[Kabar-indonesia] Yogya Quake Victims Show Initiative [2 reports]

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also: JP Feature: Quake family survivor: 'Where are the helping hands?' 

The Jakarta Post
Sunday, October 8, 2006

Feature

Yogya Quake Victims Show Initiative 

Christina Schott, Contributor, Yogyakarta

photo: Model Workers: Villagers in Pacalan, Klaten build a house under 
the close supervision of the German and Indonesian Red Cross teams, 
with materials provided by ECHO. (JP/Christina Schott) 

Welcome to Yogyakarta, the heart of Javanese culture, center of Indonesian 
arts and crafts, tourism destination and student town. Signs greet you 
everywhere on the way from Adisucipto Airport to Tugu Station. Driving along the main 
streets in the center, almost nothing but a few cracks hints at the destructive 
power of the May 27 earthquake. The view of construction sites is shielded by 
high fences, the rubble in front of damaged houses has disappeared and the 
shopping malls have re-opened.

But there is no way to overlook the damage left by the 5.9-quake as soon as 
you leave the city center. Going anywhere south or east will provide the same 
sights of destroyed houses, piles of bricks and tiles, bamboo and triplex huts 
or tents on empty foundations. An estimated 300,000 houses were destroyed or 
damaged, leaving around 1.5 million people homeless. 

More than four months after the disaster, most of the victims live in 
makeshift homes built close to the remains of their former houses. In many places, 
construction materials and tools were provided by local and international NGOs. 
Some villages, however, did not receive any other help than food supplies and 
emergency items during the first weeks after the quake and have to be content 
with plastic covers and recycled bricks for their temporary homes. 

Food stalls and shops have re-opened in improvised shelters. In the 
handicraft village of Kasongan, whole new facades are already rising out of the debris. 
However, the few new houses already built in the disaster area are all 
financed by private funding and donations. Except for the initial emergency support 
of Rp 90,000 and ten kilograms of rice per family, no one has received any 
help from the Indonesian government yet. 

"There are rumors that the money from the government will arrive soon. 
Everybody with a broken house is supposed to get Rp 15 million. But I will only 
believe it when it's here", says Muhammad from Sembungan village in Bantul. 
"Nevertheless, there is already fighting between the villagers about who gets the 
money and who does not, whose house is damaged enough and whose is not. The 
strange thing is that one has to build a completely new house with this money. 
Recycling the remains is not allowed. What a waste," continued the father of two, 
whose house was half destroyed. 

Due to the uncertainty about the official money as well as the uncountable 
rumors and mystic predictions about new disasters that circulate around the area 
almost every week, many quake victims are still reluctant to build a new 
house. But whether it is official or private funding, temporary or permanent 
buildings -- in the meanwhile, the reconstruction has started to become a race 
against time, since the rainy season is expected to start soon. In many villages, 
the inhabitants still live with their undamaged furniture under plastic 
covers. Not really comfortable and definitely unbearable in a heavy tropical rain 
storm. 

Facing this pressure, some NGOs have seemed to intensify their efforts to 
provide construction material and tools. Every now and then the obligatory truck 
convoy from the International Organization for Migration, Oxfam, Red Crescent 
or Red Cross passes by with logistic supplies. Huge piles of bamboo and 
coconut wood wait at the main roads of Bantul and Klaten. The production of gedheg 
(traditional bamboo mats) is running at top speed, since most NGOs use this 
traditional material for their temporary houses. "Most of our transitional 
shelter projects will be finished by October," says Heinke Veit, speaker of the 
European Commission Humanitarian Organization (ECHO), which finances 16 different 
emergency projects in the disaster region with 9.5 million euros (Rp 117 
billion). 

Fortunately, most villagers in affected areas have proved to have a very high 
degree of initiative. They have already cleaned up the sites and improvised 
as much as possible, so that they can start building a new home as soon as they 
are provided with the necessary means. "It is a lot easier to help people 
with this kind of motivation than starting from scratch," says Marc-Andr‚ 
Souvignier of the German Red Cross, who arrived in Yogyakarta just three days after 
the quake struck. 

"Who else will help us, if we don't help ourselves?" says Wagiyono, chairman 
of the Indonesian Red Cross in Klaten. "But the motivation is definitely much 
higher, if people from outside care for us." 

The magic formula is the gotong royong (community work) spirit, which makes 
any cash-for-work program look silly. Like many other organizations, the German 
and Indonesian Red Cross include this local spirit in their cooperation 
plans. Since mid-August they have provided construction material and tools donated 
by ECHO to 8,000 families in Wedi district, Klaten. 

At the beginning of September, around 15 men in Pacalan, Sukorejo village, 
were taught on how to built an earthquake-proof model house with a cement 
foundation, wooden pillars and walls of gedheg, following the sample provided by the 
NGOs. The set up house was given as a new home to the poorest of the 
community: a widow and her 100-year-old mother. Later, the trained men will help other 
villagers use the equipment distributed during the coming weeks. Everybody is 
free to use the provided material according to his own needs. 

"So far, this is the first support for reconstruction we have received and we 
are really grateful for it," says village head Pak Teguh. "These simple 
houses are absolutely enough in our current situation and we can look a little more 
relaxed about the rainy season." 

