Promoting fitness for all starts from childhood. On the 2nd, Chiayi City’s Jiuhua Mountain Dizang Temple hosted the Dizang Cup Parent-Child Public Welfare Fitness Games and Baby Crawling Fun Competition, with 120 families participating. The event featured baby crawling and toddler fitness challenges. Mayor Huang Min-hui encouraged parents to help their children develop exercise habits, emphasizing that a strong physique is one of the indicators of national strength.
Huang Min-hui said that declining birthrates have become a national security issue. She expressed gratitude to Jiuhua Mountain Dizang Temple and YouLove Garden Parent-Child Center for organizing the event and donating the registration fees for public welfare purposes, allowing families to engage in fitness activities while contributing to charity. The event holds significant educational value, and she also hopes young people will have more children to enjoy family life and strengthen national vitality.
Huang Jun-sen, chairman of Jiuhua Mountain Dizang Temple, said that the issue of declining birthrates is becoming increasingly severe. This event was organized to encourage parent-child bonding and to reawaken the desire to have children among the younger generation. With the concept of “donating rice to plant fields of blessings,” the temple initiated the idea of doing good deeds and cultivating blessings. The “blessing rice funds” collected from registered children were donated as rice for charity, and participants also received a set of Dizang Bodhisattva Baby Safety Jerseys. Children from low-income and disadvantaged families could join for free.
The organizers stated that crawling is a comprehensive physical activity that aids in the development of vision, hearing, spatial awareness, and balance. It is suitable for 1-year-old toddlers, while children aged 2 to 6 participated in fitness challenges. Each station included physical tests to help parents understand their child’s physical development.
Little ones dressed in Dizang Bodhisattva Baby Safety Jerseys crawled enthusiastically toward the finish line. Their adorable S-shaped wriggles were incredibly cute, prompting parents to shout or guide them forward with objects. The fitness challenges included walking across a balance beam to test stability, creating a fun-filled atmosphere.
(China Times)