By Huang Zhiling (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-05-20 07:27

CHENGDU: Shen Yonghong could not hold back her tears as all the 55 students in class five of grade four in Paotongshu Primary School here stood up and applauded to welcome her 10-year-old daughter Han Wenjing to become a temporary member of their class.

Han, a fourth grader from Beijie Primary School in Dujiangyan, about 40 km from Chengdu, had come to the provincial capital of Sichuan with her mother Shen, a 33-year-old saleswoman. They arrived here two days after the earthquake, which left both her home and school in a precarious condition, and moved into the house of Shen's friend near Paotongshu.

"As all primary and high schools in Chengdu were to resume classes on May 19, I have brought my daughter to Paotongshu to see if she can temporarily join grade four," Shen said.

"I didn't know anyone in Paotongshu, which is one of the top primary schools in Chengdu. But the school authorities admitted my daughter readily when they learned of our plight. That was both surprising and moving," she said.

Han was among the five primary schoolchildren from outside Chengdu that Paotongshu admitted yesterday. All five have lost their school and home to the quake, said Chen Qun, deputy headmistress of Paotongshu.

Soon after admitting them, Paotongshu held a ceremony at 9 am to raise the national flag and then lower it to half mast as a mark of mourning for quake victims. All the school's 2,600 students took part in the ceremony.

Although nobody in the school was hurt in the quake and the only telltale sign of the earth moving just miles away was a few ceramic tiles coming off the walls, Paotongshu still made sure everything was in place and that nothing in the school would remind the students of the trauma they experienced.

Before classes resumed yesterday, the school removed the tiles and covered the walls with paintings by students.

Classrooms had been left in a mess, littered with books, stationery and schoolbags, when students fled the building in the wake of the quake.

"Teachers picked up the books and stationery, put them back in the schoolbags and left the bags on the desks before the school reopened," said Chen, who, along with all other school officials, stood at the gate to welcome students when the school opened at 8:20 am yesterday.

(China Daily 05/20/2008 page9)