It’s rice planting season here in Myanmar and, two months after Cyclone Nargis, many of the more able-bodied survivors are experiencing a sense of urgency to get their rice crops started. If they can plant quickly, they have much better likelihood of reestablishing their homes and their lives, hopefully harvesting rice in 6 months rather than having to wait until December 2009. Unfortunately, many things still stand in their way.

Seed is an obvious need for almost all of the farmers in the delta. Survivors who are asked to prioritize what they need help with have recently been telling HOPE and other relief agencies that seed is up at the top of their lists. Seed will allow people to secure their own food supply, and many people are expressing a preference for help to grow their coming year’s food supply over many of the other types of aid that the UN and other organizations are now offering, including shelter and food aid.

Seed is available, although it is not easy for all relief organizations to source it in quantities that would match the demand for it. The distribution process itself also remains difficult for many of the same reasons that have hampered the distribution of all other assistance so far.

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Another major barrier standing in the way of timely planting is the condition of the fields and villages that the survivors must return to in order to plant. In recent weeks, the government, operating from the perspective that the cyclone was almost two months ago and so relief is no longer necessary, has energetically pushed survivors to leave the temporary settlements and return to their homes. Some of these people have not been back to their homes since the cyclone hit.

Even when people try to return to their villages, they do not have the equipment, the help or the energy to support more than the rebuilding of crude, temporary shelters. Fields and water sources are often still heaped with debris and in many cases, the carcasses of animals and the bodies of community members are still trapped under fallen buildings or tangled tree roots. Survivors struggle to find the physical and emotional energy required to tackle the burying and cleanup process that must take place before the villages are habitable and the fields are cleared so they can be plowed and planted.

This community cleanup process is where HOPE and some of our partners have been spending our energies lately. Through our local partners, an organizing process takes place so that volunteers are matched up with community members from a set of villages near one another. These joint teams select leadership from among the community members and then they work together to clean up not only their own village, but those of their nearby neighbors, as well.

In this way, we are trying to use the cyclone as a tiny opportunity to help people reach across former boundaries to create a new sense of community and sharing where the old community and community relationships may no longer exist. HOPE has provided very basic cleanup equipment and supplies to each of these teams, along with feeding all the team members during the cleanup process (in a kind of “food-for-work” scheme). HOPE has also helped to define the organizing and operating principles that the teams use and has provided counsel to local partners regarding the inevitable trauma experiences that this cleanup process will evoke.

Our local partners have managed to gain the support of 1,431 volunteers and community members in these cleanup teams! As one foreign aid worker recently said, work on the Nargis aftermath reminds us of an anthill – thousands of local people are swarming to repair damage in many small and some not-so-small places and ways. The story of this disaster response and of its successes thus far includes actors from both inside and outside the country. But the heroes continue to be the local people who, time and time again, rally to overcome the insurmountable. I’m reminded constantly what a privilege it is to be present here at this time.

Nargis was almost two months ago, but please keep this place and these people in your thoughts and prayers – that is needed as much now as it has ever been needed. Thank you for the many ways in which you have shown and continue to show your generosity towards Myanmar people.

The Burmese children’s drawings bear silently eloquent witness to the devastating experiences that they and their families went through during the cyclone and its immediate aftermath. Two American volunteers with school-age children have since collected drawings and messages from a number of elementary school children at two different schools in the San Francisco Bay Area. Burmese translations are being made of the messages the American children wrote with their drawings – messages that express caring, concern, and hope for the future. A selection of these drawings and messages will be posted here once they have been translated and scanned in.

This bad road makes the village even more distant from the outside world. Along the road people are waiting for someone who will drive them somewhere. They had to leave their homes. There is no doubt, if they told you their story the cyclone would be the reason and I am sure you would be left speechless after hearing their story.

The village is located on the side of the Wah Ba Lout Thout river. The location is itself quite close to the sea. So the huge tidal wave came to the village and killed the helpless villagers at dark night on the 2nd of May. They will certainly not forget that fearful night.

After Nargis destroyed the village, a family who had lived in a big house could only rebuild a small hut with a plastic tarp. Those who had lived in huts became homeless. They have only received some plastic sheet from a private group - and that would be still nothing when it rains.

