Monthly Archive for January, 2007

On Progress of Sri Lanaka School Project Buy maxalt mlt 10 mg

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Dear Friends,

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I would like to update you with the current status of our Sri Lanka school project. We are working hard but our progress has been slow. Our work has been hindered mainly by recent escalation of the war. Other NGOA?a??a??s are experiencing similar problems.

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As you know, we have two groups of friends, one group in Germany and one group in the USA working to raise funds to help the community in Panama to build a school.A?A?A?A? Panama is located in the east cost of Sri Lanka where the Tsunami damage was the largest. This area is also effected by the ethnic conflict dragging on for over 20 years.

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By May of 2006, we had raised about $39,000. Our German group received about $35,000 for the project ; $25,000 from Hamburg Hilft, $10,000 from Stern magazine, and $1000 from other small donations. We all are grateful to immense efforts by Thomas and the German group. The US groups has raised about $3000 from small donations. This money will be spent for the building construction.

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We are working with the Sri Lankan volunteer organization SUCCESS based in Kandy, Sri Lanka.A?A? Our goal is to bring the multi-ethnic community in Panama together. We want to provide the funds. Sri Lanka people must do the work. Most NGOA?a??a??s send paid employees to Sri Lanka and manage their work themselves. We believe that it is often counter productive. In this war torn part of the country, getting the local people together and getting them to do the work is not easy. It takes longer but we believe that it will serve the local community better in the long run.A?A?A?A?

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I went to Sri Lanka in March, 2006. I visited Panama with our friends from SUCCESS. We discussed our plans with teachers, students and the parents. On our request, they formed a Parent Teacher Association (PTA) representing all ethnic groups. They requested our help to build a school for English medium science and language education. We all agreed that this is a prime opportunity to promote peaceful ethnic coexistence because students from all three ethnic groups who speak Sinhala and Tamil can attend this school. Education department is actively working on establishing English medium schools in the country but making virtually no progress in rural areas.

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Panama is one of the poorest communities and almost isolated from the rest of the country. Often during the monsoon season, Panama can only be reached by boats. We could have worked much easier and faster in other parts of Sri Lanka. But Panama is one of the communities our support would be most meaningful.

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We donA?a??a??t want our support to be a free hand out. The people in Panama would like to give back to the people who help them. In order to facilitate this we want to connect this school to two schools, one in Germany and the other in USA. This will enable students and teachers in all three countries to work and learn together. Our friends working in this project are all different in ethnicity, religions, and social backgrounds. We want to show people in Panama, specially the children, that, if we can come together to help them, they can do the same.

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When we were ready to start our project in July 2006, unfortunately, the war between Sri Lanka armed forces and LTTE broke out in the entire eastern part of the country. Traveling in and out of Panama became almost impossible. Telephone communication was shut off during major military operations. Different political groups are actively working to foment communal unrest. Civilian killings and abductions have become a common occurrence.

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War and difficulty in communication has been the main obstacle for us. But we are moving forward, slowly but persistently.

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PTA has got a piece of land allocated for the school. Getting the land for multi ethnic purpose was a major accomplishment. People risk their lives and fight on ethnic lines for land in this part of the country. Actually, the war is about the land. Most people donA?a??a??t realize.A?A?

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PTA has got building plans approved by the education department. This is not an easy task for the people in Panama because education department is so inefficient. It sounds crazy, but if you are a foreign national from a rich NGO, it is much easier to work with bureaucratic machine in Sri Lankan government.A?A?

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I have to mention about the help we got from Julie Hollen. Most of you already know Julie from her e-mails and reports. She stayed with the family of one of the teachers in Panama. She switched the field work of her masters program to help our school project.A?A? She got the computer room at Panama school up and running. She also helped PTA as the messenger between Panama school and education ministry in Colombo. She was working to start a student news paper and a series of town hall meetings to educate people about our project when she had to leave Sri Lanka Order zestoretic 20 in August because of the war. She now lives in Anchorage, Alaska and continues to help us.

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We are close to getting an Internet connection to Panama school. This is essential and very important before we start the actual building construction. Our main difficulty was to figure out the available technologies and an affordable and reliable Internet Service provider. The connections must be made via satellite services (VSAT) because there are no land communication lines in this part of the country. Julie helped us to figure out the details of how to get the Internet connection. The US group at the moment is working hard to raise $5000 needed for the equipment and installation cost. We hope to get it done as soon as the war situation subsides.

