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GREAT LOVE ACROSS THE TAIWAN STRAITS |
| Forward In the summer of 1991, the greatest floods of the century occurred in central and eastern China. The houses and farms of these regions were all submerged for two or three months. More than two billion people were displaced from their homes. Refugees were seriously short of food and had to face the severe winter with only tattered clothes and broken furniture. Saddened by their plight, Master Cheng Yen started raising funds to assist the refugees in China. Tzu Chi began its relief efforts in China in Quanjiao County, Anhui Province. Since then, Tzu Chi members around the world, out of their compassion and warmth, have been setting aside their work, paying their own travel expenses, and traveling for thousands of miles to give love to mainland China. So far, they have left their footprints in the sixteen provinces of Anhui, Jiangsu, Henan, Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Hebei, Jiangxi, Liaoning, Qinghai, Fujian, Hubei, Zhejiang, Guizhou and Gansu. While traveling within China, Tzu Chi members have gone to Liaoning in the bitter cold of minus fourteen degrees Celsius (7 F), the Tibetan Plateau five thousand meters (16,500 ft) above sea level, the barren landscapes in Guizhou or the sandstorms in Gansu. But because of their efforts, great love could spread far and wide. Although Tzu Chi members were simply there to give food, clothes and homes to refugees and to allow children to attend school, their presence also nurtured deep affection and compatriot love because we all are Chinese. In addition to the relief work, Tzu Chi also helped to build thirteen nurseries in nine provinces. Meanwhile, the foundation also carried out goodwill activities such as non-relative bone marrow transplants from donors in Taiwan to recipients in China, and other cultural exchange programs. The foundation has simply employed the Buddha's spirit of "great mercy to strangers and great compassion for all." This deeply heartfelt great love has transcended religions, races, political standpoints, and other man-made barriers. In this book, we have used concise introductions and several hundred photographs to record our work in China. We hope to share with our readers the radiance of great love through simple descriptions and valuable photographs. |
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