The village was so beautiful before the cyclone Nargis came the villagers said.

The rooms for giving birth and the operation theatre of the Wah Ba Lout Thout Hospital were totally destroyed. This is the only hospital in the area. The staff are running the hospital in another area of the Hospital. For the electricity they use torch light if there is an emergency, otherwise they wait for the day light.

Delivering aid went very smooth under the experienced arrangement of the Monks. A group of volunteers from the village delivered a coupon to the every family for us. The villagers came to us one by one and change the coupon for an aid bag. How nice it is.

Also, I am surprised to find out how they have already learned to survive from the horrible experience. Their look with appreciated eyes is also one of the reason to come back to help them.

In Karokani Village there were originally 78 houses and 337 families living happily. Two hundred and eighty farmers were working at the 3565 acre of their fields peacefully. Now they are waiting for help. Sea water destroyed their field and all seed got wet.

Twenty percent of the cow were killed and half of the remaining cows are not able to work. Animals are very important for them. At the present, they are not able to feed them and for more than ten days all animal were staying away from the humans. With all due respect, they have lost everything. Finally, they are waiting for the systematic support from someone.

In the spirit of Gitameit, the Yale Spizzwinks are working with the Gitameit Music Center in Rangoon, Burma to bring a choir to the United States in 2008. It will be the first ever visit of a Burmese choir to the US.

Who is involved?

So far our major supporters are the Yale Spizzwinks and the Yale Spizzwinks Alumni Association, but we need your help too! We’ll need to purchase plane tickets, set up home-stays, find performance opportunities and secure visas for the performers.

Donate to this project

The Spizzwinks(?) visit Gitameit

Visits to Burma (Myanmar) by American performing groups are extremely rare. In what Gitameit founder, Kit Young, described as "one of the most important things to happen in Myanmar in the past 5 years," the Yale Spizzwinks(?) visited the Gitameit Music School in May of 2007. During the 5-day visit, the Spizzwinks worked with several choirs from the school, including Gitameit Voices and Gitapella.

The Spizzwinks(?) and the Gitameit students worked together in musical workshops and presented a Gala Evening Concert together at the Inya Lake Resort in Rangoon (Yangon). The Gitameit students also graciously hosted the Spizzwinks(?) during the visit, showing the group the cultural and historical landmarks in and outside Rangoon. For both the Spizzwinks(?) and the students of the Gitameit School, it was an unforgettable experience.

Why Project Gitameit?

This project is about cultural exchange. During their trip to Rangoon, the Spizzwinks and the Gitameit students, though separated by a lifetime of vastly different experiences, felt a musical camaraderie. This project is intended to enhance that camaraderie, exposing the Gitameit musicians to a broader array of American musical culture and giving Americans their first opportunity to see a Burmese choir.

About The Trip

In fall 2008, 16 singers from the Gitameit Music School in Rangoon, Burma (Yangon, Myanmar) will embark on a 2-3 week tour of the United States. Exact travel dates will be determined in the near future. We are tentatively planning for the last several weeks in October, 2008. The Gitameit Voices choir will make stops in San Francisco, Washington DC and New Haven, CT. They will also take a day trip to New York City. While in the United States, the choir will put on gala evening performances in San Francisco and New York, as well as combined concerts will choral groups from Yale University in New Haven, CT. The Gitameit students will interact with American audiences at their concerts and in churches and public schools. The Gitameit students will also fit in some sightseeing in each of the cities they visit.

Watch videos of the Yale Spizzwinks and Gitameit Voices performing:
Thekyin So Mei | Accidentally in Love

Report for relief Trip #9 conducted on Saturday, 31 May to Kyonda area (Taw Chike Village)

Photos of trip #9

On this trip we used boats to reach villages that were inaccessible by road. We confirmed once again that the “official” aid effort is concentrated on large towns; little to no aid is getting to the more remote villages, even almost a month since the cyclone. People in these areas are at risk for starving to death. It is also getting more and more difficult for us to operate in this area, as the police try to keep out foreigners or even Burmese making private donations. Our final destination for this trip was Taw Chike village, located three hours by boat from the Kungyangon town on the island of Kyonda. However, we later found another nearby village called “The Seven Houses Village” that was in much worse shape.