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So whatA?a??a??s up next?

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The top priority is to get the Internet connection up and running. PTA and SUCCESS have been working together to choose the best affordable construction company.A?A? SUCCESS will send us the building plans, cost estimates and other necessary documents before the construction contract is granted. We will review all the documents and make them available on our web site. We plan to divide the construction process to number of stages and transfer the money for each stage. This will allow us to evaluate and mange the funds properly.

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This process is difficult and slow. It is frustrating at times. But it forces us to communicate with each other and share our ideas to find solutions.

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We have been able to overcome every challenge that we had faced. The war in the east seems to be ending. We have a lot of new friends in the US joining to help. We are optimistic.

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On behalf of everyone, I ask for your understanding, patience, and continuing support. Together, we can make it happen! For the education and for the children in all three countries!!

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Thank you.

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Sincerely,

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Sugat

sciensoul@yahoo.com

Angels at Arugam

A short video clip of a fishing boat trip in the famous Bay has been posted by the Engel family on You Tube.

Below is the link:
< http://youtube.com/watch?v=4UzrpDXX6gk> Tenormin 50 price

Mr Thevaraja’s wife and children live in eastern Sri Lanka

Thangaraja Thevaraja is sitting in his east London home wondering when he will next hear from his wife and three children in Sri Lanka. A former policeman in Batticaloa district, he was forced to leave his job by the Tamil Tiger rebels, who ordered all Tamils, the country’s ethnic minority, to quit the police and armed forces.

The 44-year-old fled to the UK in 2001 after being arrested by police on suspicion of supporting the rebels.

They are fighting for a separate homeland for the country’s 3.1m-strong Tamil population following decades of alleged discrimination by the majority Sinhalese.

But instead of things improving he had to watch from thousands of miles away as his home village Kallar, in Batticaloa, was wiped out by the tsunami in 2004, forcing his family to live in a temporary shelter ever since.

He has since learned that his nephew was abducted, and days later found dead, and that his 14-year-old son is now too scared to go to school.

Human rights groups have frequently criticised both rebels and government troops for carrying out abductions.

Mr Thevaraja cried as he recalled his infrequent, hurried conversations with his family.

“My son was so shocked by my nephew’s death that he refuses to step out of the house. My wife is also scared that he may be abducted,” he said in Tamil, speaking through a translator.

“I feel guilty and sad about leaving them there but I don’t know what to do. I might be arrested if I go back.”

Six years on he is still waiting for asylum to be granted before he tries to get the rest of his family over.

His is one of about 100,000 Sri Lankan Tamils living in London alone – with 5,000 settled in Newham, east London.

Many have similar stories to tell, but do not want to be named, fearing for their families’ safety in Sri Lanka.

An estimated 65,000 people have died in Sri Lanka’s civil war and the 2002 ceasefire between the government and the Tigers now seems to exist only on paper. More than 3,600 were killed last year and tens of thousands of civilians have been displaced during the recent violence.

My father’s house was in ruins, the roof and windows were falling off and I couldn’t find any of my friends Councillor Paul Sathianesan

Paul Sathianesan, a councillor in Newham since 1998, said he came to the UK as an asylum seeker in 1985 from the Jaffna peninsula to escape the violence.

He visited Jaffna in 2003 planning to help the local community, but was shattered to see the devastation caused by the conflict.

“My father’s house was in ruins, the roof and windows were falling off and I couldn’t find any of my friends.

“There was an air of emptiness and people looked grey, thin and scared.”

The expatriate community over the years has tried to invest in their former villages and cities but this has become very difficult.

Mr Vellupillai Bose, who owns an estate agency in East Ham, said he and 10 friends purchased land in the capital Colombo to build residential buildings but they had to abandon the project after the violence worsened soon after presidential elections in November 2005.

Police display posters of victims of gang violence in the area

“All clauses were finalised but things got worse after the elections. Now we have decided to sell the land. We can’t do business in this situation.”

He has taken his family to Colombo for vacations but he has not been able to visit Jaffna, his hometown, since 1998.

He fears the younger generation who were born and bred here will not be as attached to their homeland.

Arjuna Subramaniam, 21, acknowledges this.

