Briefing from Biloxi, and Happy Holidays to the HODR family

post from DavidC. Had a great visit back to Biloxi, to celebrate the opening of the new Coastal family Health clinic, that so many HODR vols helped to make possible. While the funding for the facility came from the SSBG ( Social Srvices Block Grant) it's fair to say that the exposure Coastal got from the May 2006 Moss Point clinic opening, which dozens of vols contributed to, plus the sustaining work of the team that dealt with FEMA, IT issues, etc...all made this result possible. I was invited to speak, on behalf of all Hands On Folks, and recognized Nate Herrold, whose efforts were extraordinary, plus Kris Cyr, good friend Jack Blanks, and thanked the Coastal CEO, Joe Dawsey, for embracing our efforts. AND took the opportunity to name dozens of other volunteers who chipped in; yes I remembered you ALL!

Also got a chance to catch up with the REALLY LONG TERMERS, those HOUSA folks who are still helping out in Biloxi more than two years later. Amy, Jamie, Beau and Becca, Deubs, and others, who are living in Biloxi and carrying on great contributions.

Joined up with my "other family"  to celebrate the holidays, and had a nice week with 15 family, including 6 grandchildren....

Will cycle down to Peru in January, then to  back to Bangladesh in February.

To all the Hands On family, please have a wonderful holiday season, and thank you for being who you are!

David

hodr karma continues

from marc in bangladesh..........

we have a house!! this one was a little more difficult (although it is always a challenge to find a facility suitable for a volunteer base in close proximity to a natural disaster area) because of the extreme level of poverty in the affected areas and the issues raised by access. BUT, WOW, 5 big rooms with 3 (yes that’s THREE) bathrooms and a kitchen AND a great out door balcony that is big enough for meetings and socializing! ok, so there is no roof, but we have paid up our lease in advance and the construction repairs have already begun. also, the family that owns the house and lives on the level below has 2 sons that speak pretty good english.
my concerns over water were valid, for most of the areas we scouted had no water available on-site, but our new volunteer base has 1 deep tube well for drinking water and 2 shallow wells for clean water suitable for bathing!
at our first inspection of the house we were told that the electricity would arrive in a day or two. "oh, i see, wow that would be great!" all the while we knowingly snigger 'yeah, sure power in a few days when we havent seen anyone working to restore the power grid. when we returned to express our desire to let the house we curiously found trees downed in the yard. when we spoke with the owner we were told the power company had come to connect the house. when we arrived the following day to sign our lease agreement .......sure enough, the house was wired in! after dark i visited our beautiful large balcony where i found not another electrified neighbor.
the next step is to get the base set up for volunteers to arrive. we have contracted a banner maker to hand paint our signage for the front of the volunteer center and hired a local woodworker to construct the first bunk-bed. it will be exciting to return from dhaka and see what they have created.

Turnover

(Posted by Bill @ Project Pisco in Peru)

We have had a lot of turnover in the last two weeks. Many long-term volunteers (the name given to those who stay for 30 days or more) have cycled out as many new faces continue to cycle in. Project Pisco has had a baker’s dozen of veteran long-termers who joined us on previous projects but many here are first time volunteers. Most of the first time long-termers are coping with the departure of their friends; some of the veterans are coping as well.

One of the biggest challenges we face as an organization arises when long-term volunteers return to their “normal” lives, especially if they were a team leader as most end up stepping into a leadership role of some kind during their time with us. A long-termer’s knowledge base of how things work is traditionally the only form of institutional memory we have on projects beyond the operations director.

The turnover rate at Project Pisco, in terms of short-term volunteers is huge because we are in a heavily traveled area and travelers talk when they meet like-minded individuals on the trail. We have had over 430 volunteers walk through the doors so far. A truly amazing number over shadowed by only the volunteer’s impact within this community.

But the challenge of plugging new/fresh volunteers into the project falls in the lap of the long-termers and becomes a team effort to share the knowledge of how this and that is done and what time to do it etc.

The turnover rate presents challenges for our communal style living and the efficiency of the work day but another challenge, perhaps the hardest to deal with for a first time long-termer, is the “loss” of a friend and brother in arms.

