Tiger, tiger, burning bright

• Source: Global Times
• [20:30 July 08 2009]
• Comments

Homelessness

In December 2007, Zhang Shihe discovered dozens of homeless people in the Qianmen area of Beijing. At that time, Qianmen Avenue was under renovation and the homeless sheltered in about 50 blocks of makeshift shelters. They collected empty plastic bottles at Tiananmen
Square during the day and sold bottles to recycling stations. When night fell, they slept in underpasses by the square.

Shocked by their miserable living conditions, Zhang left some money and a business card. A few days later, he received a call for help. City inspectors were cleaning up the square. When he arrived at the scene, the inspectors were gone. They had ripped up the cardboard and plastic materials the homeless had used for walls and roofs of their makeshift shelters.

The same thing happened again twice in 2008. Zhang decided to find a better and safer living environment for the homeless by renting rooms for them in Daxing District of Beijing.

He posted a call for small donations on his blog and soon received enough money from web users to start. Now there are 19 homeless – mostly seniors and disabled – living in six rooms at a 140 yuan ($20) rental per month each.

“I have no intention of doing something that moves my fellow countrymen. Nor do I have any political intention,” he said.

“It’s just human.”

Some parents whose children died in the Sichuan earthquake last year heard of Zhang and asked him to write about their children on his blog.

“I wondered why they wanted me to do this, because my blog was only influential with a limited group of people.

“They said, ‘The newspapers all refused to publish my child’s story. Your blog, although not far-reaching, still has a few thousand visitors. Why not come to you?’”