I am aware of all the problems there but I can’t relate to it Arjuna Subramaniam

His parents follow news and politics closely as many of their relatives are still there, but he feels alienated.

Purchase pamelor 10 “I love the country and I loved the time I spent there on vacations.

“I am aware of all the problems there but I can’t relate to it. I have a different life here.”

The community, which has been dealing with the news of mounting violence in Sri Lanka, have been confronted with a new challenge closer home.

Tamil gangs

Since 2000 at least 10 people have been killed in gang-related incidents spurring the Metropolitan Police to set up a special task force, Enver, to tackle Tamil gangs and crime.

Mr Sathianesan recently held a public consultation – where police, youth and other local agencies were invited – to talk about an issue which was “damaging race relations and the image of the community”.

He hopes they will overcome the hurdle.

“The next generation shouldn’t be given hatred as heritage, we want to see them enjoy love, peace and safety.”

source:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6291009.stm

Wednesday, 24 January 2007

Here Endth the Marathon Blog Update

After a day or so there I flew back to Colombo on the red-eye and got in at 8.30 in the morning. I went to the office to check in and say hi, with the intention of leaving earlyish and heading for a nap. But of course that didnA?a??a??t happen, and I ended up in the office until dark. Joe was having a barbie that night, and as a there were a few guys going away I went up to his place and had a few beers, which stretched on a bit, as they do. So the drive back to the east the next day was a) later than planned; and b) much longer than planned (well it seemed that way anyway). Fergus was out here with the boss and some of the donors so we had dinner and then I crashed out for the night.

Since then itA?a??a??s been back to the grind, with lots to do including getting the office renovated, finding a suitable site for guesthouses (I found one next to the beach with a lovely coconut grove but the houses need a fair bit of work, but they do everywhere anyway). Christmas and New Year I spent in Arugam Bay, we worked through Christmas but had days off over New Year as it was Eid as well so I decided that would be a good time to shut down the site. Christmas and New Year were a blast, there were a few people around, mostly at a place just up the road called Beach Hut, so had a pretty good night both nights. Consequently I have placed myself on the wagon for a week or 2 although I am going to Colombo this weekend for a course, and Fergus, Mick etc are back so there could be 1 or 2 New Year beers next week too.

Christmas Tree, Tamil style…

Christmas Dinner prep

Purchase temovate generic Eating Christmas dinner

Dawn and Chandra giving Ranga (Beach Hut owner) his pressies

Christmas Sparklers

NYE Refreshments

A mad Irishman spinning a blazing coconut frond on NYE

I got back into some of the heaviest rain seen here in a while; 2 days after I arrived it absolutely pissed down for 2 or 3 days, and turned a lot of the roads in the area into rivers. There is a pretty serious drainage problem in Pottuvil as it turns out, and we might be able to line up another project to come up with some sort of master plan to fix it. The drainage from the last project mostly worked, with some issues, but then I donA?a??a??t think anyone was expecting the volume of water that came. One night we were coming back from the office when we had to cross an area with water above the hubs of the Patrol, and just after that there was a crocodile crossing the road in front of us! I was too slow on the camera to get it and Fergus wouldnA?a??a??t let me get out of the car to chase it down Steve Irwin stylezA?a??A?I found out that monsoon is actually just like anywhere else it rains a lot A?a??a?? wet and muddy A?a??a?? and really wasnA?a??a??t that exciting at all, more of a pain in the arse. However it has brought a lot of the wildlife out with heaps of birds and other animals coming back into view. We even passed some deer on the side of the road the other night too, and the elephants are on the move which makes night driving a bit more excitingA?a??A?But hopefully it has stopped now (for my sake, although the area needs more water) as our worksite was getting a bit inundated until the lagoon broke through the sand bar and drained some of itself into the sea. Pottuvil got it bad, but not as bad as some other areas in the south where there were landslide that killed 15 people or so and made around 60,000 leave their houses.

The main road out of Pottuvil

The main road north of Pottuvil

One of the culverts we built on the last project – we know it works!

