(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-05-20 07:25

NEW YORK: More than 200 Chinese American entertainers staged a benefit performance here on Sunday afternoon, which raised more than $106,000 for victims of the earthquake.

The performers, including singers, musicians, martial artists and a competitor in this year's local beauty queen contest, endured showers during much of the five-hour event.

"None of the performers changed their appearance because of the rain," Richard Li, one of the event's organizers, said.

Organizers were able to pull off the benefit performance in just three days, thanks to a tremendous outpouring of support from the local Chinese community, he said.

All logistics and services, including the venue, audio systems and other supplies, were provided free of charge.

One of the anchors at the event broke into tears time and again, especially when she saw children offer their piggy-bank dollars to the quake victims.

"How I wish those children in the quake-stricken areas were as happy as you are," she sobbed.

Many had teary eyes at the event, including Peng Keyu, the Chinese consul-general in New York.

Diplomats at the consulate general have been working overtime over the past few days helping people to make donations.

Hundreds of checks are coming in every day, Peng said.

Ellen Young, a Taiwan-born New York State assemblywoman, read two letters, one to the Standing Committee of the Sichuan Provincial People's Congress, the other to the provincial government, in the Sichuan dialect, expressing sympathy for and solidarity with the Chinese people.

"I am sure people in the disaster-stricken area will, proceeding from the Chinese nation's spirit of perseverance in hard times, pass the period of difficulty soon," Young said.

She said she would propose establishing a sister state-province relationship between New York and Sichuan so as to better help the quake-hit province's reconstruction efforts.

Near the benefit performance's venue outside Flushing Mall, in Flushing, home to one of New York's largest Chinese communities, many local Chinese organizations continued collecting donations despite the rain.

Lily Costa, a Sichuan native, has been collecting donations since Tuesday, one day after the massive quake struck. The nine-member family of her stepmother's brother was in Beichuan near the epicenter; only three survived.

In the Washington area, Chinese Americans have donated nearly $300,000 for the survivors of quake-hit areas, officials from the Chinese Embassy to the United States said yesterday.

Xinhua

(China Daily 05/20/2008 page5)