Bi-Monthly Summery

Our work is fully in the rehabilitation phase now, five months after the tsunami/earthquake. There are many ups and downs in carrying out our work as the reality of government bureaucracy and ineptness and a general lack of coordination of this massive relief effort make every day unpredictable and planning for the long term quite a challenge. By His Grace, our projects are inching towards completion.

We completed the clean up of Durung village in which 96 villagers participated over a 15 day period with the funds ($5500) being provided by UNICEF. The cash for work program resulted in the entire village being cleared of debris and rubble caused by the tsunami.


Villagers during cleanup

We completed a distribution of 55 tons of supplementary food items valued at $39,000 to 6500 IDP's (Indonesian Displaced Persons) in 12 distribution points at 8 villages with food provided by the German Embassy.

We are well into the rehabilitation of the 42 damaged brick factories in Neuheun village. The brick owners received the necessary funds now to rebuild their kilns or to repair the ones that were damaged. The 14 other owners who required cash grants to re-start their factories have also received those grants and will begin production of bricks this week.

Our engineers have completed the assessment of the 12 damaged houses that we will repair in Neuheun village in a project that is also funded by GTZ of Germany. We hope to begin the repairs this week once the first installment of funds is released.

AMURTEL has acquired 30 sewing machines with which to begin the implementation of a livelihood project for women seamstresses in two spontaneous camps called Bada and Raider. Each woman will be required to make 20 school uniforms (for which they will be paid a nominal fee as part of a cash for work program) after which the sewing machines become theirs permanently. Already AMURTEL has an order of 1200 school uniforms as many children require uniforms for the start of the new school year in July.

AMURTEL have already begun the renovation of two kindergartens in Raider and Seremo camps to benefit 146 children (?). Although the budget is a modest $6300 it seems that the renovations will exceed that amount. It is expected to complete the renovation by next week after which Didi will begin to furnish the two kindergartens.

AMURTEL also distributed school materials and recreation kits donated by UNICEF to three camps for 223 children. In Bada village as Didi was doing the distribution the Director of UNCEF Ibu Sayo Aiki was passing by! She was pleased to see UNICEF materials being put to good use for the children!

Our organic farming project in Meulaboh, West Aceh is still seeking donors. We submitted our project proposal to UNICEF and the Spanish Red Cross and await their response.

Our three other large projects, namely housing construction and repair in two other villages and the rehabilitation of 85 brick factories are in need of funds.

Dada Shiilabhadrananda, Banda Aceh