The Giving Continues

Robert Hsu, June 03, 2008

I've recently talked about the outpouring of charitable giving in China in response to the earthquake that shook the Sichuan Province. Within the past few weeks, many countries and individual donors have opened up their hearts and wallets to help the country's relief efforts. After tragedies such as this, attention and support sometimes dwindles quickly in the weeks following the event. But that has definitely not been the case for the earthquake in China -- it seems that people just keep on giving.

In fact, I just attended a special benefits concert on Saturday night in downtown Los Angeles for the Sichuan Earthquake relief. There were performances by several famous Taiwanese pop stars who flew in for the occasion. This shows that the people of Taiwan care deeply about Mainland Chinese, and that that relationship between Mainland China and Taiwan is strengthening, as I have discussed in the past two dispatches of China Strategy.

After viewing footages of the suffering and destruction during the concert, the 3,000 ethnic Chinese audience members from different parts of the world -- Taiwan, Mainland China, Hong Kong and America -- all felt a common bond with earthquake victims. It was obvious that although the earthquake caused tremendous damage, it helped bring ethnic Chinese everywhere together. In fact, in a survey taken after the earthquake, the percentage of people living in Hong Kong and Taiwan who identify themselves as "Chinese" instead of "Hong Konger" or "Taiwanese" shot up by nearly 40%.

This coming-together will help further integrate the 70 million ethnic Chinese outside of Mainland China with the 1.3 billion living there. And I expect this unity to grow stronger, as the earthquake recovery, along with the upcoming Beijing Olympics, will drive Chinese ethnic pride to an all-time high.

Along with the other audience members, I, too, was deeply moved by the suffering in Sichuan. That's why I made another donation to the earthquake relief that evening. As a result, my six-year-old daughter Rachel went on stage for being one of the largest donors of the night.

In addition to the earthquake relief concert on Saturday, I saw another great show last night -- The Police concert at Hollywood Bowl. It's been 25 years since I last saw them perform live in a concert -- I was only in the eighth grade back then. Despite the fact that all three members of the band are now in their 50's and 60's, they still rocked.

You may find it interesting that The Police's lead singer Sting and his wife Trudie Styler once made a documentary film based on the life story of a friend of mine -- a student leader of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. Well, after my friend left China, he got a JD/MBA and eventually became a hedge fund manager, and Sting became an investor in his fund. Small world!

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