BEIJING — For three minutes that seemed like an eternity, this very busy nation of 1.3 billion people Monday stopped shopping, producing, eating, talking, driving.
Instead, they stood still, heads bowed in mourning in commemoration of victims of last week's earthquake. The memorial began at 2:28 p.m., exactly one week after the deadly tremor. Many said it was the biggest display of mourning in China since the death of Mao Tse-tung in 1976. It was the first time ordinary Chinese were able to grieve collectively for others like themselves, as opposed to an emperor or Communist Party leader.
With each passing day since the quake, there is ever more to grieve. The Chinese government announced Monday that more than 200 rescue workers had perished over the last two days, mainly because of landslides set off by aftershocks. There was little detail provided, except that 158 were transportation workers who'd been buried while trying to repair a road leading to the epicenter in the town of Wenchuan in Sichuan province.
Fears of more aftershocks were fueled by a report from three provincial earthquake centers that a tremor between 6 and 7 in magnitude would strike over the next 24 hours.
That set off a panic in Sichuan province, and thousands slept out in the parks and streets. One family in Chengdu moved its bed to the median of a six-lane road. Highways out of the city were clogged with cars as people tried to flee.
The confirmed death toll from last week's earthquake, which the Chinese government now says was a magnitude 8, was raised Monday to more than 34,000 and was expected to climb to 50,000. More than 4 million people are homeless and 245,000 injured.
To mark the country's largest natural disaster in more than 30 years, the government declared a three-day mourning period beginning Sunday. Movie theaters were closed. Television stations canceled most entertainment programs, and movie networks such as HBO and Cinemax were blacked out. The Olympic torch relay was suspended until Wednesday. Flags flew at half-staff.
From Beijing's Tiananmen Square to Shanghai's Bund to the far-flung villages where rescue workers were still trying to dig out the living from the rubble, everything simply came to a halt. It was an amazing sight in a country that on a normal Monday afternoon would be such a hive of activity. Trains stopped in their tracks. Cars on the huge ring roads encircling Beijing stopped. Drivers in unison leaned on their horns so that a giant siren seemed to be shrieking.
