Dateline ACT

Indonesia 1705

A year later, tsunami-battered Aceh searches for security and hope

By Chris Herlinger, ACT International

Banda Aceh, Indonesia, December 7, 2005--It is difficult for an outsider visiting Banda Aceh not to be drawn to the ocean.

Not to swim. Nor to fish. But merely to look and marvel at the ocean’s destructive power.

On Banda Aceh’s coastline, neighborhoods like Kampung Mulia and Lampaseh Kota took the full brunt of last December’s tsunami. A year later, the surviving residents, most still living in tents and awaiting completed housing, still struggle with memories of an accursed day.

They include Afifuddin, 26, an information technology graduate who acts as a community representative for Lampaseh Kota, a once vibrant neighborhood now laid waste and recovering from an almost indescribable loss of life: from a population of 5,000, the urban village now has about 1,000 residents.

Afifuddin lost a grandmother, nephews, nieces, a brother and a sister last Dec. 26. He speaks of memories of that day - of panic, confusion, pandemonium - quietly, almost dispassionately. He is focused on the future and not the past, but that is not always easy - many around him are still traumatized, he said.

Church World Service (CWS), a member of the global alliance Action by Churches Together (ACT) International, provided basic relief items to his neighborhood - health kits, tents, mattresses - which have proven valuable in what has been a difficult year.

Not far from Lampaseh Kota stands another urban village, Kampung Mulia - “noble village” in Indonesian - and also a recipient of CWS assistance. It is home to Marzuki Arsyad, a one-time driver of a bicycle taxi and part-time fisherman. Arsyad’s immediate family fared better than many in his neighborhood - his wife, a physics teacher, works in another city and was not in Banda Aceh the day the tsunami hit. But he still lost brothers, sisters and other family - 13 in all.

The memories of that day refuse to lay dormant. “We were like people losing our minds. We saw these bodies - women, children, older people - all around us, and we couldn’t do anything.”

Staying determined and busy has helped ease a bit of the trauma. Like Afifuddin, Arsyad is focused on the future and believes Aceh’s full recovery depends on developing the region’s economic base.

Education and easing trauma also have key roles, as Siti Mariam quietly but determinedly believes. Mariam, a CWS program officer, helps coordinate a psychosocial support program for children in Krueng Kala village, south of Banda Aceh, site of a resettlement program for internally displaced persons affected by the tsunami.

Mariam said the program, which one day recently hosted nearly 100 lively and talkative children as they engaged in crafts, has noticeably helped the children. Once afraid of noises that suggested the roar of the tsunami - even the sounds of helicopters sent the children cowering in fear - the young people are now engaged, funny, and “not afraid to express their emotions.”

Small steps, to be sure, in what remains a long process of recovery. Much housing has yet to be built - CWS and the other ACT members in Indonesia are actively involved in that work - and Aceh itself is recovering from a double crisis, not only from the tsunami, but from a 30-year civil conflict that only recently ended.

In fact, the tsunami and recovery efforts are believed to have caused the Indonesian government and rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, or GAM) to recognize the need to end a war that, prior to this year, showed no signs of abating.

That is why, as reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts continue into the future and as Aceh sets to mark the one-year anniversary of the Dec. 26 tsunami, the word “security” has particular poignancy in Aceh.

“This is not just about building homes,” said CWS staffer Ejodia Kakunsi after several days of visits to Aceh’s recovering coastal areas, “but building for the future.”

The other ACT members in Indonesia responding to the Dec. 26, 2004, tsunami are Yayasan Tanggul Bencana Indonesia (YTBI) and YAKKUM Emergency Unit (YEU).

Chris Herlinger is the information officer of the Emergency Response Program of Church World Service, a member of ACT International.