On a personal level the significant turnover periods on projects can be hard to deal with. I remember when I woke up one morning in Biloxi during our Hurricane Katrina Relief Project (my first Hands On Project) and suddenly the “Tree Team” I had been working with everyday for 3 weeks had suddenly all returned home.

The realization that “this” won’t last forever and now I have to go and make new friends can be very strange and jolting. The veteran volunteer suddenly feels like the new kid in town because they don’t know anyone else and maybe don’t trust the “newbie’s” because they are new and “they don’t know...” The long-termer is faced with the decision to just leave because they don’t know anyone anymore or stick it out, make new friends and compartmentalize their emotions.

Yesterday long-term volunteer Amy touched upon this during her farewell speech at the end of our daily “All Hands Meeting.” Many of her closest friends left weeks ago but Amy stayed to oversee the rebuilding of a school, a project she started and has nurtured for months. She began by stating how she had debated whether or not she should even get up and speak to say goodbye because almost all of her friends had moved on and she didn’t really know many of the volunteers present. She decided to speak stating, “what I have to say I think everyone should hear anyway.” Man, I was glad along with everyone else that she decided to say goodbye to us and share her thoughts.

Her goodbye came on the 4-month anniversary of the quake that brought all of us together and Amy had been here since the beginning. She was Peace Corps Volunteer who had already been working in the area for 2 years prior and experienced the before, during and after of the devastating 8.0 quake. She described walking in the streets a week after the quake and seeing the sad state people were in and how survivors just wandered around not knowing what to do “... and then HODR showed up…and volunteers started pouring in. I saw the hope in people’s eyes when they realized that the whole world was fighting for them.”

Amy’s goodbye was poignant and reminded all that were present what the point was… to help, to give hope and to do everything we can. Her words rang true to those here for one day and those who have committed til the end. Her words will stick with us as the whole world fights for Pisco.

at the beginning

from marc in bangladesh (who has crashed the UNICEF office to get decent internet access)

stef and i will leave tomorrow for our proposed area of operation. it is south and a little east of Bagerhat, the biggest nearby city. the closest communities are Morrelgonj, Rayenda, and Sarankhola. the spelling can vary because they have a character alphabet and the translations to a roman alphabet are not always uniform, so many of the maps and signs are not in agreement. there is no internet available in the sharonkhola area– there is no electricity or water for that matter! the water issue could be a major. the people here use ponds to collect water during the rainy season. they look like “the ole swimming hole” – but now, many have been contaminated by the storm and who knows what was in there anyway. even in the USA i am not too crazy about murky water…..in bangladesh it is downright scary! we may be forced to drill a “deep tube well”. in 4 days a crew of 20 guys can MANUALLY dig a 900 foot deep well! the output is sweetwater – clear, clean, drinkable! there are still many many details for us to work out. i will try and keep you posted as we have them sorted.

Bangladesh is a GO !... but why?

We decided yesterday to go forward with an HODR project in Bangladesh, and I thought it might be interesting to see "behind the curtain" at our decision process.
Our first criteria, before we send an assessment team, is to try to measure the extent of damage, normally using destroyed homes as a key parameter, in the context of what is the local/national response capability. So when the California wildfires destroyed about 3,300 homes, and local response was strong, we decided not to deploy. In Bangladesh, with about 600,000 homes destroyed, and an equal number damaged, that criteria was easily met. The response capability is heavily dependent on NGO's ( non-governmental organizations, like CARE, OxFam, Red Crescent, etc), who are present in-country to deal with ongoing humanitarian issues, partly in anticipation that having a base there will allow rapid scale-up in time of disaster. SaveTheChildren, e.g., had 200 staff on the ground in Bangladesh BEFORE the Cyclone, so they have equipment and local knowledge that is invaluable.
Next we seek an area where the damage is concentrated, so that volunteers can be effectively engaged over a 3-4 month period with minimal transportation needs. Travel in these areas is slow, expensive, and exhausting, and to the extent we can do good work in a tighter area we're better off, and so are our volunteers. Our Peru project combined tasks in the immediate vicinity of our Op Center with several remote projects, which helped in several ways: by rebuilding irrigation canals up toward the mountains we helped the farm community, but also took the load of 30 volunteers at a time off our cramped central facility.