After leaving Rangoon in the early morning, we drove two hours to the town of Kungyangon. We noticed that along the roads every 50 meters were groups of riot police but otherwise the roads were eerily empty of people, certainly not like the scene a few weeks ago when refugees lined the roads to get access to private donations. We also passed several refugee tent camps that looked liked ghost towns. Once we arrived to Kungyangon, we had to wait for our boat to be loaded.

The boat ride towards Taw Chike took approximately 3 hours. Along the river we were able to observe how badly the villages had been damaged by the cyclone. There were many dead water buffalo carcasses, although thankfully we only saw one human corpse along the way. We saw steep river banks that had been created overnight by a combination of the storm surge and strong winds. Another depressing effect was the damage to the DANEE plants, which are critically important to the villagers because they supply the green leaves used to build roofs. Since most of these plants were destroyed, many villagers cannot rebuild their roofs. New DANEE plants will grow, but the only ones available now are the young plants whose leaves are not strong enough yet to provide shelter from neither the monsoon rains nor the sun.

We finally arrived to Taw Chike village where we met the head monk. The local villagers were very surprised to see us because this was the first time that foreigners had ever been there. The village had received no aid apart from some private donations that had come in sporadically. We saw immediately that the two barrels with 100 gallons of diesel that we brought were going to be a tremendous help for the villagers. Their fresh water ponds were flooded with salt water and were completely unusable. The village was desperate for fresh water. With the diesel fuel, they were able to pump out all the muddy sea water and start collecting fresh rain water again. Unfortunately the soil in the area has been already damaged as well, and they won’t be able to plant rice this season. On a positive note, we observed that some teashops and other mini convenient shops were open. This is a positive sign that most villagers are trying to back on their feet. Sadly, many homes were completely destroyed and it will take a long time to rebuild. Some families have debris that they can reuse to build but others have nothing.

As the end of our visit drew near, we decided to go and see the ocean. In order to do that we need to ride the boat another 10 to 15 minutes downriver. When we finally arrived to the southern point of the island, it initially looked uninhabited and deserted. Then we began to notice many things half buried in the ground, like pillows, photo frames, plates, clothes, ornaments, etc. As we came closer to a fishing village, we saw that some fishing boats were completely destroyed and others still usable but in bad condition. Even worse, we found the remains of a dead woman exposed just 30 meters from the small house. When we asked the villagers about the remains, they told us that she did not belong to their village. When the ocean water flooded their villages, many bodies floated into their area, but they left the ones from other villages alone. Apparently now the government has given instructions for the locals to leave the bodies alone and let the Army dispose of them with flamethrowers, but they still haven’t reached many of these areas.

When we asked for the name of the village, they said “now people call us The Seven Houses Villages, but before the cyclone we had more than 40 houses and 200 people”. Now the survivors have lost most of their livelihoods, with the boats destroyed or damaged, they can no longer fish. Many Burmese don’t want to eat fish now anyway because of the association they have with all the bodies in the river and sea. Many of the families were trying to crowd into the remaining houses that survived the storm, but there just wasn’t enough room, and many had to live out in the open.

Our desire to enjoy and see the ocean was gone; however we were happy to find this village and be able to give them much needed supplies. We found out that they lost 20 residents during the storm and had received no help since then. All of the villagers look very malnourished. There was also a pregnant woman who will soon give birth. We are now trying to set up a family kit for her to take to her. We hope to gather more information in our next trip and try to set up something more sustainable, such as helping them repair their homes and fishing boats.

We are very concerned about premature resettlement of refugees. Although we understand how important it is to resume rice cultivation in these areas, most have no homes, no water buffaloes to plow with, fields flooded with salt water, no seeds, and little food to sustain them. In addition, they are now not allowed access to the roads, where at least they could get private donations. In addition, access for private donors is become more and more limited, and official efforts still are not reaching outside the main towns. We fear that many may starve.

