Beichuan is a city in a river valley surrounded by high hills. Until the earthquake struck they were lush and green. When the buildings began falling the residents could not stay inside and were left with only one choice – to go to the mountain side of the city. DS3_6745.

But that turned out to be worse. The earthquake caused rock slides which rushed down the mountainside killing people and burying the town. DS3_6811.

Parts of the riverbank collapsed. DS3_6659.

Wherever the people of Beichuan ran, they faced death.

For the rest of this article I will tell the story of my trip to Beichuan in the summer after school ended. I went into Beichuan with several friends who are also photographers two months after the earthquake. On the way there were already houses in ruins but their owners were not willing to leave the land that their grandparents had left them. So they set up their tents beside the remains of their homes. Others settled in the nearest public square.

I had a very interesting and ironic story. It was the home of a famous traditional Chinese poet Li Bai or Li Po. Beside his home are two squares of open land so the government settled the survivors there. At the right side of the square survivors were making their lunch when we got there. They were preparing corn taken (fallen) from the ground. The little girl in the picture is having her summer break but she has to spend all of her time searching for food. DS3_5793.

The tent they lived in was unbearably hot – 120 degrees F. Even if they could have afforded a fan, there was no electricity. DS3_5811.

The old man in the photo has lost everyone in his family - his two sons and his wife. What he had now was himself and a disabled leg. He told me that he was supposed to get the equivalent of $30US per month from the government. This was now the third month and only now was he starting to get anything - $10US and a half package of rice when he was supposed to get a full one. The reason for the reduced amount, the government told him, was that since there was only him, he did not need that much money or that much rice. So many other people are busy trying to rebuild their homes but for this old man, he has no money and cannot take out a loan because he has no collateral. There was no possibility for him to ever move out from this hot tent. DS3_5839.

When people like me with our huge cameras went into his tent, maybe he thought we were journalists and he give us bottled water because he really wanted us to help him and water was all he could offer. When I looked around I saw that he drank the boiled river water. I asked him and he said he didn’t like bottled water. He was lying. When I left his tent I was drinking his water and crying. I was not a real journalist and I could not help him.  DS3_5819

When we went to leave and we saw there were many people on the left side of the square. When I got close I could see they were giving out water, rice and oil. I know it is just a show by CCP because they had flags all over the place and so many people stopped me from taking photos. They said that without government papers, you cannot take photos. When they were not paying attention I would take photos by holding the camera on my arm and not bringing it up to my face. DS3_5887

I was thinking that on opposite sides of the square there becomes a heaven and a hell.

Anyway, we can’t do anything. We had to continue our journey towards our destination, Beichuan.

Most of the roads towards Beichuan had been destroyed and all the bridges were dangerous. Engineers built bypass roads to go around the bridges. DS3_5909

Beside the road you can see the tombs of workers who died rebuilding the roads. The aftershocks brought more rocks down, crushing the workers. We thank them for guaranteeing the road by losing their lives. DS3_5981

When we got closer and closer to Beichuan the same story happened again. On both sides of the road, one side is tents and one side is houses. DS3_6057

Lunchtime these two old men sitting beside the house were eating huiguorou (famous Sichuan dish, twice cooked pork) DS3_6082.

But on the other side of the road they were only eating packaged noodles IMG_4568.

We kept going. There was 4 wheel drive car half buried on the road. As the two mountains slide together it formed a lake and buried everything. The army bombed the dam to reopen the road. DS3_6261

The floodwaters covered the buildings with the bodies inside. This poisoned the water making it unsafe. The temporary water system was just built. DS3_6063

We were upstream where the dead bodies were and downstream was the capital city of Chengdu. The government said the water in Chengdu was safe but that was a lie.

At last we finally got to Beichuan. The police set up a poison skull sign to warn people that you could be poisoned from the decaying remains of the thousands who had died. We were told not to touch anything, not even to sit on the ground. DS3_6293

After we were out of the policemen’s sight we got into the city by climbing the mountain. We were shocked when we first saw the city because the beautiful city had no signs of life at all. Silence. Like a ghost town in a movie. I felt cold. A broken advertising sign blowing in the wind made a metallic screeching sound that was scary. DS3_6318

All these roads had been flooded by the waters so all the people who had survived the earthquake died from the flood. We were told not to touch the silt because it was contaminated too. DS3_6333

This couple had just been married and were having their wedding when the earthquake happened. I don’t know if they are alive. It is hard to imagine that the day they married is also the day they separated forever. DS3_6325. DS3_6889

Look at this chair. Can you imagine how they worried about their family when the army was trying to dig people out. DS3_6351

Some of the roads were buried when the buildings collapsed and we could not pass through. DS3_6388

This next picture represents something that only China has – the birth planning department. I really wanted to ask, in the earthquake time – you guys control birth, but who controls death?   DS3_6391

So many buildings were like the following one. The first floor could not handle the pressure and collapsed from the upper stories. So many people were in the first floors and when they tried to dig people out, the buildings collapsed even more. The policeman told me that on the first day there were so many people screaming for help but it was too dangerous so they could do nothing. The yelling became fainter and fainter as people died. DS3_6430

Buildings like this you could no longer recognize except for the gate. DS3_6451

Even staying in a car was not safe at all. DS3_6464

For this building the only thing left you can see is the roof, now at ground level. DS3_6523

Three buildings were under construction. What is critical is how much corruption was involved in the building process. One collapsed totally, one partially, and one did not collapse at all. How did those bad business men who used shoddy construction get approvals from the government? Bribery? DS3_6535 

Here comes our main point – the school. Look at the building on the right. It seems nothing was damaged but you never know how students were buried on the ground floor. DS3_6568

When you take a close look at this building you will find that they tied all the sheets and clothes together. It brings us back to that moment. Students are screaming. Desperate to live they came up with any means to try to get down from the upper floors. The stairs had collapsed. If students could not get down as soon as possible, who knew if the building would survive the aftershocks? IMG_4932

The army has already taken out all the bodies it could but there were also many bodies in the ruins so the army disinfected each ruin with chemicals. They would spray paint each building to tell which had been done and which had not. Two months later the air still smelled of rotting flesh. DS3_6609

There are many more photos and they can be seen in this gallery:
http://aasquared.org/gallery/SichuanEarthquake2008