Next we look for a physical location that could support an Op Center: water, power, kitchen, and space for 50-100 people at a time normal parameters. We can modify an existing facility with additional showers, tent out in open space, and make do with limited communications(internet access) capability, but all weigh in the decision process. Next is volunteer access; how will they get to us. In BD, with limited English speaking, congested traffic, etc we are looking for a location that may be accessible from the local ferry system. This may mean a 20 hour overnight ferry ride from the Dhaka port area, itself a 2 hour ride from the airport, but all in all reasonable, if you're sensible and patient.
Another key ingredient can be supportive NGO's, particularly if we've had a good prior experience; UNICEF, Salvation Army and others falling in to that camp. We anticipate a working relationship with SaveTheChildren, who have been very open and supportive during our assessment process.
Much of our motivation is volunteer driven: will they want to come here, and can we make it safe, and productive. We're learning that our ability to make the trip a bit less daunting can swing the decision to motivate volunteers to come, so we aspire to make our communication, and logistics, as dependable as possible, and to maintain a safe environment, given the often chaotic situations we drop into.
Perhaps foolishly our last concern is funding - we really do go a bit on the " if we go, they'll support us" approach. In Peru, e.g., we spent about $125K before going out funds seeking, but that allows us to show what we are doing. We're starting now, off the demonstrated success of Peru, to raise the $100K+ that BD will require, so if you have suggestions, thoughts, or donations, please write to me at david@hodr.org or donate on-line at www.hodr.org

Lastly, we need the leadership of the local team will organize and run the operation, in this case Marc Young and Stef Chang. They have been in a dozen different communities, always watching for the combination of needs and characteristics that can form the basis of a successful project. While we've made the decision to deploy, they will pick the location sometime over the next 1-2 weeks,

We know BD will be a challenge, and that mounting two projects simultaneously will stress all our capabilities, but we think we will learn a lot, and be able to pull it off.
Please tag along with us......

Observations on departing Dhaka

It's Friday afternoon, and I leave at 1:30 AM to start the 36 hour or so trip home. 

Dhaka is the capital, and the international airport city, with about 8 million inhabitants. When I arrived it seemed crowded, impossibly congested, chaotic - after having a week out in various other places (Barisal, Barguna, Pathakouli, Parghtakata) it seemed comfortable to come back! Amazing how we initially resist anything different, then accept it on some future interaction, often wondering why "it" ever seemed so strange. Whether it's a new person, ski hill, country, game, language ( OK, for me languages are never easy to come back to) it's often best to have at least a second chance to experience before setting opinions.

Bangladesh, being almost 90% muslim, celebrates the weekend on Friday/Saturday, and the quiet Friday allowed me to enjoy Dhaka as a more pleasant city. The people are helpful, curious ( staring at a stranger is considered good form, and any westerner  quickly draws a crowd just by being here), colorful- with beautifully colored saris worn in all parts of the country, always. And while many of the women wear full burkhas, and most at least a headress, I never sensed any female discrimination.

Corruption was a concern of mine, and it is much in the news here. A military government, with a Princeton PHD as CA Caretaker Advisor, has really cracked down. The heads of both major political parties, both daughters of former government leaders, are in jail awaiting trials, the mayors of several cities have been convicted and are serving time. The anti-corruption message has been ubiquitous in the discussions of disaster aid, now estimated at about $250 million, with $100 million from Saudi Arabia alone. The US has been most noticed with the support of helicopters from 2 ships offshore, ferrying relief supplies from major airport sites to remote villages. There is speculation re how soon the ships will leave, but it appears imminent as the food emergency supply chain seems to be getting in place. USAID is also a strong player, but normally through NGO's like SaveTheChildren.

It's so different being on site; you drop in to an organization like CARE or UNICEF, and strike a bond with the good people there immediately. Having connections from prior experiences " We worked with Cecilia from UNICEF in Peru, do you know her?" works wonders. Deservedly so. This is a people business, in every aspect. And since we need help with language here, also, great to have used our own network, with volunteers connecting the dots to get us to the right place, and people, directly.

