Wang Li was Smile Train patient #1.
Her surgery took place on Chinese New Year, in 1998.
While she was being operated on, on the other side of the world, while wewere hosting a major fundraiser for Smile Train, as part of a special project of Operation Smile.
It was a very fancy, black tie event at The Winter Garden in New York City.
There were lots of celebrities there like Carly Simon, Diane Sawyer, Ann Ziff
and Ron Meyer. Senator Al’D’Amato was also there along with other prominent politicans and businessmen including the Chinese Ambassador to the United Nations.
NBC anchorman Tom Brokaw was supposed to host the event but he was called away to D.C. earlier that day to interview Monica Lewinsky. Ann Curry of The Today Show covered for Tom and did a great job.
After all 500+ VIP guests were seated for dinner, Ms. Curry welcomed
everyone and told the heart-breaking story of Wang Li, a young girl in China who had suffered with an unrepaired cleft all of her life.
A short, heartbreaking video of Wang Li’s life showed the audience how
difficult it is for children to survive in developing countries with unrepaired clefts. It featured Wang LI’s father who worked at a brick factory and made $1.50 a day. He spoke about how he knew his daughter needed surgery but that he was a peasant, and could never save enough money to get her surgery.
It ended with Wang Li watching all the children in her village go to a
school that would not admit her because of her cleft. Through her tears, Wang Li explained how she dreams of one day going to school.
At the end of the video, which left most of the audience in tears, Ms. Curry
explained that Wang Li had recently been examined by Smile Train surgeons who deemed her fit for surgery and that she would soon have her cleft repaired. Everyone applauded.
Then Ms. Curry said she had a surprise. Wang Li was eager to thank all the
donors in the room who made her surgery possible. “We’re now going to live to China, via satelite, to speak with Wang Li…”
Everyone gasped as Wang Li’s smiling face suddenly appeared on large screens up on the stage. Suddenly the sad, little Chinese girl featured in the video was there, live, full screen, crying and smiling and blubbering. Trying her hardest to say thank you, through an interpreter, to a huge ballroom full of wealthy, VIP Americans. Everyone was completely speechless.
Dr. Han Kai, a local, Chinese surgeon, translated for Wang Li. As Wang Li
spoke in Mandarin, Han Kai said, “She is saying, she wants to thank you
for helping me. I am excited about having surgery. I am excited about being
able to go to school. That is my dream. Thank you, thank you, thank
you….”
You could have heard a pindrop in the large function room at the Winter
Garden. Half the room was crying and the other half was on the brink. This was not your typical Manhattan charity fundraiser.
Ann Curry graciously thanked Dr. Han Kai and wished Wang Li well and the satelite feed ended. Ms. Curry told everyone to enjoy dinner – she would be back with the rest of the program then.
So everyone dug into their rubber-chicken dinners, sipped expensive
chardonnay and talked about what a nice surprise it was to meet that little
Chinese girl on a live satellite TV feed.
But what no one knew, was that while 500 of them were eating dinner, Dr. Han Kai was actually operating on Wang Li.
This brilliant idea came from Mike Schell, my ad agency partner. In less
time than it took to eat a rubber-chicken dinner, Wang Li received the
life-changing cleft surgery she had been waiting for for 9 years.
After dinner it was back to normal charity fundraiser mode. The usual
speeches about the importance of giving back. A fundraising appeal by Senator Al D’Amato. Kind words from the Chinese Ambassador.
Everyone had completely forgotten all about Wang Li when Ms. Curry concluded the evening with these remarks….
“It’s been a spectacular night, and the best way to end it is to send
each of you home with a big smile on your face….so once again, we are going to go live to China to speak with Wang Li….you see ladies and gentlemen, while all of you were eating dinner and listening to speeches, Wang Li was in the operating room where she received the cleft surgery she has been waiting for her entire life….”
The room went completely silent as the screens lit up with Wang Li again. She was sitting upright on her O.R. table surrounded by the surgeons and nurses who operated on her. AND HER CLEFT WAS COMPLETELY GONE.
No one could believe it. She had had a very severe cleft, her mouth was
completely mangled, her teeth portruding, it was grotestque. And now it was gone. Her lips were closed, she was smiling, she was crying, looking at a mirror and her new smile and her new life.
