City museums seeking volunteers

By Zhao Hongyi

Museums are the best resources for people to deepen their knowledge. The city has a handful of enthusiasts who have an interest in volunteering at museums every year.

Beijing has 159 museums, mainly funded by local government, but only 32 have volunteer programs and few provide bilingual services, according to a recent survey conducted by the Association of Beijing Museums.

“The comprehensive large-scale museums, such as the Forbidden City Museum, National Museum of China and Capital Museum of Beijing, have full internal management and a qualified volunteering program,” the report said, “but many mid-sized and small museums are far from satisfactory.”

The reason might be the lack of popularity of these small museums. “Many people have never heard of these museums, which makes it difficult for them to recruit qualified volunteers.”

Another factor is the lack of an overarching system to manage and coordinate the volunteers, according to the report.

The museums in Beijing have had volunteer programs for a decade, but there’s hardly any overlap in the programs. “It turns out that museums and volunteers don’t know each other,” the report said.

The survey showed that Beijing’s museums have more than 1,000 volunteers. Most work as guides.

National Agriculture Exhibition Center

The National Agriculture Exhibition Center on East Third Ring Road is famous for hosting trade fairs and bazaars every year, but few know the center has six permanent exhibitions covering agricultural history, technology and the processing industry.

The exhibition center has 16 professional guides but none of them speak a second language. The museum began promoting volunteer programs years ago, but the results were not ideal.

“The volunteers we used before were university students, but they had to study during weekdays and went out on the weekends,” said Lin Zhengtong, director of social education at the museum. The volunteer program lasted only a month.

Lin said the museum should be at the top of many potential volunteers’ lists after it completes its current round of renovation and expansion.

The museum is scheduled to recruit two types of volunteers, Lin said. One is the professional guide who is interested in the exhibits and has basic knowledge of agricultural history.

The other type is the simple fan who can hopefully provide ideas on how to perfect exhibitions and organize events such as lectures, seminars and workshops.

“The volunteer program for 2012 will start soon,” Lin said.

Contact: Lin Zhengtong

Tel: 6509 6066

Why do the Cantonese eat cats?

By Zhang Dongya

A saying goes that “a cat has nine lives,” but this does not seem true when it involves Cantonese dinner tables.

Local media in recent years have increasingly reported on rescues of cats about to be shipped to Guangzhou, Guangdong Province. But ailurophagy persists. On Monday, at least 800 cats were discovered in cages in Tianjin – en route to Guangzhou.

Why do Cantonese people eat cats? Is it a lack of education or geographic eating habits?

As of press time, the cats were being kept at a primary school in Tianjin’s Hongqiao District. They would have been slaughtered in Guagzhou if not for the action of animal welfare volunteers and pet lovers.

“I haven’t found my kitty yet, but some said they found theirs,” said a woman who asked to be identified as Garbage Mom, a volunteer at CatHope, a Tianjin-based network that rescues cats from slaughter.

The hundreds of caged cats were found in a cottage by a person looking for his missing cat. He immediately got in touch with Cats’ Hope on the Internet. Th group raided the cottage on Monday afternoon, discovering that another room in the house contained caged sparrows.

“We were shocked,” Garbage Mom said by phone, adding it was the most  caged cats she saw sincthe network was founded a year ago. A count revealed 39 cages with more than 800 cats.

Garbage Mom said her group encountered the “traders” at the cottage. The men, who looked 40 and spoke with a Tianjin accent, said ey were shipping the cats to restaurants in Guangzhou.

The men only had a license to sell flowers, birds and fish. They are now detained at Shaogongzhuang Police Station in Hongqiao District.

They claimed to have bought the cats, but the rescuers believe most of the animals were taken from the street.

Garbage Mom, who lost her cat last week, said volunteers saw a few of the men trying to catch the cats with professional equipment. “They ued a stringed bag with a sparrow inside to lure the cats,” she said.

On Tuesday, the animals were moved to a primary school with the help of the China Small Animal Protection Association. More than 30 people – network volunteers and residents – have taken turns feeding and cleaning the cats.

“We’re not yet allowed to set the cats free. The police said there are no laws or regulations concerning” w to do with rescued cats, Garbage Mom said. She said the network was willing to pay the traders to release the cats.

Hebei donors bleed for Beijing’s bank

 

Volunteers came from Hebei to donate at the Beijing Red Cross Blood Center. CFP Photo

 

By Jin Zhu

A group of 76 donors from Langfang, Heibei Province, came to Beijing to donate their blood at the Beijing Red Cross Blood Center Sunday after hearing the capital’s bloo bank is running dry.

