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Imagine the desperation.

这是一个令人绝望的场景。

A friend more than 1,600 kilometers away, who speaks no English and whose address and other contact information I do not have, posts on WeChat, late at night, a photo showing that she is committing suicide.

距离我1600多公里之遥的一个朋友，凌晨在微信上发了一条朋友圈，从更新的照片来看，她正在自杀，我这个朋友不会说英语，我不知道她的地址，也没有她的其他联系方式。

I had to decide, and quickly, what to do to help this young woman whom I have not met in person.

我必须快速作出决定，怎样去帮助这个年轻的女性，尽管我没有见过她本人。

Never has my lack of language skills been more agonizing than in the three hours it took to save my friend Ping, with the help of another friend and dedicated police officers stretching from Beijing to Ya’an, Sichuan province.

从北京到四川雅安，在一个朋友和热心警察同志的帮助下，我用了三个小时成功挽救了一个年轻的生命（她的名字叫萍），而也就是在这三个小时的时间内，我比以往任何时候更能深切体会到不会说中文的痛苦。

Caught up in an emotional maelstrom — she was widowed several years ago and has a toddler son, and her recent boyfriend conned her out of her entire savings of 130,000 yuan — Ping, 28, did the unthinkable, something she now admits was foolish: She slashed her wrist, deeply (this was no mere cry for help), and settled in, alone in her home, to await the end.

萍，年仅28岁，几年前丧偶，与蹒跚学步的儿子相依为命，新交的男友卷走了她13万元的全部身家，面对一系列的打击，处在情绪极其混乱的漩涡中，她选择了后果不堪设想的，事后自己也觉得非常愚蠢的解决方式——割腕自杀，手腕的血口很深（不是做做样子，寻求帮助），她把自己关在家，奄奄一息地等待死亡的来临。

I happened to be scrolling through WeChat at about 1:45 am, before retiring for the night, when I saw the gruesome photo, posted half an hour earlier. She followed up with a series of recent selfies, a heart-wrenching retrospective in which she noted, “I came to this world.”

大约凌晨1点45分，睡觉之前，我习惯性地看一下自己的朋友圈，恰好看到萍在半个小时之前发布的可怕照片。她同时更新了几张最近的自拍，在这个令人心痛的照片回顾展上方，她写道，“我来过这个世界。”

My next few messages to Ping went unanswered, but eventually she said she wanted to “leave this world” and confirmed that she had hurt herself.

我马上给她发了几条微信，她没有回应，稍后，她终于回复说自己想要离开这个世界，承认已经割了自己的手腕。

Then she went silent.

接着她就不再回复了。

Though I cannot speak Mandarin, I knew I had to somehow contact police and get help. But where, exactly, was my friend? 

虽然我不会说中文，但我知道我必须打电话报警，寻求帮助，不过我并不清楚我这个朋友现在到底在哪里。

I phoned and awoke my friend Sunny, who works at CCTV. Although she speaks little English, I was able to quickly convey, using WeChat and translation software, the urgency of the situation. She began working the phones and relaying messages between police and myself.

我给在中央电视台工作的朋友Sunny打了电话，把她从睡梦中叫醒，虽然她的英语也不是很好，但是我能通过微信和翻译软件向她及时转达这一紧急情况，然后她在电话上把我说的话转达给了警察。

Did I know Ping’s address? No. Did I know her other friends? No.

我不知道萍的地址，也不认识她的其他朋友。

Her WeChat ID, linked to her phone number, was our only lead.

她用电话号码注册的微信账号是唯一的线索。

As I scrolled desperately through earlier messages, I found that she lived in or near Baoxing county, Sichuan province. But I found no other clues to her whereabouts or friends.

我匆匆忙忙地翻阅了以前的聊天记录，得知她住在四川省宝兴县或者附近，但我没有找到有关她的确切地址和朋友信息的线索。

Then, in answer to a special prayer in those grim hours, I discovered her earlier posting of a conversation with a friend whose user ID included his phone number.

接着，在这千钧一发之际，我发现了她一个朋友的微信账号和手机号码，她曾在朋友圈中发过自己和这个朋友的谈话。

I relayed this to police, who contacted the friend and set in motion a frantic rescue effort. Ping was located, unconscious and hanging on to life, and rushed to a hospital.

我把这些信息告诉了警察，警察赶忙联系到萍的朋友，并迅速展开营救工作。警察定位到萍所在的确切地址，把已经失去意识、生命垂危的萍送到了医院。

I am reminded of a comment my former wife once made, derisively, about the social site Facebook. “Those aren’t real friends,” she told me. “They don’t care about you.”

我记起了我前妻对脸书这一社交媒体的评价，“社交媒体上所交的朋友都不是真朋友，他们不会关心你。”语气中饱含嘲讽。

Yet, on that fateful night, many people, mostly strangers, formed a chain of caring that reached across China to save one life in a land of nearly 1.4 billion souls.

然而，在那个人命关天的晚上，很多人，大多数都素未谋面，凝结成了一条关心链，穿过大半个中国，去挽救14亿人中的一个年轻生命。

The chain, notably, was linked by smartphones and social apps — offering a beacon of hope that technology can deepen, rather than blunt, our emotional bonds.

显然，这链条是通过智能手机和社交媒体连接起来的，为我们点亮了一盏希望之灯，提醒我们技术会加深我们的情感联系，而不是让我们变得冷漠。

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