After Wang Li thanked the crowd again through her tears, Ann Curry asked her if now she could realize her lifelong dream of going to school now that her cleft was completely repaired. Wang Li nodded, still smiling, still crying. Ann Curry couldn’t resist the follow up question as any good TV anchor . would. “So now that you can do to school Wang Li, what do you want to be . when you grow up?”
Wang Li responded ” I want to be a doctor.”
That brought the house down. Best fundraiser dinner experience ever.
Wang Li was famous after that. At least in our world. As Smile Train patient
#1, we used to fly her to the U.S. and other places to give speeches at
important fundraisers. She was always so appreciative and wanted to help us any way she could. It was always a treat to see her and her dad.
I remember I put them both up at The Harvard Club of New York City one time and how fascinating it was to see two smiling Chinese peasants, father and daughter, there surrounded by some of the smartest, most successful, wealthiest people in America.
They had come to New York for one of our biggest donor “thank you”
events. We didn’t believe in traditional fundraisers like other charities do.
Instead, we would invite donors to come at our expense for events to thank them and show them how their generous support was being used. Donors loved this approach.
More than 1,600 donors from all over America – including Alaska – came to
this event, celebrating our 100,000th surgery. And of all the big name speakers we had that night including Candice Bergen and a legendary, star surgeon, Dr. Hirji Adenwalla who we flew in from India, the star of the show was Smile Train patient #1: Wang Li.
She looked so small and young walking onto the stage. She had to step up
onto a milk crate to reach the podium and microphone. But when she began to speak, a silence fell over the large crowd. Speaking through an interpreter, she told her story.
Wang Li had grown up in a family of peasants, in Jiangsu Province, north of
Shanghai. Her father earned a meager living working at the local brick factory, and her mother made fishing nets to bring in extra income.
Although Wang Li’s four sisters went to school, Wang Li stayed at home. Her
cleft was so severe that whenever she left the house, she was taunted and
shunned by the rest of the village, so she stayed at home as much as she could. Meanwhile, the surgery to fix her defect would have cost more than her family’s income for an entire year.
“Before my surgery, I had no future.” Wang Li said. “I used to watch my
sisters go to school every day and cry because I couldn’t follow them. I had no friends. I used to tend to animals in the fields every day. Every day I would watch all the children in my village go to school. A school I was not allowed to attend. My parents worried constantly about what was going to happen to me. They told me that I would never get an education, I would never get married, I would never have a family of my own.”
One day a traveling salesman noticed Wang Li, playing alone in front of her
house. He yelled for Wang Li’s mother and told her about a program that offered free cleft surgery for the poor. Wang Li’s mother was skeptical – why would anyone give my daughter free surgery? Why would anyone help us?
There was an ad in the local paper – which a neighbor read to Wang Li’s
parents because they were illiterate. It said the surgery was free but it was
far away, in Nanjing. After much discussion, Wang L’s father agreed to take a few days off of work and bring his daughter to Nanjing where she was examined and approved for surgery. Then she was selected to be Smile Train Patient #1 and part of the satelite feed to the New York City donor event.
“After my surgery, my entire life changed instantly. Suddenly, I could go to
school. I could make friends. I could smile and laugh. I could see a happy
future for me. For all my life I had nothing, then suddenly, I had everything.
Thanks to all of you. And the help you gave me. I will never forget what you
did for me. And I hope that one day I will be able to help someone else as you helped me.”
1,600 donors stood and applauded as a smiling, happy, Wang Li waved to the crowd and then stepped down from her milk crate.
Over the past 20 years, I have tried to stay in touch with Wang Li as best I
could. I know that she finished school and got a job in a computer factory
where she made more money in a year than her father made in his entire
lifetime.
And I almost started crying when I got word that she got married and had a
baby. Someone sent me these photos which I keep on my desk.
Amazing that a simple, 45-minute cleft surgery can have such an impact on a little kid’s life.
And her children’s lives.
Since Wang Li’s surgery so many years ago, more than 1.5 million children have received free cleft surgery thanks to the Smile Train.