Certainly there is substantial need here, though sometimes difficult to segregate the poverty from the disaster ( does it matter?). One of the "discoveries" from the five other disasters where we've deployed is that they hurt the poor so much more than... others. Here, with an average ANNUAL income of $400, the impact is, well, total. Our volunteers would have a strong message to bring of compassion , and competence. It would be a challenging environment, and there is a strong and well organized response, but that is needed just to get clean drinking water and a survivable food quantity to people. There is no effort yet to repair schools, help with homes, clear the thousands of trees ( I don't think there is a chainsaw in the whole country). So we will assess several more communities, search for possible locations, and make a decision as directly  as we can.  Marc and Stef will stay here until a decision is taken, then stay if we decide to deploy.

Thanks for following along, and may I suggest you think about reallocating some part of the holiday gifting to some sweet people who have little to celebrate,  and could use a source of hope. www.HODR.org 

Ooops, the BanglaDitch!

Lots has happened in the last few days, some of it good. We travelled from Dhaka by overnite steamer, sort of a throwback, with a waterside deck cabin a whole $10 for the overnite 10 hour sailing. A bit chaotic getting through traffic to the ship, and discussing tickets, etc ( all signs in Bangla), but trip was fine, although arriving in a smaller city in the dark at 5 AM proved a bit challenging.

We've been off assessing multiple communities for damage, and to visit with NGO's, and local folks.

"Highlight" of the visit to Pathagharkata, during a walking tour from the village to some out homes, was my crash from the "log bridge" after the railing let go, plunging me about 8' into a nasty ditch, filled with.... well, let's just say a nasty ditch. After much scrambling, water splashing, etc I shed  my clothes to don the Bangladeshi style sari-for-men, called a lungi. Very stylish.

We've visited 3 areas in depth, seen half a dozen destroyed schools and hundreds of homes, and travelled hours over congested Bangla  roads; a mix of rickshaws, cars, trucks and buses that is  an event in itself.

Effective meetings with Unicef, SaveTheChildren, Koinonia, and other NGO's indicate there is plenty of need, but also a strong international response.

One observation from the trip is the extraordinary  success of the system of cyclone shelters that were built after the last major event, in 1991. That cyclone claimed over 140,000 deaths - the current toll for Sidr is about 4,000. Most people used the shelters, concrete reinforced, elevated buildings that can pack in about 1,000 people, and that are used as training schools or daycare in normal times.

It looks like I will cut my trip short to have some time at home to communicate our fund raising needs, if we deploy. We're getting very tight on cash, but this is a significant need, and I believe our volunteers would respond. Please be prepared  to help out!

Off to Barisal, in the cyclone impact zone..

If you're new to blogs, it's best to read from the "bottom up" since the prior postings constantly get pushed down in the stack, so the most recent is on top...

Marc Young and Stef Chang arrived midday yesterday, and after giving them A WHOLE DAY to recuperate we plan to start the trek down to Barisal, the major city in the impact area, midday.

I had gone out to the airport to greet them, but then got a call that I had an opportunity to meet with a prominent Dhaka businessman, Samson Chowdhury, so I bailed from the airport and "dashed" 50 minutes, across teeming Dhaka. Think of NYC (or Manila,Phnom Penh), but with a mix of rickshaws,( manually pedalled bicycle frontend with a two person seat behind), CNG's, (motorbike gadgets ( fueled with compressed natural gas, hence the name) with little seats, but lots of flexibility to weave in the traffic), baby-taxis, which are minivans you hop off  and on and pay about .20/mile, and then full size buses, and some regular cars. Blaring horns, kids selling and begging in the clotted traffic, visual overload, but it all, eventually, works.

Mr Chowdury, who shares a birthdate with my wife ( thank you, Zoominfo.com) is Chairman of the Square Group of companies, which is the major conglomerate in BD. Properties include the largest pharma company, a beautiful and modern 350 bed hospital, banks,IT company,  etc - but a pleasant, warm,  active and effective man in his early 80's ! Oh, and his son is head of the government disaster management agency, so hopefully a useful visit.

