Reports of the devastation in Japan caused by a strong earthquake and tsunami have spurred many Taiwanese to post online messages of prayer, support and encouragement and prompted a local university to organize a donation drive for victims of the disaster.
National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU), which on Monday launched a five-day fundraising campaign called “Pray for Japan,” had collected more than NT$116,000 (US$3,927) in donations on the first day of the drive, an NTNU student surnamed Hu (胡) said.
The 300-plus Japanese students taking courses at NTNU Mandarin Training Center are very concerned about the situation in Japan and are grateful to the people of Taiwan for their tangible and moral support, Hu said.
The donations, mainly from Taiwanese students and Japanese expatriates, will be handed over to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Saturday for families affected by the disaster, Hu said.
Meanwhile, the campaign office of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), who on Friday announced her bid to run in next year’s presidential election, said Tsai would donate NT$200,000 to help disaster relief efforts in Japan.
The amount will be a personal donation and unconnected to the DPP, which has announced a separate donation drive, the office said.
“Japan is ... a very close friend of Taiwan. We should do everything we can to help Japan get back on its feet,” she said.
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), and the smaller Taiwan Solidarity Union, have each asked ranking officials to donate a day’s salary to relief efforts.
While the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has announced an official NT$100 million donation, Tsai’s donation is believed to be the single highest amount given by a political figure.
“I hope to use my own influence to call on everybody around the country to give what they have,” she said.
In addition to the donation drive, more and more messages of support are being posted on social network Web sites to extend condolences, hope and encouragement to the Japanese people.
The posts also discuss what can be done to help the country in what Japan Prime Minister Naoto Kan called its “darkest hour since World War II.”
Taiwanese manga artist Tseng Chien-hua (曾建華) has launched a Facebook link called using-manga-to-pray-for-Japan, which invites Internet users to upload a drawing based on their favorite manga artist or character as a prayer for Japan.
As of yesterday, more than 1,000 people were involved with more than 250 drawings posted online.
The idea of using manga to pray was inspired by Japanese manga artists who are now using their art form to reach out with a message of hope. One of the artists is Takehiko Inoue, known as the creator of Slam Dunk, who has been posting drawings of smiling Japanese on his Twitter feed.
On Saturday, a Taiwanese Internet user who goes by the name of “Sasson 5789” uploaded a five-minute video clip showing 100 Taiwanese people displaying a message written in Japanese in their left palms that read “pray for peace for Japan.”
An online Japanese magazine, Rocket News 24, ran a story about the video clip.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY VINCENT Y. CHAO
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