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Home>Service> Awardees of Fervent Global Love of Lives Award> 13th Fervent Global Love of Lives Award 2010> The president of cancer fighter—Liu Kuei-Hsi from China
A person with four terminal diseases who insists on fighting for the welfare of the disadvantaged
      Liu Kuei-Hsi is a common woman, who had fought with four kinds of terminal illness—beast cancer, gallbladder cancer, bone-marrow cancer and malignant pleural effusion—and paralysis caused by lower limb fractures for ten years. She is a terminally ill patient wandering around the boundary between living and death, who devoted her finite life to the charities and created a ten-year life miracle that pushed the dwindling charities for the disabled towards the new path.
 
 
A considerate girl from a poor family
      Liu Kuei-Hsi was born in 1967 in an ordinary family in Chang-ling town located in Lianyuan City , Hunan , China . Her parents were both tailors, who had mixed feelings about her coming into being. Since young, her parents instilled the ethics of hard-working in her, so she understood the struggle of her family clearly. In order to earn money for her family, she often followed neighboring adults to pick fruits and sold them for money. In every summer vacation, she bought some wholesale ice bars from Hongshan temple and Jinshi town and peddled them to faraway towns. Peddling all day made her feet filled with blisters. On a day in August 1978, she fainted while she peddled ice bars; fortunately, she was sent to the hospital by a kind person. As the other two kids were born into her family, the economic burden of her family became even heavier. Though she struggled to find ways for making more money, the money she earned was minimal to her family.
 
 
An arduous, hard-working, and wise business owner
      In 1983, Kuei-Hsi was an outstanding high school sophomore, who yearned for knowledge, ready to live out her dream in college, but gave the opportunity to her brother with grief due to the poverty and economic hardship of her family. Born and raised in the dressmaking family, she opened a tailor's shop in the Sinheng market in Shueidudong town on the strength of her deft hands and persistent learning and shouldered her brother's tuition.
      In 1995, she started to work for Loudi Liangang Welfare Co., Ltd. The company was loosely regulated where workers there only had to produce 30 pairs of shoes in one month. As dexterous as she was, she could make 40 pairs of shoes in one day, and 1,000 pairs of shoes in one month, exceeding the company requirement. Other workers laughed at her and said, “You won't get extra pay, why would you do that much?” She smiled at them and discarded others' misunderstanding. Nevertheless, her supervisor saw what she did for the company. In the following years when the company made lower profits and could not reverse the deficit, the manager though of Liu Kuei-Hsi, hoping that she could improve the situation and anchored his hope in her.
      In 1997, the company sent her to take over the food service sector that had a deficit of 20,000 RMB per month. She took the challenge and responded to it with enthusiasm. She cleverly deployed channels that could expand their business and fought wholeheartedly with the deficit. She often went to work before the sun rose and went home late at night. Whether in rainy or windy day, she delivered lunch boxes with her employees. Beyond working side by side with her staffs, she even proposed new ideals of business—lowering the cost, selling more with smaller profit, prioritizing the needs of customers—and turned deficit into profit by virtue of her business model and enthusiastic service attitude. Although she made a profit of 10,000 RMB for her company, she was not content with it. She had the spirits of taking up challenges posed by others, which also made her stick to her own business without hesitation. She had taken multiple job positions, such as worker, chief operator, assistant director, workshop head, service department manager, food and beverage manager, manager, and party secretary.
      In 1999, she took over the bluepring sector from Lian Gang (Loudi) Welfare Co. At that time, there were 70 disabled workers. She took all her savings and opened a “Kuei-Hsi Welfare Hotel” in 2004. In 2007, she opened a furnace company and partnered with a Guangdong manufacturer in the joint venture on travel crafts. In 2009, she opened the largest car appearance center—Car Jazz—in Loudi.
 
 

Tribulations never defeat her
      However, while the career of Liu Kuei-Hsi was thriving, she would never expect the approaching tribulations in her near future.
      In October 1998, her left breast was diagnosed with tumor, but her mind was occupied with her business and did not keep it in mind. Until April, 1999, she met her friend, who worked for Lian Gang Hospital while visiting her employees. Her friend recommended that she undergo a medical inspection. To her surprise, she was diagnosed as having advanced stage breast cancer. It was a thunderbolt from a clear sky! She was only 30 year old, young in her life with a bright future!
      As staunch as she was, Kuei-Hsi did not tell others about her illness. Under the medication, she still worked normally and endured the suffering silently. She said, “The piercing pain could not be expressed by any language.”Finally, she decided to undergo a surgery on May 4, and phoned her husband Chang An-Yuen right before the surgery, who passed out upon hearing the bad news.
      After the surgery, the doctor told her to stay in the hospital so that they could monitor her conditions. Although resting in the hospital, she was much concerned about the life of her factory and workers. When she learned that around 70 disabled workers in her factory were not paid due to her factory's poor financial situation, she could never lie still on the bed. Discreetly, she ran back to her company while doctors and nurses were not around, and dragged her ill body to search for fund. Struggling for finding more time to race with the death, she hoped to win more welfare for her disabled workers.
      Nevertheless, it was not the end of her tribulations. In 2001, she was diagnosed with malignant gallbladder cancer. Though doctors performed a cholecystectomy on her, her illness was not cured. She was diagnosed with new illness on July 2005. Due to her permanent labor, she fainted once again with aching chest, waist and neck. The piercing pain was wearing down her energy to cry. She went to the hospital to have a CT test without telling anyone. The results of her diagnosis showed multiple shades in four ribs of her lower chest. Then she went to Loudi hospital to do a reexamination, the result of which was bone marrow cancer. Escorted by two medical staffs, she was transferred to a provincial tumor hospital. Although no one told her the truth, she already sensed the seriousness of her illness. She pretended to be Liu Kuei-Hsi's sister and asked the attending doctor about her illness. The doctor did not suspect it and told her that, “Your sister was diagnosed with terminal bone marrow cancer and could only live for another three months at most.” Undergoing medical treatment for days, she became agitated again. She was still concerned about the welfare of her employees. She went back to her factor to do some business, but when she was back to the hospital once again, she had used all her energy and became a regular patient since then.
 