When I returned to the hotel met with Marc and Stef, happy their grueling travel from Peru through New York ( for the BD visa) and Finland, India, to BD, finally completed. Great to have them here, since they immediately go into "..how do we do it..." mode, like figuring out how we'd tell volunteers how to travel, get visas, change currency, etc. We had an early dinner with a friend from a major UK humanitarian donor, TEAR Foundation, that I had met earlier at the hotel - he's here helping launch education programs for the hill tribes up near Bhutan.

This morning we'll have breakfast with the country director of SaveTheChildren , then introduce Marc and Stef to Dr Datta of Konoinia, then start our drive down toward Barisal.

Although there is an airport there the commercial flight traffic is shut down, and the driving trip south requires a ferry crossing, with the last ferry at 3 PM, so we've decided to get part way and spend the night enroute, somewhere. Our version of "a plan".

Two plus weeks after the event, and the international response, and local concentration, indicated that this is an extraordinary event, even by Bangladesh standards. The Bangladesh people we've met have been competent, caring, and considerate. We'll soon learn what life is like where the cyclone hit.

A friend from USAID who is down in Barisal located a place we think we can stay, and advised that the needs are great, and security seems OK, so we'll get there and start doing a look-around.

Very unsure what my internet access will be, but will post again as soon as I can.

End of first day, and we're off and...talking

As much as could be hoped for, and maybe more. A visit with the USAID office in the US Embassy yesterday  afternoon ( Hands On is an authorized recipient of funds from USAID, an option we have chosen to not yet pursue) gathered several useful contacts, so I had dialogue today with someone heading down to SIDR-land tomorrow, and an extended meeting with Dr Dennis Datta,  the head of a local NGO called Koinonia, who had been down to see the needs first-hand, and has opened his organization to help us in many ways. He was referred to us by Rachel Peletz, a friend of our Stefanie Chang, and I believe will become an effective ally.

I also spoke with the country director of SavetheChidren, and he was coming to the local hotel I'm staying at to greet 2 new arrivals for his NGO, so we'll all have breakfast together tomorrow morning, Saturday. That's the way it goes, in terms of people helping with connections, and giving great immediate and straight information... things that just wouldn't happen from a distance. When you're HERE, they know you're worth spending some time with. Soon, HERE will mean down in the disaster zone, but I'm starting to gather information on that. A prime spot might be Barunga, but normal means of transport would be a 12 hour ferry ride from Dhaka. Another candidate is Barisal, closer to the only southern commercial airport in "the zone".

By all measures, and coverage, this is the worst natural disaster here in 16 years, and since they are used to recurring nasties, that's saying a lot. 

The food ramifications are staggering. Rice is the bulk of their diet, and the crop is estimated to be 80% destroyed; it was about a month short of harvest time. Also, there won't be any seedlings ( a byproduct of the harvest) to plant for next years crop, without special imported assistance. World Food Program, WFP, just announced they will provide enough food for 2.2 million people for 6 moths, which is great, but demands major new logistical issues.  Water remains a problem, since the 15 foot storm surge contaminated most wells, etc etc.

It feels like there is broad demand, and cooperation available. I'm looking forward to having Marc and Stef arrive tomorrow, and we'll all be fully engaged, maybe after they have a nap. They've endured five days of constant travel from Pisco, Peru to Dhaka, with convenient stops in places like NYC, Helsinki, Mumbai....

Thanks for tagging along with me, and I'll try to add more about BD (Bangladesh) as we go.

For some simple stats, it's a country of 150 million people, and Dhaka has 7 million inhabitants, the metropolitan area 12 million. When India was given independence in 1947 the muslim areas were partitioned off into 2 separated geographic areas, West Pakistan and East Pakistan, with a 1,000 mile long chunk of India between them. That didn't work out, and E Pakistan broke away and became Bangladesh in 1971, the name being the Bangla language version of Bengal, as in the Bay of Bengal, from whence come the cyclones. The country has a fascinating and complex history, best understood with a solid read at our favorite source, www.wikipedia.com .

