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Tampa Bay Area Chinese-Americans Join Relief Effort

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By SHERRI ACKERMAN

The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 20, 2008

TAMPA - Chinese-Americans in the Tampa Bay area are raising money to help victims of the massive earthquake that ravaged the Sichuan Providence of China and killed at least 34,000 people.

"We're very concerned for them," said Alex Yu, a Tampa lawyer and member of the Chinese American Association of Tampa. "We're helping them any way we can."

To date, the group has raised about $15,000.

Two of the association's 240 families have relatives in the area hit by a 7.9 magnitude quake last week, Yu said. Their homes were destroyed, but they are alive along with countless others left homeless.

The association has joined efforts with five other local Chinese-American groups to create a relief fund that will forward donations to the Chinese Consulate General in Houston. From there, the donations will go to the Red Cross in China. Public monitoring will be available on the association's Web site at www.tampabaycaat.org.

"We'll make sure that 100 percent goes to the consulate to be used for relief efforts," he said, adding that the Chinese government is "doing the right things - acting very fast."

More than 10,000 Chinese-Americans live in Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties, Yu said. Although many have become naturalized citizens of the United States, they still have strong ties with their homeland.

"No matter how many years we live here, our connections and bond can never be cut off," said Yu, a 38-year-old U.S. citizen who was born in northeast China and has lived in Tampa since 1995.

Chinese-Americans have been riveted by news of the quake, Yu said. They read Chinese newspapers, watch satellite television and use the Internet.

Stories of the quake's aftermath, and the children who have died, are heart-wrenching for Ping Chen, a 46-year-old art teacher in Riverview who was born in China and is now a U.S. citizen.

"The Chinese government only allows families to have one child," she said. "It's very sad."

But amid the tragedy, there's hope.

Two women were found alive Monday, a week after they were buried in the rubble of a collapsed building at a coal mine in Sichuan. And Chen's relatives told her about a boy rescued a few days after the quake.

"He hadn't even opened his eyes yet," she said, when rescuers asked him if he wanted something to drink. "He asked for a Coca-Cola with ice."

Other groups involved in the relief effort include the Suncoast Association of Chinese Americans, the Chinese Chamber of Commerce of Tampa Bay, The USF Confucius Institute and the Friendship Association of Chinese Students and Scholars.

Reporter Sherri Ackerman can be reached at (813) 259-7144 or sackerman@tampatrib.com.

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