'Strong' girl in recovery

CHENGDU: Seven-year-old Wang Jiaqi is a "very strong girl". That was the praise Premier Wen Jiabao gave the girl when he visited the Sichuan Provincial People's Hospital on May 24.

Wen had been present when rescuers pulled out Wang and Zhao Qisong from debris on May 13, the second day after the quake hit Sichuan province. The premier could not hold back his tears when he saw the plight of the two youngsters.

It has been about two weeks since Wang's rescue from the rubble of the Xinjian Primary School in Dujiangyan, about 40 km from Chengdu, capital of Sichuan. She suffered a nose fracture from the quake and is still traumatized, unwilling to talk with anyone except for her mother Lan Qunxia.

Every day, she falls asleep for at most 20 minutes before waking up suddenly, shouting: "Mom, earthquake!" Lan, 44, told China Daily, from their ward in the hospital.

At 10 am on the morning of May 13, about 20 hours after the earthquake, Premier Wen reached the site of the collapsed Xinjian Primary School. When he heard rescuers were trying to save some children trapped in the rubble, the premier climbed over rubbles and sharp broken cement to get closer to the survivors.

He tripped and wounded his arm. But, when medics came to dress his wound, the premier pushed them aside, asking people to rescue the children as soon as possible.

"Children, I am Grandpa Wen Jiabao. Please hold on and you will be saved," Wen said, shedding tears.

About half an hour later, Wang and Zhao were rescued. Lan credits Wen with saving her daughter.

"The firefighters from Chongzhou (a city under Chengdu's administration) had not eaten anything for almost one day and was exhausted when Premier Wen arrived. Thanks to the premier, their morale was boosted and they sped up the rescue operation," Lan said.

Soon after her rescue, Wang was sent to the Sichuan hospital. Because she suffered from an open fracture on the head, neurosurgeons operated on her for three hours, removing the broken bones.

After the successful operation, Wang was transferred from the neurosurgery department to the department of surgery, said Yu Hao, a surgeon in the department of surgery who was in charge of Wang.

Doctors will take an X-ray to determine whether the congestion on her hip is the result of soft tissue damage or femur fracture. After treatment in surgery, she will be transferred to the department of facial features, because her nose has collapsed and her incisors are exfoliated, Yu said.

Wang had her hair cut before the neurosurgical operation. Because of her baldness, many visitors mistook her for a boy, which would make her cry. She thought she was no longer beautiful.

"She hates meeting and talking to people. Even when Wang Hongmei, her favorite teacher, visited her, she did not speak and only cried," Lan said.

When people tried to visit the girl, Wang hid her face with the book Green Fairy Tale, sent by two journalists from Beijing.

"She reads fairy tales almost all day, as if only the unreal world can comfort her," Lan said.

Lan said the restaurant and home she and her husband owned in Dujiangyan had been reduced to rubble.

Although they were made homeless and penniless by the quake, they know the government will help them rebuild their home and lives. But they worry about their traumatized daughter.

When the Xinjian Primary School collapsed, 28 of the 50 pupils in Wang's Class 2 of Grade 2 died. Two others remain missing.

(China Daily 05/29/2008 page18)