Nevertheless, the deeper one goes into the countryside, the more places one 
finds still overlooked by voluntary organizations, both in Central Java and in 
Yogyakarta. 

In some areas, rice fields have dried out, since the irrigation systems 
collapsed in the earthquake. The farmers need tools to dig their wells deeper and 
afterwards they will need new pumps. In the meanwhile, they help themselves by 
growing corn, peanuts or ketela instead of rice. There are already plans by 
several organizations to help the farmers regain their livelihood. But at the 
moment the focus is on health, shelter, water and sanitation projects. So the 
Javanese seem to be trained once more in a virtue they know already very well: 
patience. 

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The Jakarta Post
Sunday, October 8, 2006

Feature

Quake family survivor: 'Where are the helping hands?' 

Fitriani Dwi Kurniasih, Contributor, Yogyakarta

Redjo Sumardi sits in front of what the May 27 earthquake left of his home in 
Mindi, Bantul. This loss weighs even more considering the long struggle he 
and his family had to build their old house -- a struggle that saw Redjo's wife 
Marsiyem forced to work as a maid in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, 
leaving her family behind for a long time. 

"We saved for a very long time to be able to build this house -- and then in 
only seconds it was destroyed," Redjo lamented. 

"We want to have a house again soon," Redjo, 46, said to an agreeing nod from 
his wife Marsiyem, 44. 

More than four months after the earthquake, the pair, their two sons Gunadi 
(30) and Suryadi (27), along with Suryadi's wife Prastiwi Sri Susilawati (26) 
and baby daughter Kidung Sahdu, still live in a makeshift tent on top of the 
remains of their old house. 

Bricks and tiles are piled in front of the empty foundations. Three by four 
meters wide, this tent is clearly not suitable for housing the six of them, 
with recovered furniture stuffed in every available corner. At noon the air 
inside is stifling hot, at night shiveringly cold. Living in such circumstances 
will certainly have an effect on their health, especially that of the 
granddaughter, who is only seven months old -- her entire face covered with the small red 
scars of mosquito bites. 

However, they are still grateful for what they have, in comparison with life 
in the first week after the earthquake, when they lived in one large tent with 
sixty-five other families. This tent didn't only function as a place to sleep 
at night but also served as a public kitchen. 

"It was difficult to sleep, in fact, there wasn't enough room to accommodate 
everyone, so some of the youths had to volunteer not to sleep in the tent and 
instead keep watch because of the many thieves who entered the village at 
night," recalled Gunadi. Incessant rain and frequent aftershocks during the week 
also made the mood tense. 

"We even occasionally went without food, though fortunately with our 
neighbors who had food supplies, we helped each other out," says Marsiyem. 

Not only was their home destroyed, their handicraft products were also broken 
-- Buddha heads and other souvenir statues which they made part of their 
living from. The artwork of the two sons, a painter and a student of sculpture 
from the Indonesian Institute of Arts was damaged as well. 

"Even though I am doing my final university assignment, I can't concentrate 
anymore," explains Suryadi, who is for the time being still enrolled in his 
final studies in sculpture. For an artist, living in a tent with limited space is 
very disruptive to productivity. 

Although the family now lacks orders for their craftworks, their income has 
not yet been totally wiped out. 

Redjo previously worked for a marble company, but the quake forced the 
company to give the entire workforce a six-month break. "I don't know for sure if I 
will be called in to work there again," he said, adding that the company's own 
premises were also damaged in the quake. 

Consequently, craftsman can only look for work as a laborer for those of his 
neighbors who can already afford to rebuild, but this work is infrequent. "Now 
I'm a bricklayer at my neighbors place. It's not as much pay but it's better 
than not working," he said. 

Daughter-in-law Prastiwi Sri Susilawati or Tiwi as she is fondly called by 
her friends, had to give up her job to take care of her daughter. In contrast to 
her father-in-law, the young mother resigned from her job at a hotel where 
she had worked everyday as she was afraid to leave her daughter behind. 

"I couldn't concentrate on my work because I was scared there'd be another 
quake. The thing is my daughter is still a baby," says Tiwi. 

In order to keep her "dapur tetap ngebul" (a Javanese term that is the 
equivalent to "there's always food on the table"), the 26-year-old sells ice in the 
village, though the income from this is far from what she earned when working 
for the hotel. 

The losses of homes, possessions and places of employment, however, hasn't 
dampened their struggle to sustain their livelihoods. 

The Redjo family and residents of Mindi RT 11, Sumber Agung, Jetis in Bantul 
have not received assistance from the government except for some food and 
emergency supplies in the first weeks of the quake. Why RT 11 was overlooked when 
assistance arrived is not known, but definitely it was not due to the lack of 
effort from the community. 

They submitted numerous requests for help and they were always unsuccessful. 
For Gunadi, this was quite astonishing since his house was located near a main 
road. 

"Houses lined along the main road are still being given help and I have seen 
new temporary houses in other neighborhoods, but no organizations have come to 
help us with materials or anything else to reconstruct our houses," he said. 

As the rainy season is already near, things are likely to get worse if they 
have to continue living in tents. The health of the family is definitely at 
risk, the burden of getting on with their lives will certainly increase. 

"We just hope that the government assistance will arrive at once -- before 
the rainy season starts," Suryadi said. 

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Joyo Indonesia News Service
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