Tzu Chi assists at New York plane crash

On November 12 at 9:17 a.m. EST, an American Airlines plane from New York to the Dominican Republic crashed in Queens, New York, killing 260 people on board and five people on the ground. Two people on board the plane were from Taiwan, so Tzu Chi members in the U.S. expressed their condolences to the victims' relatives.

Lin Chi-yi, Tzu Chi New York branch executive officer, reported that after the incident, one Tzu Chi member who was also a doctor was allowed to enter the crash site to help. Tzu Chi members in Hawaii and New Jersey were also mobilized to help the victims' families to fly to New York to identify the bodies.

The son and daughter of Chen Ching-chih, one of the victims, were studying in Hawaii. When they received a call from a Tzu Chi member in Hawaii about the death of their father, they cried bitterly with shock and grief. Chen's wife was in Taiwan. She said very sadly that she had even talked with her husband on the phone the night before and told him to get to bed early because he had a very early flight to catch. Unfortunately, that was her last conversation with her husband.

According to one Tzu Chi member, Tsai Tsu-li, 170 people on board were Dominicans, 40 of them from the same community in the Dominican Republic. Tzu Chi might send volunteers to visit that community to provide necessary help.

Rebuilding India

On November 11, Tzu Chi signed a joint agreement with Care France, a French charity group, to rebuild earthquake-damaged villages in Gujarat Province in India.

Gujarat, located in the northwest region of India, suffered a major earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale on January 26, 2001. More than 20,000 people were killed and over a million buildings were damaged. The devastation covered a vast area and many disaster areas were inaccessible. Because the Indian government did not ask for help from the outside world, Tzu Chi was not able to go in to inspect conditions until April, when Care France helped a Tzu Chi team enter the area.

Tzu Chi and Care France will start reconstruction programs in Anjar and Kotda soon. They will first build houses for refugees. Local residents will be invited to participate in the reconstruction programs, so that they will be able to learn some skills at the same time. Both organizations will also help in other areas, such as education and job training. For instance, they will import raw weaving materials and set up export channels, so that local women will be able to sell their products and increase their income.

The Tzu Chi construction fund for this project is being raised by volunteers at the Malaysia and Singapore branch offices. Liu Chi-yu, executive officer of the Tzu Chi Malacca office, said that since May this year, more than 7,000 volunteers have been mobilized. They have held thousands of bazaars and charity performances to raise money. Many families who are receiving help from Tzu Chi have also donated money to help with this good cause.

Care France is now carrying out more than 600 humanitarian programs in 70 countries around the world. It has also been providing assistance in India for more than 50 years. Thus, Care France has a very good knowledge about the situations in India, and that knowledge is very beneficial to the execution of the assistance programs.

Master Cheng Yen and Marina de Brantef, president of Care France, signed the joint agreement at Tzu Chi headquarters in Hualien, Taiwan. The Master praised Care France for its generous contribution to the needy around the world, and she also hoped that the cooperation between the two organizations could show the Indian quake survivors that love transcends all boundaries. [Please see our earlier report on the earthquake in India in our Summer 2001 issue].

Nomad farmers of McFarland, US

On October 14 last year, at the suggestion of social workers, the Tzu Chi Free Clinic in Alhambra, California, held a free clinic for farm workers in Kern County, northern California. On the same date this year, the Free Clinic again held free medical examinations for these people, who are mostly immigrants from Mexico and the Philippines, before they went back home at the end of the agricultural season. The free clinics treated 450 people and gave free haircuts to 73 people. Tzu Chi also distributed daily necessities to 165 farmers and school supplies to 200 children.

These farmers follow the seasonal changes, traveling from Texas and Arizona to California to find work. They stay in McFarland from June to October. They earn a very small salary for their work, so it is impossible for them to receive medical care.

On that day, a Tzu Chi volunteer was giving a haircut to nine-year-old Harvey when he discovered that the boy had a tumor on the back of his head and a scar from an operation. Through a translator, Harvey's mother told volunteers that when she and her husband came here to harvest crops, they didn't receive any prenatal care, so Harvey was born with some handicaps.

Adding color to their lives

Children born in SK Lampada, Sabah, Malaysia, hardly think of their future, mainly because the terrible environment doesn't allow them to think much about it. But when Tzu Chi volunteers held a free clinic this year in the area, these children began to have a colorful life.

