Struggling for the basics in shelter
Struggling for the basics in shelter
The Jakarta Post, Lhok Nga, Aceh
It's raining outside, and inside the tent, Ernida is frying
tempeh and eggs for a very late lunch. On the other corner of the
four-by-three meter tent, her husband Ridho is playing with their
five-year-old daughter Khairani Maulani.
The daughter is about the only valuable possession the couple
have left.
"Please join us for lunch," Ridho offered a visitor on this
wet Sunday afternoon. In spite of their conditions, he remained
true to the Indonesian tradition of generosity toward visitors,
especially when it comes to lunch.
Welcome to Camp 85L in Lhok Nga, one of several in Lampaya
district, the only village still standing in the area.
Ridho and his family are among 1,400 people now housed in this
makeshift displaced persons shelter.
On Sunday Dec. 26, Ridho had been visiting relatives here in
Lampaya when the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and following tsunami
devastated most coastal areas of Aceh.
Their own home in Ulee Lheu near Banda Aceh had been
completely wiped off the face of the earth and Ridho has become
resigned to the likelihood that he had lost all his relatives
there.
"I have nowhere else to go," said Ridho, adding that he
believed this would be their home for the next six months.
Ernida, who is seven months pregnant, added: "I have to
deliver the baby here."
Ridho is unsure what he will do next. "We are just waiting for
some kind of direction from the government."
It has rained heavily every night over the past week and
turned the camp into a mudbath, adding to the misery here.
"Water is still our worst enemy," says Tengku Zainun, a
resident of Lampaya, who is the designated imam at the 85L
Refugee Camp. "It rains every night, and most of the tents we are
sleeping in simply are not water repellent."
Zainun lost his house, rice field and just about everything
else, though all the members of his immediate family -- his wife,
son and mother-in-law -- survived.
"We have seen some improvements over the last two weeks. We
are now getting food and clean water. But with this rain, we need
more tents."
Lampaya was spared the wrath of the tsunami because it is
partly sheltered by a hill. Neighboring villages Lam Krut, Wuraya
and Moniken were almost completely obliterated because there was
nothing to stop the wall of water that rolled in that fateful
morning.
In these three villages, virtually nothing is left standing.
Wherever one looks, there are just mounds of rubble and debris,
some of it pushed aside by bulldozers.
The remains of a cement factory owned by PT Semen Andalas
Indonesia, the largest employer in the area, can be seen towards
the end of the road to Lhok Nga, but the only way to get there is
by a barge or boat because a key bridge was destroyed.
Assisting the people at Camp 85L are the Pompiers Sans
Frontiere (Firemen Without Borders).
Jean Cartier, who heads the 10-person team, says the camp
needs up to 30 more tents to be able to ensure that every family
has even a rudimentary shelter above their heads.
"Hello Perancis (France in Indonesian)," some of the children
shriek as they see Cartier walk by. Cartier, an old hand when it
comes to emergencies and helping refugees with stints in Rwanda
and Albania, greeted them back.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) had
earlier delivered 25 tents for the camp.
"That's about all we can do at the moment," said Mark Nyberg,
a Finnish national and now spokesman for the UNHCR operation in
Aceh.
"We wish we could do more, but we also have to think about the
refugees on the western coast of Aceh," Nyberg said. "Over there,
people still sleep in the open."
Nyberg promised that more tents would be made available by
UNHCR for displaced people in Aceh. And they are good quality
tents, light material but double ply to protect against the water
and heat, and thus more comfortable.
Volunteers, meanwhile, still find bodies among the rubble in
Lhok Nga, and vehicles belonging to the police or the National
Mandate Party (PAN) can be seen doing the rounds to collect them
and take them to a mass grave in Lampaya.
A procession of about 10 people walked pass Lampaya, carrying
the remains of Zainal, a security officer at the cement factory,
in a black plastic bag.
His older brother, Adenan, said he and his neighbors heard
about the discovery of the body in the rubble of the factory.
They recognized him by the name tag on his uniform.
Zainal will now be given a proper burial by his family.
Thousands of bodies have been buried without being identified
first.
If life seems hard for the likes of Ridho, there are others
in nearby camps that are not so lucky.
Food distributed to the camps was not being divided equally
between the groups within the camp, Burhanuddin Abdullah, an
Acehnese man who lost his wife and child, and now works as a
volunteer, told The Jakarta Post.
"Some groups are stronger than the others. They get all the
food, while others are left to beg."
Even in this most difficult of times, many refugees still
count their blessings. They know that things could be worse, and
know that others did not survive.
"I am lucky, because I got a nice tent. I thank the French
people," Ridho said.