Howard
Arfin’s greatest trouble came from a tiny drop of water.
Having being deployed to Indonesia in the International Federation
immediately after the tsunami of 26 December, Arfin worked long,
difficult and dangerous days alongside international emergency
teams and local volunteers in the midst of indescribable devastation
caused by the largest tsunami in modern history – a wall
of water so large it redrew geography and sheared away entire
communities, killing hundreds of thousands of people.
“It was as if a huge hoe had scraped along the coast,”
said Arfin on his return to his native Canada last month.
When it came to water in those terrible days, Arfin, a member
of the Federation’s Field Assessment and Coordination
Team (FACT) which is deployed immediately after a major disaster,
was careful to do almost everything right.
He was careful to drink only purified water. If in the long
days of emergency work he had a few moments to brush his teeth,
he did so only with bottled water.
When he bathed in the Indonesian fashion by pouring ladles of
water over his head, he was careful to keep his mouth tightly
closed. Arfin knew his bathing water could be contaminated by
sewage from broken pipes that ran alongside shattered water
mains.
In spite of the careful measures he took, Arfin caught the diarrhoeal
illness giardia and was sick for five days. The most probably
contracted the illness merely by washing in water contaminated
by the parasite responsible.
As the emergency phase of the tsunami operations winds down,
the International Federation is redoubling its commitment to
make water safe again for the people of Aceh, the province worst
affected by the tsunami.
Just as importantly, it is committed to teaching people how
to properly use water and other sanitation tools to make their
lives more healthy and safe.
The tsunami not only destroyed water works and pipe systems,
it filled thousands of households or community wells with debris,
sludge, sewage and salt water. In the days immediately after
the tsunami, people who could not find a spring in the mountains
or clean water at a faraway relative’s house had to use
contaminated water for bathing and drinking.
The International Federation deployed four specialized emergency
response units (ERUs) to Indonesia in the early stages of the
disaster. Those teams, staffed by delegates from the Austrian,
French, German, Macedonian, Spanish and Swedish Red Cross Societies
and the Malaysian Red Crescent Societies, helped to prevent
a secondary disaster of waterborne diseases and have been providing
clean water to hundreds of thousands of people daily.
One of these units alone - at a convent across the street from
a collapsed shopping mall – has provided over three million
litres of water to residents of Banda Aceh. All day long, large
tanker trucks fill up with a wide hose and depart for all points
in the city, while people on motorcycles and bicycles bring
jerry cans to fill from convenient, finger-spigot tap stands.
Ardi Sofimar, an Indonesian Red Cross volunteer who worked in
the town of Meulaboh after the disaster, said the water people
had to use before the ERUs arrived was like a mixture of oil
and tea.
The service provided by these ERUs has been so important, Sofimar
says, that many people’s biggest concern is that the Red
Cross will leave. Getting clean water for free also allows people
to save what little money they have for other needs.
The Federation has no intention of turning off the taps. The
emergency units, which have mandates of only four months, are
already handing over their equipment to be run longer-term by
delegates from their own national societies, or they are directly
training local Indonesian Red Cross volunteers to take over
and run some treatment units permanently.
Uli Jaspers, head of the International Federation’s Water
and Sanitation unit, says there are “new gaps every day”.
The Federation has agreed to step in and continue operations
where foreign army units helping with water distribution have
begun to pull out and return home.
The Indonesian government has also asked the Indonesian Red
Cross and Federation to help improve water and sanitation conditions
in at least 60 temporary shelter camps constructed by the government.
As part of a general reconstruction blueprint yet to be approved
by the Indonesian government – the Federation also plans
to help the Indonesian Red Cross provide water and sanitation
support to 110 villages of Aceh province. The International
Committee of the Red Cross will be doing similar work in 90
villages.
But finding new water sources, restoring water works and building
new wells is only one half of the of the job, says Jaspers.
“People tend to think of this just in terms of pumps and
pipes. But that is only the hardware. The software, hygiene
education and promotion, is just as important.”
Water and Sanitation delegate Ena Kuang, like Howard Arfin a
Canadian Red Cross delegate seconded to the Federation for the
tsunami operation, is in charge of the software.
Recently, she has been tracking through jungle, sleeping on
fishing boats and dodging cobras as she evaluates community
water needs and locates clean water sources on Aceh’s
Simelue Island. However the main focus is helping people learn
how to use water and latrines properly in order to avoid illnesses.
Part of this soft-spoken, Chinese-Canadian’s approach
is to support an Indonesian Red Cross (PMI) Participatory Hygiene
and Sanitation Transformation programme, whereby selected members
of communities are trained to conduct workshops and raise awareness
about this issue. Through group work, mapping and discussions,
communities discover for themselves the links between habits
and sickness and decide on plans for better hygiene practices.
“It does no good to build a latrine without people knowing
how to use it and maintain it,” Ena Kuang explains.
To overcome the scale of this disaster, she stresses the need
to develop local human resources. “Water and sanitation
staff in some communities perished in the disaster, and there
was also not yet a formalized water sanitation component in
the Indonesian Red Cross.”
Uli Jaspers saw this same kind of challenge seven years ago
in Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Since then,
with the Federation’s help, Jaspers says “the DPRK
Red Cross has gone from zero water and sanitation counterparts
to having 10 full time staff in the sector.
The hope and plan in Indonesia is to support the national society
in a similar way - all part of making more water safe for more
people, one tiny drop at a time.
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International
Federation water and sanitation delegate Michael Hodges
examines wells where the town of Lamno used to be. The
tsunami destroyed countless community and family wells
like this one, filling them with debris and salt water
(p12737)
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Residents
of Banda Aceh get drinking water at the "Pump Station",
an Austrian emergency response unit established on the
site of the city water works, which was destroyed by the
tsunami. The team taps into an underground reservoir,
providing water by to thousands of residents every day
(p12735)
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Austrian
Red Cross team leader Werner Meisinger and his Indonesian
Red Cross counterpart, Atik Amburwati, work together at
a water tank near a school, one of 23 water distribution
points maintained and serviced by the Red Cross in Banda
Aceh (p12734)
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Water
and Sanitation delegate Ena Kuang visiting the "Pump
Station" with the head of the Federation’s
delegation in Indonesia, Ole Hauge. Kuang is running the
"software" component of the Federation water
plan: helping people learn how to use water and latrines
properly (p12736)
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