Sleepless doctors, nurses

Donations from around China have been flowing into the area while most injured people badly lack tents and medicine.

"Forty injured people slept in tents last night in the yard of our hospital," said Han Huiying, president of Yushu Prefecture People's Hospital.

All the 260 staff members of the hospital are restless to save the injured.

"Many doctors and nurses had not even had a meal," Han said. She showed a small piece of ship's biscuit. "It's the best food we had today," she said.

Han said the main building in the hospital had been damaged and the injured could not be transferred back into the sickrooms.

"The situation would continue tonight," she said with a worried expression.

Buses had been made into temporary ambulances to do simple examinations including x-ray tests, type-B ultrasonic tests and electrocardiograms, she said.

"Tonight will be another sleepless night," she said.

Instant noodles with dust

"I have stomach ache," said 61-year-old man named Jigme Sengye who was eating a bowl of instant noodle covered in dust and sand.

"My house collapsed and the new house under construction was also fell down," he said, sitting on a pile of quilts mixed with mud on the gymnasium's playground.

His 14-year-old grandson Thubten Dorje cooked the meal -- instant noodles -- for the family Thursday night. "I was scared," said the boy recalling the quake. He is a junior middle school student at Yushu Minzu Middle School.

Dorje was at school when the quake hit while the rest of the family was still sleeping. He rushed out of the school building with his classmates. His family however did not get out of the house in time, but survived to pull each other out of its debris after the quake.

All the family belongings they have now are the quilts plus three thermos bottles, a kettle and a boiler.

It would be the second night the 10-member family spent on the playground without a tent, as most of the rescue supplies are still on the way.

"We are lucky enough. Others lost their lives," said Jabar Tsopa, the second daughter of Thubten Dorje.

"What we need now is simply a tent," she said.

The family is just one of the hundreds of the homeless families on the playground without a tent and has to cope in the open air for one night more.

Many survivors had to stay out in the open Wednesday night in the freezing weather.

Some wrapped themselves with quilts taken from the debris, others had their own tents.

Rescuers have set up dozens of tents for survivors in Gyegu, but the effort seemed far from enough.

Trucks loaded with tents, quilts and drinking water could be seen on the 800 kilometers long highway from Xining to Yushu on Thursday.

As of 3:00 PM, 8,370 tents had arrived in the quake-hit area and another 12,500 tents were expected to arrive in the town Friday, two days after the quake, said Kunyang, director of the provincial civil affairs department.

Nearly 40,000 tents had been dispatched by the Civil Affairs Ministry, Beijing municipal government and Qinghai Provincial civil affairs department, but had not arrived yet.

Within a couple of days there should be enough supplies, Kunyang said.

(Xinhua News Agency April 16, 2010)