Meeting an 11-Year-Old With Rare Courage

LUOCHI and CHONGQING, China, Aug 11, 2008 — -- When the worst happened, Zhang Jiazhi exhibited a courage far beyond his 11 years.

On an otherwise typical May afternoon at school this year, the ground violently shook beneath his classroom and the school collapsed, killing hundreds if not a thousand students. The May 12 earthquake in Sichuan, which registered at 7.9 on the Richter scale, ultimately killed over 70,000 people in China.

"The staircase collapsed and buried me … bricks started falling down. I didn't know what was happening," Jiazhi said in May.

Jiazhi's father recalls the buildings shaking and the school collapsing. But his son was one of the few lucky students. He bravely dug and crawled his way out of the school after it collapsed on him. But both of his arms were broken.

When he found his shell-shocked son at the crumbled school, the older Zhang didn't know it was him.

"I couldn't recognize him," Zhang's father told ABC News. "Only when he called my name did I realize he was my son."

His parents, unemployed farmers, kept a vigil next to the hospital bed of their only son, not sure if they were blessed or cursed. The doctors said they had no choice but to amputate both of Jiazhi's arms.

"I told the doctor, please save just one of my arms," Jiazhi said. "But the doctor said it is too late."

Making a Courageous Comeback

Today, exactly three months later, Jiazhi is making a triumphant return to life as a normal 11-year-old. ABC News traveled back to his hospital in Chongqing to visit Jiazhi and his family, over 1,200 miles southwest of Beijing.

In the hospital room was the same young boy with the same trademark bravery. But fear on Jiazhi's handsome face had vanished and the bandages that once covered his arms and head were long gone. The bright, matter-of-fact Jiazhi was back in action.

Jiazhi was eager to show off his newest toy: one of his two prosthetic arms, fitted just three weeks ago.

He explained to ABC News that he was feeling great and had big plans for his new arm. An aspiring artist, Jiazhi will use his prosthetic arm to paint like he did before the earthquake.