Earthquakes link Li Sha's home town to Hastings

The woman whose identity has been puzzling hundreds of students over the last few weeks is no shrinking violet – with awards for rescuing the wounded in an 8.0 earthquake that killed 70,000 and left another 18,000 missing, among them her mother and two “so cute, so young” nieces. 

In The Amazing China Face Race, Hastings students had to use their research skills to unravel clues to find one unnamed person in China – a country with a population of more than 1.4billion. They then had to find a way to contact that person for a code to submit to Hastings council to claim the prize - a fully funded trip to China.

Choosing Li Sha to be The Face of the competition was not a random act.

The Hastings selection committee, headed by Hastings District councillor Kevin Watkins, ran an application process in China through that country’s Foreign Affairs Office, and chose Li Sha from a list of four.

Li Sha’s courage in the face of adversity was among the reasons she was selected. She lived through the Wenchuan earthquake in May 2008, in which landslides all but obliterated her home town. Despite being just 23 years old and losing her mother and four other close relatives in that earthquake, Li Sha worked within the rubble to rescue the wounded and move children to safe places. She co-ordinated volunteers and after the initial rescue efforts were over, took up a position helping resettle earthquake victims in their new town of Beichuan.

Her work during that time was recognised in China with excellence awards.

Mr Watkins said Li Sha’s resilience and bravery in the face of great personal loss, “leading the recovery of the injured while the ground was still shaking and mountain debris was falling, and her dedication work in the planning and rebuilding of the new Beichuan County seat, convinced us she is one very humble yet outstanding young lady”.

As part of the selection process, Li Sha wrote to Mr Watkins about her experiences on the day.

She was attending a conference in her home town when the earthquake struck. “When the earthquake ended, I cannot believe the sight . . . I froze at the sight of collapsing houses and the mountain.”

The conference venue was single storey which made getting the attendees out relatively easy, however her office was in a six storey building, which collapsed. Many of her colleagues were buried in the earthquake. “The whole county was beyond recognition and I could not find my way home . . . My mother was a business woman, running a grocery store which fell down.

“I lost two sister-in-laws . . . and two nieces. They were so young and so cute. They died in the kindergarten which was buried.”

The bodies of four of her relatives have never been found.

Now married to husband Yu Chun and with an 18-month-old daughter, Li Sha will visit Hastings in September.

4 October 2017

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