Tsinghua SEM Students lit hundreds of candles to pray for quake victims on Friday evening as the activity named “love in the world—pray and donate for quake victims” was held at the garden in-between Weilun and Shunde Building of the School.

As the sun set, nearly 200 students had gathered outside the eastern gate of Shunde Building, lighting 150 candles on window sills. Students also lit candles on the ground arranged in the shape of a heart. Hundreds of paper cranes made by students to pray for peace for the quakevictims were placed on the two wishing trees. On the path lit up by the candles, students wrote down their sincere wishes on an eight-meter long banner for the quake victims in Sichuan.

SEM students Chen Junquan, Xiang Zheng who queued for 10 hours to donate blood shared with participants the moving scene they saw during the blood donation. Xiao Siyun, from Du Jiangyan City of Sichuan, whose home was totally destroyed by the massive quake told participants how the victims helped with each other forgetting about their own loss after the disaster. Wu Lizhi, from Mianyang City of Sichun told participants how local people devoted themselves to rescue and relief work. Many were brought to tears by the touching stories.

All the participants stood in silence to mourn tens of thousands of quake victims for one minute during the activity. Students donated 18,060 RMB and 1111 HKD during the night, after they had made donations through various channels before.