to build back better.
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