A station of love

Fan Yinhua piles up the bags. [Photo by Ruan Fan/chinadaily.com.cn]

"Look at those bags," Fan says as he points at the three layers of bags piled up to the ceiling against the wall of the 200-square-meter room, "inside them are over 30,000 pieces of clothing."

By this April, it could reach 60,000 – sufficient for Fan to charter a bus and bring them to Gansu province in Northwest China.

April is the peak time for donations, as people put away their bulky winter wear and embrace the warmth of spring.

For the last two peak seasons, Fan used to stand by the long desk in the middle of the warehouse for hours, sorting clothes into boxes labeled children's wear, teenage clothes, women's trousers, men's trousers, coats for adults, and sweaters.

"And I had to record the items into the computer so that my eyes will get dizzy and my back will ache. Every day was a real challenge for me," he said.

Last year the number of goods broke his previous records, with 37,000 pieces of clothing coming in per month. That's when Fan wrecked his brains to come up with two bright ideas to save him from exhaustion.

One is the Sina Weibo system that Fan is very proud of.

"It was a system made possible by one of our volunteers. With the system, all I have to do is take a picture of the package, count the number of items inside a package, type the information into the system, and there we go - the system will generate a microblog post, inform the donor through a microblog or text message."

The other is the group volunteering project.

"Volunteers will drive here in groups, and they will help with sorting and packing the clothes during peak times, which helps relieve me."