A hard but happy life: Quake survivors build memorial to dead spouses

Source: Xinhua | 05-11-2009 10:16

GANGOU VILLAGE, Sichuan, May 10 (Xinhua) -- With boards from dismantled temporary houses, Lin Xingcong builds the walls for his new two-storey home. His wife, Li Yunxiang, whom he married in January, helps.

"The wood is all my own to save money," says Lin, 48, who lives in the forestry village of Gangou, Anxian County, one of the areas worst hit by last year's May 12 earthquake in Sichuan Province.

In Lin's village, residents build wooden houses if they cannot afford bricks and concrete, which must be transported into the mountainous area.

His new home comprises a two-story wood structure of living rooms on the eastern side of his small yard and the kitchen and dining room on the west. Between stands the tent in which the couple live, with a bed, an old wardrobe and an old desk pulled from the rubble of their former homes.

Lin's former wife was crushed by a rock fall. She was on her way back from market when the quake struck. Li's former husband was working at a hydroelectric station, under construction at the time. Li went to the site several times, but his body was never retrieved from the debris.

"My former husband left me with a 66-year-old mother-in-law and 15-year-old son. I felt quite helpless at the time," says, Li, 37.

One day in July last year, each household in the temporary community where Li lived was given a tank of gas for cooking. Li called Lin to help her with the tank and he "immediately agreed without any hesitation".