On a positive note, here is an update on the little girl suffering from Frontonasal encephalocele that we found in Po Laung village last week on Trip #8. An anonymous donor has agreed to pay for her surgery. She and her family are now in Rangoon and she likely will have her first surgery on Wednesday. Apparently the growing mass might have started penetrating her brain cavity within a year or two, so it is so fortunate that she is getting proper care now. Recovery won’t happen over night but she has a real chance to have a normal life now after the treatment. We will continue to follow up on her. Read more about this particular problem at The Honolulu Advertiser

New photos of past relief work. These photos are much better than anything we have posted previously. They are both truly representative of the beautiful, resilient Burmese people in the disaster areas. Please take a look.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to these relief efforts – you really are saving lives! We have received donations from generous people both inside and outside Burma. Thanks also to the all the volunteers that have helped us, especially the Embassy FSN community, international teachers, the Burma Foundation and DAO.

Please, if you know anyone who would like to donate to our project have them contact beyondrangoonproject@yahoo.com for information on how to donate online or by mailing a check or wiring cash.

Trip Details:

Departure time from Yangon : 05:30 AM
Return time to Yangon : 8:15 PM
Number of Volunteers : 14 (4 foreigners and 10 Burmese)
Number of Vehicles : 1 SUV, 1 cargo truck, 1 station wagon.

Donated goods :

• 50 sacks of rice (50 kilos each)
• 10 Rolls of tarps (6″x300″ each)
• 4 Can of cooking oil (5 gallons each can)
• 1 Sack of Salt (50 Kilos) / 1 sack of beans (50 kilos)
• 2 Barrels of Diesel (50 gallons each)

Gitameit Volunteer

Meditation center, Pagoda in Hlaing Thaya
I think our method of providing aid is effective only because the abbot supervised our activities. We should continue to visit this location in the future.

Shwe Pauk Kan
The refugee camp is not so far from the city. So the situation doesn’t seem so bad. I don’t think their spirits are down because aid works come regularly.

South Dagon
I think that all the refugees are depressed and miserable. I don’t see their situation improving soon. I am sad, fed up, and feel sympathy for these refugees.

Gitameit Volunteer- North Dagon

I feel bad for the villagers and children because many people are working without shoes. But I am happy when I see the faces of refugees when the receive donations of rice and roofing. I feel that their lives are so terrible. They are struggling without depending on anyone but themselves. They will be ok if the government provides the necessary economic infrastructure for the community.

Gitameit Volunteer- East Dagon

I feel really sorry to see so many the refuges. But at the same time, I am happy to use all my strength to help. I had some difficulties when I went to East Dagon. But I am so satisfied that I am trying my best. I am so happy that I have a chance to help. After helping only once, I want to help again and again.

Gitameit Volunteer- East Dagon

All the refugees went back to their former places of residence now because the camps have been closed, not because their houses have been repaired/ reconstructed. In light of the current situation, it is urgent to rebuild their houses. At least, they need to cover their roofs with tarps.

I want monks to distribute all the roofing because it is the most efficient method. The rice was not sufficient for the refugees. Even though I distributed six cans of rice for each household, it was still
not enough. I distributed the rice until it was gone. But the need had not yet diminished.

Our aid giving was a success even though we were disturbed by certain individuals. I want to give to the refugees directly. But to personally hand them everything is exhausting.

Aung Saing

I am from Katchin state. When I was coming to Yangon from Katchin state, I was thinking that I didn’t want to see my fellow countrymen in trouble. I am so grateful that Gitameit was so welcoming. The first day I felt a little strange because I was so far away from home. But I went to Hlaing Tha Yar with my friends. I spoke with some of the monks from the monastery. I felt bad for the Burmese people because of this situation. Then I went to South Dagon with five nurses and two friends from Gitameit. When we arrived, many people crowded around us when they saw us giving. There were also other local aid workers. But the other groups were having a lot of difficulty because of not having much organization. I was so happy to see the organization of our group.

Yan Aung Bo - East Dagon

When we went to East Dagon, we saw some houses that had collapsed due to the cyclone. We asked the people from that area about the refugee camps. They told us that the refugee camps were dispersed and that we should go to the monastery to find more information. So we went to the monks and asked them about the refugees’ need. He explained that the refugees needed fuel to power water pumps, rice, and roofing.