Tzu Chi members in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, held their first charity distribution and free clinic for aborigines in 1998. This has now been done four times. When volunteers were preparing for this year's free clinic, they discovered that more than 30 aboriginal children from first to sixth grades lived in a wooden house on campus. Their homes were far from school and there was no transportation available for them to come to school.

These students got off at noon and had to take turns preparing lunch for themselves. They had no electricity, so they had to prepare supper at five, before it got dark. They collected tree branches for firewood and used a stone oven to cook their meals. They had to wash their clothes and bathe in a river.

On October 19 this year, Tzu Chi volunteers, assisted by school teachers, handed out half a month's worth of rice, sugar, salt, milk powder, cooking oil, eggs, canned food and cookies. They also explained to the children how to use these items correctly.

Helping institutions and individuals in Greater Vancouver

Joshua O'Brien comes from Maple Ridge in Greater Vancouver. The eighth-grade student is blind. When he was younger, he developed a special musical talent: with his electric piano at home, he could replay any piece of music he had just heard. Last year he began to receive assistance from the Tzu Chi Canada branch and was able to take regular piano lessons. At the donation ceremony on October 3, Joshua performed two pieces of music which moved the whole audience.

On that day, the Tzu Chi Canada branch donated a total of CDN$427,000 [US$270,863] to some ten medical and educational institutions and individuals, including Joshua. Recipients included poor students, the Salvation Army, and hospitals that would use the money to purchase better medical equipment.

Tzu Chi members in Canada have been donating $100,000 [US$63,427] every year since 1999 to poor students in the Greater Vancouver region, so the students could use money to participate in outdoor events or skill training. The fund has helped more than 800 students every year. This year, a donation was also made to support lectures on Buddhism held at the University of British Columbia.

Tzu Chi offices abroad follow the spirit of "Receive from your local community and repay your local community." The money raised in Canada by the Tzu Chi Canada branch is always used locally. Four hundred volunteers devote themselves every month and help in nursing homes, AIDS associations, food banks, hospitals, shelters for homeless teens, the Salvation Army, and other charitable activities.

Third free clinic in Tangerang, Indonesia

The Tzu Chi branch office in Indonesia held its third free clinic in Tangerang on November 3 and 4. A local hospital, the R. S. Qadr Hospital, helped by lending a site for the free clinic, and all levels of the hospital staff, from the superintendent down to the cleaners, were very cooperative for this event. Hospital spokesman Ridwan Ibrahim commented that the Tzu Chi spirit of love, trust and forgiveness towards everyone in the world was also found in Islam, so the hospital should also devote itself to the same charity work.

Two operating rooms were always filled with the cries of children, who came for surgeries for everything from harelips to hernias. Their mothers waited anxiously outside the surgery rooms, but when the surgeries were over, smiles appeared on the mothers' faces. They left with their children and with our blessings.

One young man about twenty years old brought three friends for their hernia surgeries. He even stayed overnight to care for his friends until they left the next day. In July this year, this young man had gone to a Tzu Chi free clinic in Bekasi Province, and there he had had an operation to remove a tumor that had bothered him for more than ten years.

The free clinic treated 1,400 patients, and about 430 medical staff and volunteers participated in the event. The day after the free clinic was over, Tzu Chi volunteers went to visit the patients who had had surgeries and were recovering in the R. S. Qadr Hospital. Because there are so many poor people in the area, the Indonesia branch will continue carrying out free clinics next year.

Tzu Chi opens English classes

The Tzu Chi Hawaii branch office started teaching Master Cheng Yen's Still Thoughts in English at an ESL class in Lanakila Elementary School in November. The class runs twice a week and has a new topic every month. Also, volunteers will help students with their schoolwork in an after-class program in Alawai Elementary School, as well as teach Still Thoughts in English there.

The Tzu Chi Hawaii office has a culture and education division whose responsibility is to promote Tzu Chi culture. Sister Chin Li-chuan, head of the division, said that local Tzu Chi members have been searching for an opportunity to teach Master Cheng Yen's Still Thoughts in English in local schools. The ESL classes in Lanakila Elementary School are set up for students who don't know English. Because ESL teacher Sallie Lee understood the purpose of Still Thoughts, she was delighted to teach it in class.

Sister Hsiao Tzu-kuang was in charge of promoting Tzu Chi culture in the Tzu Chi U.S. branch. She remarked that promoting Tzu Chi culture in English was a very important job.