IA?a??a??ve moved out of my almost-beach side house to the place down the road for a month or two, the lease was up on the house, we werenA?a??a??t sure if we wanted to keep it and the guys that are building the bridge here wanted it for office space so I decided to let it go. Bit of a bummer but the hotel is nice (if a little on the pricy side) but hopefully weA?a??a??ll get the guesthouses up and running before too long. IA?a??a??ve got a bit better internet now so you might be able to catch me on Skype once in a while to have a chat or even a bit of web-cam action if the connection is playing the game. So thatA?a??a??s it, well done if you made it to the end and now that IA?a??a??ve bought a small camera which is much more functional in terms of carriability (thatA?a??a??s not even a word) than my old one I might be able to bash out more photos tooA?a??A?Merry Christmas (belatedly) and Happy New Year to one and all, including Aza and Li who got married just before the new year in Sweden. Congrats.

Cheap rogaine foam for women Casting blocks

Blocks curing

The view from my balcony

I’ll post more on the recent happenings in Sri Lanka shortly – there has been a big upsurge in fighting (mainly on the east coast north of where I am) but also in the jungle in the area not too far from here. It hasn’t really affected me at all as I’m not working into those areas, but there have been reports of around 70,000 people leaving their homes to get away from the fighting.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

2004 Tsunami on Canvas

Purchase acivir 800 Fleur Childs is a young Australian artist who works in video, sculpture and painting. She was staying at Arugam Bay, a remote beach community on the east coast of Sri Lanka, when the Indian ocean tsunami struck. With her painting called Boxing Day, she relives her experience of surviving the Indian Ocean Tsunami on Boxing Day, 2004. (Illustration: Fleur Childs’ Website)

Posted by Michele at 10:03 AM Order bonnispaz A?A? A?A? Labels: theArts

http://micadz.blogspot.com/2007/01/2004-tsunami-on-canvas.html

In the Eye of the Tiger

Tuesday, 16 January 2007

(Our own correspondent informs us that Mr. Fraser seems to be a member of a totally new breed ofA?A? NGO workers, so far never observed in the Bay: Here is -at last- a man who seems qualified for the job, and more so: He is getting on with his given tasks! All the earlier E.N.J.O.Y.’s did was to waste donors cash..) This the main reason we decided to include Fraser’s personal account of his well earned break:

The bar under construction

Tin Smelter stuff

As luck would have it, when I got back I only had to survive a month before I got to take a whole month off, due to having to take the compulsory break between contracts that we have to do. In this time I spent about a week in Colombo, then 3 back out east getting survey started, and sorting out a yard and store room for the next project. This time we are going to construct about 8km of road, but mostly with hexagonal concrete pavers that we are making ourselves. We need to turn out something like 900,000 of these pavers, and will have around 300 people working on the casting site when it is fully operational.

So I left again, a bit disappointed that I would be missing the bulk of monsoon season (more on that later), and headed to Phuket to catch up with Spratty again, as he is living in a place called Rawai which is in the south of the island.

Thailand was a great laugh, the Thais are pretty cool people and always up for a beer and a few laughs. IA?a??a??d turned up on the same day as Kristy-Lee and her daughter (SprattyA?a??a??s girlfriend), so it was a bit of a tug of war between me and her for his attentions. I think I won out in the endA?a??A?Spent a fair bit of time on the piss with a couple of English guys that Spratty was mates with, so had a pretty good time but really needed a holiday after it. We went on a visit to the tin smelter that SprattyA?a??a??s old man runs (it was really hot around the furnaces, so I managed to sweat out the previous nightA?a??a??s folliesA?a??A?) then went fishing which was a bit of a disaster but was nice to see the island from a different perspective.

posted by Fraser @ 9:44 PM 0 comments links to this post

Mambo #5 (or Holiday #1)

Kottukal Road, completed

After being roundly harangued for not updating my blog more often (I didn’t realise I had such a big readership) while on holiday, I promptly left it for ages before updating…so IA?a??a??ve broken it down into bite-sized pieces. Good luckA?a??A?

In my last post I was enjoying the creature comforts of Hilton Colombo – big, comfy bed and a hot shower. I was there for about a week or so just tidying up the project stuff and getting everything together for the final claim. Got there in the end, and learnt some valuable lessons from that project. Went back to Arugam Bay for four days or so before going back to Colombo to go on leave to Australia, where I basically chilled out and caught up with friends in Bunbury. I went to the Royal Show in Perth for the first time, with Spratty and his kids. I also managed to catch up with the guys I used to play rugby with as they were having their end of year function the night before I left. I stayed at John and AngeA?a??a??s new place in suburbia, visited everyone at RoadCare (now SRS) but generally relaxed.