After taking down the information from the monk, we visited refugee populations in the surrounding areas. The conditions were worse than the previous area and we tried to identify the camps’ locations. But again, the camps had been dispersed. We did our best to find groups of villagers that had no food and roofing. After drafting a list of their basic needs, we distributed various goods. I really felt bad for these people when we were give out food. They were so hungry and we didn’t have enough rice to give to everyone. So we did our best and then returned to Gitameit.

Sophia- East Dagon

This was my first trip as a volunteer. I was not expecting to go out today but I felt really lucky to have the opportunity. Today we went to East Dagon to identify new refugee camps but unfortunately there were none except one monastery. A monk was organizing and managing a camp several days before, but the camp had been broken up and the refugees were sent back to their homes. Noticing that there were a number of children remaining who seemed to need attention, we chatted with the monk and asked him how we could help. A four-year-old girl named Chit Su broke her right leg when the storm brought a tree down on her home.

After contributing to the best of our ability at that monastery, we went to a nearby village to give rice and sheets of tarp. We went inside the village on foot with a list of households that required
assistance. When we started distributing supplies, we began to notice that the amount of food was not sufficient for this population. Though I felt so happy and proud to help these refugees and be a member of this team, I felt terrible for the refugees and their suffering. But there’s really nothing I can do beyond volunteering and going on trips like this one. I would like to continue to do the best I can to help these refugees and I look forward to going on another trip like today.

Good morning to you. I received 3750 water purifying tablets and some pills for indigestion and diarrhea from Gitameit. Thanks to everyone indeed! The trip was a success. Gitameit staff shared knowledge which is very important for the work we are doing now. They provided a set of questions to ask and study the situation of site.

This trip was different from our previous trips because we were able to collect important data. I also gained a better understanding of the lives of the people we are helping and what we need to support in the future.

The journey was a most terrible one even though it’s only around 30 miles from Yangon. Because of the bad road conditions, very few people have accessed this village. We took a paddy carrier which has only a single engine and small trailer for about 10 miles, and it took about 3 hours to reach the village.

Everyone in this area has been eating rotten, yellow coloured rice since Nargis came. They are drinking dirty water from the lake. Nargis almost destroyed the entire village and killed some people — mostly women and children who were not strong enough to run for their lives. When I was entering the village I saw they were cooking rotten rice (that is all they have) for monthly donations the next day for their dead relatives. Some have none left. Monks themselves would pray in front of their ruined houses for them.

I handed over the medicine to the first class nurse. She will organize the people to drink purified water, but there were not enough tablets for everyone. Also it was not possible to replace the rotten rice with white rice. I think no one can do this but UN. Funeral Service Yangon promised me to donate some medical needs such as needles and anti-biotics. Now I am trying to get these thing as first priority because the death toll is rising day by day.

Thank you all for your hard work and willingness to circulate our Myanmar Relief efforts to your friends and family. The $1 million dollar goal is so near…. $710,000 has been achieved since we began on May 8th.

In a flash, what CW Asia Fund has accomplished since we returned home from SE Asia on May 8th. The last day for federal matching funds is June 14th!

As of May 30th

1. Posted relief information on our website www.cwasiafund.org
2. Launched on line giving — GiveMeaning.com (100% , 0 deductions)
3. Established on line giving in the UK on JustGiving.com and donations by cheque set up in the USA. Coming soon a US on line giving site!
4. Researching gov’t for matching funds



5. Applied to gov’t to waive the treasury sanctions for 5 groups (4 NGOs and 1 business) inside Myanmar
6. Funds raised to date are $710,000 at Radcliffe, (not including $$$ at Tides Canada Foundation/CWAF, $33,000USD + from the UK)
7. Advanced donations in cash to Myanmar $75,000 (+ an additional $15,000 from Italian foundation). Donations pledged to Metta $150,000 and $50,000 to AZG. CWAF funds are only released as needed and as requested by the predetermined NGOs …balance will remain for rebuilding over the coming months. CW Asia Fund will continue to fundraise throughout the year to help with rebuilding health clinics, schools and villages. Updates received daily from the field.
8. Soliciting for donations in kind of bulk pharmaceutical, vitamins, food supplements, dried soy powder, high energy bars, gastrolyte for children, light weight durable roofing material…We have secured 4 pallets of vitamin C and high protein bars and 3 pallets of medical kits for 30,000 treatments.
9. Asking for help from friends of Myanmar and our personal friends to please contact your local MLA to encourage the government to match funds donated to CW Asia Fund.

