Sri Lanka Journal- Andew and Annette Dey- 1/23/2005
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Links from Andrew and Annette:
Pro Photographer Dixie's web site
Mondo Challenge set up Andrew and Annette's trip.
Unawatuna is the village where they're staying and working
In the north, Andrew and Annette are working with Norwegian People's Aid. NPAID is partnered with the German organization called Arbeiter Samariter Bund.
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Andrew
We give ourselves permission to “take the day off.” I spend several hours researching playgrounds at the internet café in Galle, and catching up on some writing. As I had suspected, there are many web sites with ideas for playgrounds that can be adapted to the local situation. When I return to Unawatuna in the mid-afternoon, Max and I measure the washed-out play area at the local temple, and I sketch up a quick “as-built” (“as-destroyed”?) site plan.
I
catch up with Annette late in the afternoon. She has been up and down the
coast with Mally and Rajika, trying to arrange for equipment to remove Mally’s
thirty-foot catamaran from downtown Galle. They meet with the American marines
who have been stationed in Koggala, and learn that the marines will be pulling
out the next day: “mission accomplished.” It seems to us that
there is still plenty of mission left to be accomplished, but in fairness
to the marines, they have been a tremendous help to the area. They brought
lots of heavy equipment, including loaders, excavators, trucks, and a crane,
and as far as we could tell, did a great job of clearing schoolyards and
other public spaces. The locals are also impressed with the marines, commenting
on how big and strong they are, and how hard they work.
Annette, Mally, and Rajika next try the Sri Lankan navy, where they are subjected to a runaround from one officer to the next. They finally learn that the commander who could authorize equipment to move the boat is not available. They return home still unsure how the catamaran, which was parked downtown by the tsunami, will be moved.
Mally is testy that evening at dinner. Perhaps it’s the hassles with his catamaran, or the complications he is encountering in trying to start a community kitchen. Or maybe it’s having a houseful of non-paying volunteer relief workers. Another explanation arises when Mally begins complaining about the neighbors and his tools.
“I
needed a wheelbarrow and shovels to work on the slab for the community kitchen.
When I went to look for mine, they weren’t there. I had loaned both
wheelbarrows and several shovels to the neighbors to help with their cleaning
up, and they weren’t returned. And if my tools do come back, they
are broken!” Annette and I decide that the next day we will try to
find Mally a new wheelbarrow.
As part of the preparations for dinner, Annette and I “spin” coconuts. Rajika demonstrates the technique. The spinner is clamped to the counter. It has a handle like an old-fashioned meat grinder, and a horizontal head shaped like half a lemon. The head is made up of multiple serrated edges. After removing the husk from the coconut and cracking it in half, Rajika grabs half the coconut in her left hand, and pushes it onto the head while cranking the handle with her right hand. We find that it’s harder than it looks, but eventually we end up with a serviceable pile of shredded coconut.
Sharomie takes half of our yield, adds water to it to create a milky soup, and then squeezes the coconut meat out of the milk. She uses the milk for cooking, and discards the shredded meat.
“Can’t we eat this coconut meat after you have strained the milk from it?” I ask. It was no small effort to generate it.
“Maybe Max [the dog] can eat it. Or we use it to polish floors.” She grabs a handful, throws it on the smooth painted concrete floor, and spreads it around with her bare foot. The floor in that area shines.
“See how nice? Like wax: dust no stick, easy to clean.”
The dinner conversation revolves around whether the locals would be willing to go back to work, if there were opportunities, as long as they are receiving free food. Opinions differ, with the Unawatuna residents at the dinner table tending to think that their neighbors are lazy. But I have seen people in other villages working diligently under Cash for Work programs to clean the rubble. I doubt that Unawatuna would be any different.
The clean-up in Unawatuna is taking time to get underway—and this village seems to have a disproportionate number of concerned foreigners and locals who are in a position to donate funds. Annie has arranged for two JCBs (the local term for backhoes) and several “lorries” to begin the clean-up, but even that effort is getting mired in local politics. A woman from Italy named Francesca is considering hiring another company with more equipment. Max is looking into buying a Bobcat to help clean up “tsumani” (as he calls it) destruction. I suggest that a Cash for Work program in Unawatuna could help with the clean-up, and get people back to work. Our debate is energetic, but inconclusive. What continues to be clear is that any clean-up in the near term will have to be locally-organized; nobody expects the government or any large NGOs to spearhead this effort in Unawatuna.