Two days after the 7.0 magnitude Lushan earthquake in Sichuan, Song Qin, a 32-year-old resident of Lingguan township, Baoxing county in the city of Ya'an, carried a pot of rice and home-made bacon to treat the armed forces, fire fighters and other disaster relief personnel.
Since the earthquake on April 20, she has been voluntarily preparing food for around 2,000 people working on the disaster relief frontline.
There are many locals, young or old, making their own contribution to the disaster relief. Some of them are helping transfer the critically injured with their own vehicles.
With some 1,000 local residents living in makeshift shelter covered by tarpaulin on the playground of the county's high school, which was named as a resettlement area, they are helping each other pitch tents.
Some brave ones even snuck back to their houses with cracked walls to fetch food, vegetables, water and clothes.
Residents are also helping soothe the emotional pains brought by the earthquake. The relatively ample food supply has allowed residents who have taken sanctuary at the resettlement site to cook a favorite local pork dish in a huge wok.
Rescuers attribute the raise of local people's awareness of the disaster prevention and earthquake relief to rich experience they have learned from the Wenchuan earthquake.
"After the Wenchuan earthquake, local people accumulated rich experience in self-aid. Instead of waiting for us to save them, they have taken moves to protect themselves and their families," Cao Yong, head of disaster relief headquarters, told the Global Times.
As I was writing this note a fierce aftershock shook the ground, but no one panicked. Local volunteers kept cooking, knowing their rear-base efforts might help save a life on the frontline.
Special report: 7.0-magnitude earthquake jolts Ya'an, Sichuan
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