Cooperation Makes Grim Work Easier for Taiwanese : Disaster: Volunteers, some of whom have lost their own homes, join in relief effort. Survivors in outlying areas say help has been slow to arrive.

By VALERIE REITMAN

Sept. 24, 1999 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

TONGSHIH, Taiwan —

Roads were clogged Thursday with small trucks ferrying tons of tents, blankets and food donated from across this island to the two counties devastated by Tuesday’s massive earthquake, even as rescue workers battled the clock and fatigue searching for survivors.

By late Thursday night, the nationwide death toll stood at 2,109 and the number of injured had climbed to nearly 8,000. Hopes were fading for an estimated 350 missing.

And rescuers were just beginning to reach about 5,560 survivors trapped in isolated mountain villages in the hard-hit interior, where landslides have occurred and transportation has been cut. One search expedition walked hours to reach tiny Kuoshin, where landslides killed 60 villagers with 40 still missing, according to the China Times. About 50 people survived, the newspaper said.

In the Taichung suburb of Tali, a child was found alive in the rubble today, three days after the quake, state radio reported. Rescuers were working to free the 6-year-old from the wreckage of an apartment, but no details were available, the report said.

There were extraordinary scenes of people helping each other, particularly in Tongshih, the worst-hit city, where the death toll was so high that a wood factory was converted into a temporary morgue to store more than 450 bodies.

Throughout the city, volunteers--many of whom had lost their houses--were out in force, peeling fresh vegetables and stir-frying noodles in industrial-size woks to keep thousands of newly homeless people and rescue workers well-fed. Others helped unload trucks arriving with donated supplies, stacking thousands of boxes of food, blankets and tents in parks. Some volunteers handed weary truck drivers freshly made, surprisingly tasty meals, a welcome treat after hours braving the last few miles, where a damaged bridge and buckled roads added to delays.

It was good therapy for the volunteers, and the least they could do to help far less fortunate neighbors. “My house is destroyed, but my family is all fine, and so many others aren’t,” said Lee Mei-fong, as she and half a dozen other middle-aged women picked through donated straw baskets of a dark, leafy green known as water grass that is somewhat akin to spinach. They were serving up rice, noodle soup, the stir-fried greens with mushrooms and Chinese bread to anyone who came by.

The cooperation was a striking contrast to the scene after a massive earthquake in Kobe, Japan, nearly five years ago, where there were few volunteers initially, since the Japanese culture had long considered volunteering aberrant.

In terms of relief, Tongshih had it better than many other towns in Taiwan’s Nantou and Taichung counties. The local media had beamed footage of Tongshih’s destroyed streets, lilting or toppled structures and high death toll throughout the nation, eliciting donations and empathy from across the island. And the scale of destruction in the dense city of 60,000 does appear to be far worse than in most other towns.

That was small comfort to the city of Wufeng, where more than 40 people died. Residents complained that they hadn’t gotten much assistance at all, saying most was going to higher-profile cities such as Tongshih and Pub in Nantou.

Only two pieces of heavy construction equipment had been sent in, said one survivor, and victims’ relatives were forced to dig into the rubble with the only tools they could get their hands on: shovels. Meanwhile, dozens of rescue teams from Russia, South Korea and Japan were directed to Tongshih by the Taiwanese government.

Taiwanese volunteers started arriving here from nearby counties shortly after the huge quake hit at 1:40 a.m. Tuesday. Members of the well-known relief organization Tsegi waded across a shallow river because the bridges were too damaged. The group had been preparing to go to Turkey to assist after that country’s magnitude 7.4 temblor last month but diverted its supplies to their own homeland.

The gestures by the out-of-town volunteers inspired several local women to help out. “The [Tsegi] association was so good to help, and they weren’t even from here,” said Shih Jen-ming, as she and half a dozen other women sifted through the straw bins of greens. Like the others, she is living in a tent.

A timid woman who gave her name only as Mrs. Cheu said more than 10 of her neighbors died in the temblor. About 20 minutes before the disaster struck, she had been watching a television program in which the head of Tsegi was urging viewers to make donations for the Turkey quake victims.

As she lay down on her bed, the earth shook violently, first left and right, then up and down. Everything in the room began flying, she recalls, and she heard her neighbors’ houses collapsing; three died in the home next door.

Her own family of six was unscathed, though the house is severely damaged and she too lives in a tent. But working and talking with fellow volunteers is comforting, she says. “It’s much better to be here.”

They are beginning to come back to life themselves after the shocking experience.

“There was no laughter among us the first day,” said Lee Mei-fong. “Today [Thursday] is the first time we laughed together” as they worked.

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How to Help

These aid agencies are among the many accepting contributions for assistance to victims of the earthquake in Taiwan. A more comprehensive list is available on The Times’ Web site: https://www.latimes.com/quakeaid.

American Jewish World Service

989 Avenue of the Americas

10th Floor

New York, NY 10018

Tel: (800) 889-7146

https://www.ajws.org

American Red Cross

International Response Fund

P.O. Box 37243

Washington, D.C. 20013

Tel: (800) HELP-NOW

Spanish: (800) 257-7575