Oregon Public Broadcasting

Tens of thousands of people were killed in May's earthquake in China's Sichuan Province. One family that was looking for its son in the aftermath of the quake is learning to cope with his loss.

In May, All Things Considered featured a Chinese couple that lost their loved ones in the deadly quake. Many listeners responded to their loss. This story is an update on how they are coping.

A few days after the Sichuan earthquake in May, a young couple made a desperate effort to rescue their loved ones.

Fu Guanyu and Wang Wei's son, Wang Zhilu, was not yet 2 years old. He and his grandparents were buried in the rubble of their six-story apartment building in the city of Dujiangyan.

On the day spent with the couple, machinery clawed through the debris, and their hopes of finding their family members alive faded.

Late in the afternoon, workers did recover the bodies of the young boy and his grandparents. Since then, the family has stayed in touch by e-mail.

They say they were able to have the bodies cremated the day after they were found. They soon picked out a burial spot for the ashes — in a cemetery on Qingcheng Mountain.

But there were so many strong aftershocks in those days after the earthquake that they decided to delay the burial.

On July 30, family and friends gathered on the mountain. The day was chosen by a Daoist priest based on the grandparents' birthdates in the lunar calendar so they would rest in peace and bless their children on Earth.

The family put up a stone tablet: The grandparents' names are on one side; the young boy's name is on the back.

Wang Wei is now back at work for the local government. The couple is living in a workers' dorm. Fu Guanyu worked in a department store; she's unemployed now.

A close relative says, "Maybe time is the best medicine to cure sadness." Copyright 2008 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.