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