Why help CW Asia Fund? …. aid is getting into the right hands and to those in need!

How?

The cash is being hand delivered to the organizations on the ground inside Myanmar, personally known to us, allowing to purchase emergency supplies locally. What cannot be purchased locally, a volunteer group in Thailand is helping facilitate the purchase transporting into Myanmar by truck, air and sea. From Canada we hope to secure two sea containers with the help of the Rotary World Health Network to fill with reconstruction material such as light weight durable roofing and prefabricate siding, vitamins, high energy dried foods goods, protein/ energy bars….

Progress Report?

We are being advised on a daily basis…as to what is critical, what has arrived, what the country is severely short on…this almost daily shift of needs list is dependent on arrival international aid - contents and the amount of contents! During the 10 days our Canadian friend spent in Yangon, he personally witnessed and or confirmed from non military sources the arrival of 227 international aid planes! All the contents were successfully unloaded and distributed without interference from military junta.

Copies of field reports and updates?

We welcome the request for Myanmar field reports. Please e-mail cwasiafund@strandco.com Enter “Send me field reports” on the subject line.

Thank you for helping the children and their families in Myanmar.

It’s time for an update from Myanmar. I’ve been discouraged to see the type of coverage coming out of CNN and BBC and others regarding relief efforts underway there. And despite the fact that I am in the US, I’m still in daily contact with our people in Yangon, and therefore may be able to continue to provide a better sense of some aspects of the realities of providing relief in Myanmar than you will get if I leave you to fend for yourselves with nothing but television news as your guide! So here goes…

Among the biggest challenges to relief efforts right now is the distribution issue. This is the impression being given by international news agencies, but the perspective they take in reporting it is different than mine. Let me back up and give you some history. Before the cyclone, there were quite a few international, non-UN development organizations, as well as some local development organizations, working in the Ayewaddy Delta. These organizations had field offices in many of the main towns and larger village areas and had built up working relationships with local authority structures and local community members. When the cyclone hit, these agencies and their staff remained in place. Their international staff may not have been allowed to go out to those field offices post-cyclone, but the local and international staff who were already there were able to remain. This was threatened for awhile, but in the end, their continued presence was successfully negotiated. Certainly the lack of ability to put additional people in those field offices and out into the surrounding communities was a problem, but there was a presence.

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What you are hearing on the news would have you believe that, until the UN agencies get in there, there is nothing and can be nothing happening. THIS IS INACCURATE. There has been a lot going on, and it isn’t just because of the UN agencies, it is because the other local and international agencies who were already there doing other things have used their own networks to help, plus which a number of other organizations who did not have a presence there (like HOPE) have found a way to help and provide support. In any disaster, the UN actually relies on the smaller, non-UN agencies to do a lot of the distribution of supplies – the UN agencies get supplies out to central warehouse locations that they establish as distribution centers, and then the non-UN agencies act sort of like subcontractors and help distribute from there. (For example, HOPE is currently working to get some of the first helicopter loads of UN-FAO supplies delivered to areas where our local partners can distribute it.) Whether through orderly distribution of UN supplies or the orderly distribution of supplies like the 600 bags of rice that HOPE purchased on the local markets and then coordinated to be delivered to several areas just in the past few days, most aid delivery is done in a responsible fashion, with good coordination and cooperation between international and local agencies and community people. Those 600 bags of rice were distributed to several communities and represent rice to feed 9,000 people for a week. The delivery of rice was greeted with joy, but there was no frenzy, as you can see from this photo.

When I see footage on CNN of people lining main roads and aid workers throwing small packets of food supplies out of the backs of trucks while the people lining the roads scramble and scrape and fight one another for the crumbs, I cringe. This is NOT the norm. There are lines of people begging along some main supply routes, but they do not by any means represent the bulk of needy people, nor is this haphazard, conflict-heightening method of throwing food out the back of a truck to distribute aid the commonly used approach. The news agencies do not seem to recognize that giving handouts (sometimes throwing out handouts) along the highways is a fairly destructive way to distribute aid. How aid is provided can either contribute to building unity and helping people reestablish their communities or can undermine community unity and functioning. Our aim and the aim of most organizations operating out in the Delta is to help communities rebuild so that their social fabric is stronger than it once was, rather than weakening the already damaged bonds.

