Homegrown Help

In any disaster relief scenario, my experience has been that people in the affected country band together, and help each other. The ongoing crisis in Myanmar is no exception:

Rangoon travel agent Chin Chin used to take tourists to a nearby Irrawaddy delta town famous for its pottery. But the vast waterworld of rivers and rice fields that stretched beyond it was a foreign land to her until Cyclone Nargis and its horrific aftermath. On Thursday, Chin Chin and her friends bought rice and water, loaded it on a truck, and drove deep into the delta. She was shocked by what she saw: roads lined with hundreds of cold and hungry villagers, disregarded by their own government, who had walked for an hour from their broken villages to beg from passing motorists...

The monks are also on the move again. Buddhist temples and monasteries have always played a central role in helping the needy in Burma (as, in this religiously and ethnically diverse country, have churches, mosques and Hindu temples). After the cyclone, monks led small-scale relief efforts into the delta, the distinctive multicolored flags of their faith fluttering from cars and small trucks. Monks from well-known monasteries in Mandalay and elsewhere in Burma are either in the delta or heading there, while in Pakkoku - the Irrawaddy town near Mandalay where last year's protests originated - their brethren are reportedly soliciting donations for cyclone victims. Shwe Pyi Hein Monastery, which already runs a free clinic in Rangoon, has dispatched five volunteer doctors to the disaster area, who are treating more than 100 people every day.

Despite the participation of thousands of Burmese, the impact of this homegrown relief effort will always limited, admits Zaganar. "We deliver our supplies by road because we cannot afford a boat," he says. "But most victims live close to the water. We cannot get through to them." He says Burma desperately needs more boats and helicopters from abroad...

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina on the U.S. Gulf Coast, it wasn't the U.S. government that was first on the scene. Private citizens and non-organized church groups in nearby non-affected areas were the first into the devastated region with supplies, boats, and medical assistance. It shouldn't be terribly surprising that those in Myanmar who could help their fellow citizens were the first to mobilize, and work their own internal networks. Where networks don't exist, they're improvising and working around government restrictions.

Know of any success stories? Drop me an email and I'll post them...