 
Cancer could destroy your body, but it cannot defeat your spirits!

      The first week after she was discharged from the hospital in 2007, she successively visited Inner Mongolia, Baotou , and Beijing , aiming to lower the cost of raw materials and to introduce new personnel and technology. She used her hotel as a loan on mortgage, using 3 million RMB to establish the “Welfare Enterprise of Furnace.” Placing her seventy employees and unemployed youth, her company made a profit of four millions in six months. Her employees' wages were increased from 500 RMB to over 1,000 RMB.
      However, human fortunes are as unpredictable as the weather. In April 2008, the test done in the provincial tumor hospital turned about to be thoracic cancer lesions. The hospital then sent her the notice of critical condition. Despite her cooperation with doctors in surgery and chemotherapy, her body could not get better. On June 20, 2008, she sneaked back to her company and felt down on the ground due to her weak pelvis. But she endured the pain silently until she finished her task. A week later, she went back to the hospital to have a reexamination. Her pelvis and thighbone were fractured. The doctor told her that she could only sit on a wheelchair from now on.
      Although she was diagnosed with multiple terminal diseases, she did not give herself up. There was always a belief in her mind—as long as she was confident and forgot about her illness, she could easily get over it—and she often told herself that, “Kuei-Hsi, you need to keep going, cancer could destroy your body, but it could never repel your spirits! Many disabled employees are waiting for you, so are your career, dream and ideal! Your life belongs to others. You need to stand up! Gold will spare people with kind hearts.”
 
 

Lifelong charities
      Since she was diagnosed with cancer, her belief for charities welfare industry was never shaken. She once said: “Charities and welfare industry are my dream, duty, as well as obligation. In doing charities, I experienced happiness! Charities are a lifelong business and not something I do for one for two days. I don't have much time, so I want to do things other people do in one year in one day! I want to devote my limited life all to the disadvantaged group. My abilities to devote to others will deepen the meaning of my life!”
      In 1988 she travelled to other provinces to replenish her stock and saw a deserted baby in the brink of dying in a rainy day. She took the baby with her regardless the objections of her family. The baby was adopted by her and named Chang Li-Chiung. Around three, Li-Chiung's left thigh was fractured and recovered from it after two months' medical treatment. Under the delicate care of Liu Kuei-Hsi, twenty-year-old Li-Chiung is now a pretty girl. She gratefully said to Kuei-Hsi: “You are my real mother!”
      In 2003, an employee's husband was diagnosed with brain cancer, who had to spend all their life savings to travel to Cheungsha for the surgery. In the end, the husband died of the surgery and left his wife and disabled son with a large sum of debt. They could even find a place to life. In the meantime, Kuei-Hsi opened her arms and asked her neighbor to house them without charge, and arranged a suitable job for her disabled son, so he could earn 1,000 RMB a month. She also introduced a girl who lost her right palm to him, and they formed a warm family. Soon after that they had two cute boys. Every time they mentioned Kuei-Hsi, they always said: “Without the care of Liu, they would not have a family!”
      In May, 2008, the eight degree Wenchun earthquake destroyed Sichuan . At that time, Kuei-Hsi was in the process of surgery and chemotherapy in a provincial tumor hospital. Thinking about those who had no places to go and skyrocketing number of the deceased, she felt deeply troubled and painfully sad! She disregarded her illness and went to the disaster site with her family to help the victims of the earthquake. Even it was the last minute of her life, she would not hesitate to spend her time on saving the life of others! If possible, she and her brother wanted to adopt orphans and made them feel the warmth of family one more time.  
 
 
Love is the fountain of life
      Kuei-Hsi thought: No matter how long life is, as long as one lives for one day, he/she needs to think about others and to do good things. Love is the fountain of life. So long as a person has love, the world will be full of love. Society needs its people to spread love and care.