"The Report"

Today, 27th of July 2006 friends of ours made it back in time… Just in time to adjust back to the norm, preparing for a production tomorrow. They brought with them lots of love. Can see from their eyes… They are now more grateful to be OK. OK, in all conditions they have back at home.

Just pass sunset… we watched the video that start off with shots of donations dropped to the office. That was Tuesday nite’s footages. Followed by some shots of sunrise on the road, then it showed how they met with other TV crew in Pangandaran. Then… Here they are…. Unloading half of the truck load in Batukaras. Residents of Batukaras already organized themselves with a proper POSKO with a proper management system. They were quite eager when choosing what they needed, left behind in the truck what they adequately had. Yeap….! They had enough supplies from all over the world. I guess many of those who had been there were also moved by its current condition. Good quality dome tents (which I heard from some indvidual.organization in UK) were also given to each family who had to leave their houses.

Then there were almost 100 boats destroyed, a disaster for a fishermen’s village. Many of the men were out in the sea at that time. They felt that the current and swell were not supposed to be like what they looked like at the time of the year. While for women and children…. Its their leisure time on the beach. Especially for the kids who just came back from their first day back to school. Then… the beast came... They run to the hills behind their village, watching the slapping beast took over their homes.

----- continued on July 29, 2006-------

After distributing the aid, our friends left for Bulak Benda, another village next to Batukaras. The village was also blessed by a good size surfable surfing point. I remember we went to that village by taking a half an hour boat from Batukaras. It takes longer time to get there if you travel by land vehicle from Batukaras. Bulak Benda is considerably quite remote. You cant find what other typical tropical tourist beaches usually offer. Here you can feel that the nature is much much larger than you. You are only a single particle.. floating on the shore… Waiting to catch a wave that has your name written on it… Then surf it like it would be the best ride for the rest of the year…. At least that was what I felt 3 years ago.

Many houses at the frontier were destroyed. Causalities were also higher. The boys told us, upon their arrival…. people in the temporary shelters stood up and walked toward the truck. Happiness was shining from their faces. So eager they all wanted to help to unload the truck. I saw on the video tape, an old man hugging a sack of rice on the ground. He knew… tonite he would eat rice… They knew some good hearted people were with them, all the way.

What I heard from the boys… Batukaras and Bulak Benda, and all other villages that were affected by tsunami were not as bad as Ulhee Lhee or Lhok Nga… some areas that were hit pretty bad in Aceh tsunami of 2004. However, the emotional effects must be the same. Counseling is needed immediately to bring them back to the norm. Sanitation and clean water is urgently needed. They might eat 3 times a day of ransom, but they wanted to be able to cook. They need cooking utilities. They also need helps to rebuild their homes and boats. I am sure some of you may have access to attend these issues.

"My First Breath"

Everybody is tired of doing what they think best to do.. The ending of a process is always tiring... Nothing is more compelling than feeling good. That is life. This is reality.

It seems just yesterday when our eyes were glued on TV, terrified to believe that thousands of victims.. Dead ones... were captured on the headline news reporting live from Jogjakarta, not long after close to 200 thousands victims from the catastrophic tsunami in Aceh. Situations where many of us romantically tried to spare some of what we had in order to help them. That was a glorious day. We felt like a part of the world who was in her mourn. We felt like heroes.

But then Mother Nature stroke again. We even felt it. It turned out to be deadly, bringing to deaths hundreds of victims on southern part of West Java. Latest death toll was around 600 people leaving more than 40,000 in refugee camps… scary numbers… must be scary movies..

The death toll is close enough to what was recorded from Nias Earthquake in March 2005. But maybe we were too tired to take notice to see that national and international responses were getting less and lesser. Guess… Everyone sick and tired of being a hero…

But, its so tremendous to hear the spirit of the victims in Batukaras. Seven days after the tsunami, they were back on their feet again, trying to pick up pieces scattered around them. More than 10 fishermen were reported back to sea on that day. You can certainly imagine what were in their minds, touching the ocean again…

Our volunteer team found a small village, called Bulak Benda, a place where the surf was much happening than Batukaras but still surrounded by very natural energy from everything in there including the people, was not on the priority list to be helped. Its distance and bad road made people quite resistant to go. The guys arrived there and were shocked to see refugees immadiately crowding the supplies’ truck.

Life goes on… We might feel sick and tired of reading ticker news from natural disaster… But life goes on.. Who knows.. Maybe one day we were in their shoes, vice versa.