On the ground (finally) in Dhaka, Bangladesh

As expected, the trip was NOT uneventful. Flight to London on AA was fine, and I think I bagged a new HODR donor; will watch to see if JT from Netezza comes through!

Then switched to Virgin Atlantic for the overnight London to Delhi; and decided to personally pick up the cost of upgrading to "premium economy" , somewhat of an oxymoron, but I was trusting in the "virgin brand". Was settled, bugged twice by the airline crew to show my boarding pass, - then moved to "Upper Class" HODR karma, or just the result of a pleasant chat with the folks at checkin, or maybe being a brand new Virgin Club member ( probably a good quip in there somewhere). At any rate, this got me a laydown seat, andbetter wine... oh, this disaster life.

This benefit was quickly offset when my third leg flight, Delhi to Dhaka, went through stages of delay-cancel-resched 12 hours-later,  all of which gave me a 21 hour stay in the very unglorious "transit lounge" at the Delhi airport (think '50's era linoleum, chairs, etc). I guess there opening a new international airport next year, so this one clearly hasn't received any upkeep.

Anyway, made it to Dhaka, our friends at CARE had recommended a nice local hotel, the Lake Castle  ( maybe the Pond Commercial Building" would have been more appropriate, because you could almost jump across the lake... but it's nice, clean, and I got a good night's sleep.

Have to run to a meeting, things are going well on the cooperation front, and I have a meeting with the head of a local NGO just back from the frontlines....

Departing for Bangladesh

My return to the blogosphere, after a 2 year absence For those of you interested in seeing archival blogs of my initial January, 2005 trip to Thailand in the wake of the tsunami ( maybe I should rethink that phraseology) the address is http://dncthailand2005.blogspot.com/ ;

after we launched our Katrina project I started
http://dnc-handsonusa.blogspot.com
but frankly haven't kept up since.

We've had great projects in Jogjakarta, Indonesia, and San Isidro, Philippines, both ably led by Marc Young. Although I participated in both ( got to keep my perfect record intact) Marc was clearly the prime mover, though as always the volunteers become the projects owners.

Looking back, in the Spring of 2007, I thought we had accomplished a lot, and proven the concept that if you make it easy for people to help one another, they'll do it. Recognizing this wellspring of untapped energy, and a strong personal belief that individuals sacrificing personally to help others has a special value, we decided to scale up Hands On.

A round of solicitation to a group I've dubbed the SuperFriends, who basically agreed to underwrite $200K in annual expense to cover 3-5 Operations Directors, and a Communications/FundRaising specialist, was completed over the next few months, and in the summer we added a third Operations Director, Bill Driscoll, Jr, and Paula Ogletree as Communications Director. This allowed us to have a stronger upfront message when we decided to deploy to Peru, and the additional exposure, and a well run project, brought over 300 volunteers within the first 3 months of operation - a phenomenal outpouring, and a powerful force in that recovering community.

We did assessments of several situations, a tornado in Kansas, the wildfires in California, and the serious flooding in Mexico in November, 2007, but felt they weren't "quite right".
Cyclone Sidr hit Bangladesh on November 15th, and caused devestation that matched Katrina in terms of houses destroyed. It's a challenging place to consider a project, since we can only be effective where volunteers want to be, so the outcome is uncertain. But with our expanded strength, and Peru in solid shape, it seems time to "take a look" at what we know will be a challenge.
I leave tomorrow at 9 AM, from Boston to London to Delhi to Dakha, arriving 27 hours later. Marc Young and Stef Chang will arrive, from Peru, about two days later. They are prudently doing the stop-in-NYC to get a Bangladesh visa approach, I'm trying the unapproved "visa on arrival" technique, which may become the "sorry, NO visa on arrival"... sort of like Charlie on the MTA for you Boston/Kingston trio fans.

I'm a bit nervous, but believe, as always, that we'll learn some useful things. And meet some new people. And hopefully allow more wonderful volunteers to do their thing.

Stay tuned

David Campbell Nov 26th, 2007