So where do these CNN and BBC photos come from? What our local colleagues describe to us is that the closer to a main Yangon-Delta supply route people live, the more likely they are to be waiting for relief, begging on the side of the road and relying on the outside to rebuild their lives for them. Once our colleagues get off the main supply roads and start going down some of the smaller roads or especially the smaller rives, the people there have much less access to outside aid, but also much less expectation that someone else is going to take care of them. Therefore they have much MORE of a sense that rebuilding their lives is what they need to do. The survivors in these settings are taking any initiatives they can. This is frankly much healthier in the long run. The difficulty for HOPE and other organizations is walking that fine line of making sure people have the basics so that they can go ahead and take initiative and start rebuilding their own lives, without providing them too much, so that they become dependent on outside initiative and aid. The people along the road are genuinely in need, but the way their needs are being addressed has already created dependence. In some sense, this is robbing them of their future, rather than preserving them for their future.

We at HOPE have confirmed that we are helping our local partners serve areas that are not being reached by anyone else right now. So we are already hearing stories of small villages working together to rebuild rough housing for each other. We’re hearing stories of draft animals who survived the storm, returning to their now abandoned farms. One of our colleagues even saw a farmer who had recovered one draft animal and was working to get his fields ready for planting! How is this possible? Many times, the more vulnerable survivors are sent to the temporary settlements while the remaining, most able-bodied survivors try to return to their homes to rebuild.

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There’s a steep price to be paid for choosing this option, but less costly options don’t really exist. A little girl displaced by the storm is having her upper arm measured by one of the local health team members we are supporting, in order to determine her nutrition status. She has outward signs of malnutrition. Her parents both survived the storm and are among the able-bodied who have returned to their village to try to being rebuilding their lives. The little girl was left at a temporary shelter, along with her aunt and the aunt’s two-year-old. That way, the aunt can have access to food, etc. The aunt is breast-feeding both her own two-year-old and this little girl, who is younger. Because of the aunt’s current nutritional deficit, she is struggling to provide adequate nutrition for both of these children, and the food supplies at the temporary shelter are also very limited. The shelters are filled with old people, expectant and nursing mothers and very small children. This leaves them very vulnerable, but not as vulnerable as the whole family would be if the family tried to stay together. There are no easy choices and every choice involves threats to survival for some family member or another.

Now reflect on the fact that we, along with all our HOPE colleagues, have been very actively encouraging our local partners (who include both Karens and Burmans) to provide assistance to all in need, not just to those from their own backgrounds or groups. This is the right thing to do. But it is a very difficult thing to do for people in these areas who have suffered because of being from one of these people groups or the other. The long history of trauma in these communities makes the cooperation and trust we are trying to encourage a very difficult thing to do, and our insistence on looking past ethnic identity reawakens memories and emotions in local community members that we have no life experience to compare to so that we can understand adequately. When our local partners go out there and try to work, there’s so much more required of them than simply delivering supplies and providing instructions on how it is to be distributed. The situation is one of multiple layers of dilemmas on top of one another. The need for trauma healing support is immense, more so than we even first understood.

Just to let you know the situation at our house and office – after having power restored to our house last week, we quickly started experiencing long power outages on a daily basis. The same is happening at the office, so the generator is running there more than we would like. Apparently all the bugs aren’t worked out of the power production and supply systems yet. And the phones at both the house and the office aren’t working reliably, even though they were working well enough for a short while. The lines themselves were damaged during the storm so those will have to be replaced – it isn’t a simple matter of reconnection. So in the meantime, internet and phone access is very difficult and the cell phone is the only way anyone can be in touch.

I’ll be back in touch soon, since I have a lot more news, mostly of the human interest variety. Thanks for continuing to read. Usually we think of crises as being short-term, but not this one – the crisis in Myanmar is a long way from over.