Winter always shows a seasonal dip in blood donations. Few people stop at the donor buses, and fear of the A/H1N1 flu has many wary of crowded donation sites.

According to statistics from the Beijing Red Cross Blood Center, the city has 1,311 liters of blood in reserve ?41 percent of the norm – as of November 3.

“The (donor) group was quick to contact its members the day it heard about the shortage,” Wei Fadong, a volueer and former policeman, told the Beijing News. Many group members missed the activity because they were ill or had donated blood too recently.

In the year since it was organized, the volunteer group has grown from 60 to nearly 500 members.

“Most are young or midde-aged and come from all walks of life. Some are college students. The daily work is mainly to provide services to blood donors, calling for blood donations from the public and collecting feedback,” Wang Jianhua, director of Langfang Central Blood Station, said.

“Many volunteers have donated several times. Their enthusiasm is so high that we were not surprised thy came to donate as a group,” he said.

The 58 volunteers who met the requirements donated 21.2 liters of blood.

Dai Suna, deputy director of the Beijing Red Cross Blood Center, said the blood reserve is back up to 1,740 liters, but it has not reached the normal level. “The volunteers in Langfang moved us, and I hope their effort encourages more people to get involved in blood donation,” she said.

At present, 170,000 citizens in Beijing have registered as donors at the blood center. When the city’s blood reserve becme strained, the center sends out text messages to the members of its pool. Usually 20 to 25 percent of the pool comes in to donate.

Starting November 1, Beijing terminated its compulsory donation system which took effect in 1998 and has started encouraging people ages 18 to 55 to donate voluntarily.

Citizens have access to unlimited free blood for life after donating 1 liter of their own blood.

Dai said the previous law, which enforced a donation quota, did little to guarantee the quality of donated blood.

But the new regulation is not without its disadvantages. By going entirely voluntary, the reserve is now subject to the whims of the weather and other factors.

“They need to do more to attract donors. The blood buses that park on the street also need to be more convenient,” she said.

Webpage to encourage NGO workers, volunteers

By Jin Zhu

China NGO Viewpoints, a webpage where NGO staff and volunteers can share their experiences on the job, was recently launched to support industry workers.

Many young people are working for NGOs, especially in China, where the industry has boomed in recent years, and peer support is important, said Kay Zhang, Viewpoints’ editor.

“We needed a platform to share stories and encourage each other to continue working in NGOs. There is no shining example for anything; working in charity has peaks and troughs,” said Zhang, mmunications manager at Care for Children, an international charity group.

As the first writer on Viewpoints, Zhang talked about her experiences working with Dare to Care, a donation program for hotel guests introduced in Shangri-La hotels throughout the Asia Pacific. Her sharing generated more offer of help.

“During the first week after Zhang’s story s published, we received seven responses from various hotels asking how they can get involved in the program,” said Danny Levinson, chief operating officer of ChinaCSR.com, which hosts Viewpoints.

ChinaCSR.com is the first China-based online publication devoted to providing news and information to help companies discover and implement new corporate social responsibility trends.

“In China, many companies do not have a clear or maure understanding of NGO work. They always wonder whether their donations are been used honestly. The platform aims to develop a closer relationship between companies and NGOs,” Levinson said.

Viewpoints – through itsstories – also hopes to help NGOs attract more skilled volunteers.

Instead of discussing controversial topics, the platform wants to feature inspiring and thought-provoking stories. The articles are updated weekly and contributions in English or Chinese are welcome, as well as pictures. The editors are looking for 200- to 500-word pieces with a short introduction of the featured NGO and website links.

For contributions or questions, email cfc.Kay.zhang@gmail.com or visit the website:
chinacsr.com/en/category/china-ngo-viewpoints/.

‘Carfree Day’ pushes green transport

Tuesday was World Carfree Day, and in China more than 100 cities lent their support to “greener” modes of transportation, such as walking, cycling and taking the bus.

Authorities in Guangzhou set up special areas to promote the day, while 90 percent of cars reserved for official use were taken off the roads. In Kunming, public officials were urged to lead by example and opt for transportation less damaging to the environment.

In Shanghai, authorities marked the day by sealing off some streets and only allowing pedestrians, cyclists, buses and taxis access.

Volunteers in Hangzhou handed out cards to drivers, asking them to think green and take alternative forms of transportation.

Compared with the government’s efforts, however, the public had very little planned for the day. In Beijing, many citizens said they did not see much improvement in traffic Tuesday compared with other days. Some did not even know it was Carfree Day.

Critics say although many Chinese cities observed Carfree Day, some of them have not really grasped the concept of green transportation. They suggest the government should take real action to develop green transportation and public awareness; otherwise, World Carfree Day has been meaningless.

(By Han Manman)