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Story Publication logo May 22, 2017

Beichuan, China: Where Time Stood Still

Country:

China

Author:

Chi Yin Sim
Grantee

Visitors at a museum in Xi'an, a city known for its long history and rich intellectual life. Image by Sim Chi Yin. China, 2018.

English

China is a vast land but our understanding of it is dominated by views from Beijing and Shanghai. In...

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The county seat of Beichuan, in China's Sichuan province, was the worst hit area by the 7.9 magnitude earthquake that struck on May 12, 2008. The quake, the strongest in China since 1950, left nearly 90,000 people dead or missing in the region, and an estimated 10 million were without shelter. In Beichuan alone, about half of the residents died. Thousands of these casualties were children, with locals blaming faulty construction in school buildings, which became known as 'tofu-dreg schoolhouses.' Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

The ruins of the old town of Beichuan—which sits on a fault line and was deemed too dangerous and damaged to rebuild on—have been turned into a memorial and museum. Along the streets lined with abandoned and collapsed buildings, signboards mark out government offices and institutions such as the police station, banks, showing photos of the deceased employees and telling of the heroic efforts of the authorities in the rescue effort. Large, concrete incense burners have been built outside some of the ruins—the government's way of centralizing even the mourning and burning of incense and 'hell paper' during anniversaries and traditional festivals. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Nearby, apartment blocks still littered with personal items are unmarked. The schools, so controversial when they fell and killed thousands of children, are for the most part unmarked. The rubble of the Beichuan Middle School, which reportedly 'collapsed like tofu,' has been removed and the area turned into an unmarked mound outside the earthquake memorial museum. Two incense burners sit in front of the mound. All that remains of the school is the mossy green spectator stands of what was its sports field. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

A new city, formally named Yongchang town but colloquially known as 'new Beichuan' to locals, has been built to house over 40,000 residents. It boasts of some of the best of the urbanization and planning models China has been using in recent decades. It has wide streets, hulking government offices, ample sporting facilities, lakes, lots of greenery, and handsome five and six-story apartment blocks in which quake survivors have been resettled. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Beichuan Middle School and Yongchang Middle School are super-sized and built at a huge cost. New Beichuan's schools, banks, government offices, stadium, and outdoor swimming pool are significantly better than other Chinese county seats. The town has become a national showpiece of post-disaster reconstruction. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

The ruins of Qushan Primary School where 407 of the 1,092 pupils and teachers died in the 2008 earthquake. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Seven years have gone by and the photos of victims of the 2008 earthquake put up in the ruins site—outside each of their 'work units' and offices—are starting to fade. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Yellow chrysanthemums—often used for mourning in Chinese tradition—line a stone monument with '5.12' and '14:28' etched into it—denoting the month, date and time when the quake struck in 2008. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

A makeshift shrine used by families to mourn victims of the 2008 earthquake sits on a hillside overlooking the destroyed old county seat of Beichuan. More personalized memorialization seems rare in the ruins now run by the government as an official tourist site. Large concrete incense burners stand outside some of the collapsed buildings but few personal shrines like this one exist in the ruins proper. For months after the quake, locals were not allowed back to the city and many chose to come here to mourn, say locals. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Visitors take a buggy ride around the earthquake ruins of old Beichuan city which is open daily to tourists. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Old Beichuan, as seen from a hill where a landslide buried the local kindergarten and other buildings during the 2008 quake. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

The ruins of a printing company and factory in old Beichuan surrounds a statue of Bi Sheng, a Chinese peasant who is credited with inventing the world's first movable type printing process in the early 11th century. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

These mossy spectator stands are all that remain of the infamous Beichuan Middle School where thousands of students were killed when the school building collapsed, reportedly 'like tofu' during the 2008 earthquake. While many other institutions have been preserved and marked with explanatory, memorializing signs, it seems uncanny that the rubble of this most controversial school campus was not kept. It is now a grassy mound and a part of the ground of the large earthquake memorial museum, which tells a narrative of the heroic rescue efforts of the authorities and citizens. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

New Beichuan boasts a spanking new large stadium, outdoor swimming pool, and ample ping pong tables and basketball courts for residents. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

If horses could fly: The uber-planned new Beichuan, held up as a dream, a model of post-disaster reconstruction and urban planning in China, has wide streets, rows of low-rise housing, and its own 'commercial street,” 'banking street,” and 'government offices street.” The scale and size of its facilities are unseen in other county seats and towns of similar population size. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

Near the end of the exhibition inside the memorial museum is this temple-like room with electronic candles along the walls and a digital flower dedication computer screen in the middle. Visitors can press the touch-screen to virtually send a flower to those killed in the earthquake. Image by Sim Chi Yin/VII Photo Agency. China, 2015.

As a photographer, I often like places where it looks like time has stood still, for the history and nostalgia they evoke.

Beichuan was literally that. The whole town remains largely as it was the very moment the massive earthquake struck at 2:28pm on May 12, 2008. Time stopped for the 69,000 who died in that quake. That minute is carved into the brick, mortar, and earth where the people once lived. One feels not nostalgia but a deep sadness and utter incomprehension.

Photographing in the old quake-struck Beichuan for a week, I looked to find a visual record or what remains of the town, but also collected a set of images of small, subtle signs of lives suddenly cut short, unfinished.

Beichuan, China: Where Time Stood Still

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Speaking About China

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