I nearly didnA?a??a??t make it on holiday with anything I owned, as the locals where I lived went a bit mad after 10 bodies were discovered in the jungle not too far south of Arugam Bay. They were all Muslim, and had gone to repair an irrigation reservoir and didnA?a??a??t come back. Most people blamed the Special Task Force (STF), the paramilitary Police, as there had been some sort of tension previously. They decided to protest and riot, and consequently UN security wouldnA?a??a??t let me go there to get some clothes to take away, even after it had all calmed down. But thatA?a??a??s another story. I managed to send my driver with another vehicle, and he basically gathered up everything I owned (except the fridge, but that was probably the only thing he left behind) so at least I could pack some clothes to take with me.

posted by Fraser @ 9:28 PM 0 comments links to this post

Monday, 11 September 2006

Friday, 28 July 2006

Duck…

Can’t believe it’s been 2 weeks since I posted. Oh well…I am going through another maddening phase at work, with so much to achieve last week but then being distracted by a million other things and not really achieving much at all.Last Monday I was lucky enough to get delayed at site in Pottuvil in the morning. I say lucky because there was a bit of fighting near to the office, with a stray bullet leaving it’s mark on the wall of the building. Not a very impressive hole, but it made me think about speeding up construction of the safe room/bunker…If I had left Pottuvil when I planned I would have pretty much driven right into the thick of it.

On Wednesday I went to Ampara town for the security meeting, and I managed to stock up on bacon, sausages and lamb chops for a fry up on the weekend. It’s been a while since I got to eat bacon so I was pretty excited. After sourcing a gas bottle on Sunday morning it was full steam ahead. Tim came over and joined me (he works for the company that is managing the funding of the project) and we enjoyed an English breakfast. Buying a fridge is turning out to be a great idea, not only can I store meat for weekend brekky but I can keep my water and vodka cold, essential in this sort of climate. I also had a water filter delivered, so once I get that plumbed in and find out if it will clean up the well water, then I can get a hot water heater. HOT SHOWERS, YAY! So the house is developing nicely now. I also have a new neighbour (well, kind of). Relief International have their office next door, and Chandra has arrived from Pakistan to work for them.

When I was in Ampara I also bought a great framed poster – it was in a barber shop that I have been to 3 times now over the past few months. When I went the first time I saw it and thought that I had to have it, no matter what the cost. I guess I’m still overpaid. Anyway, the first and second times I went there they wouldn’t sell it to me, but this time a different dude was there and he would. He wanted 1,300 Rupees for it (US$13) which is a bargain as I was prepared to pay a lot more just to have it. Here is a picture, and I’m sure you’ll understand why I wanted it so much. The guys in the shop thought I was mad, but I’m not sure if they thought I wanted a “do” like the dudes on the poster.

“New Hair Cutting Styles” – Check out the dude at the bottom centre and right. Yeah!

Some USAID guys also came on Wednesday and wanted to visit the site on Thursday morning, but they were late and I ended up waiting around for them for 45 minutes, so didn’t make it to the office until 12. So pretty much I lost 2 days in total this week when I really needed it most. However they were pretty impressed with what was going on and want to give us more money to build more roads in the area so that is a good result.

Thursday and Friday I managed to stay up far too late (Friday especially, which made my 2 hour car ride on Saturday morning very taxing). There are a few more people floating around Arugam Bay at the moment, but I don’t know how long that will last. There has been a lot of bombing around Trincomalee, over the Tigers cutting off an irrigation channel which feeds tens of thousands of people’s farms. So the government responded by bombing the crap out of them, then at last report the Army were advancing on the sluice gate to open it up again, but the LTTE were standing their ground and fighting back. Not a good sign for the ceasefire, which is pretty much done for now. It looks like things are rapidly heading for open warfare again, which won’t do anyone any good. Watch this space.

In other news, two of the places where I had projects in Kandahar were overrun by the Taliban, then taken back by the International forces, and Sogol informed me today that another place got the crap bombed out of it. Kandahar seems to have skeleton staff at the moment, so I’m not sure what I’d be up to if I was still there. To be honest I’d rather not know, give me the beach any day.

posted by Fraser @ 12:43 PM 0 comments links to this post

Wednesday, 12 July 2006

Ahh, a weekend

My house in Arugam Bay

The beach in Arugam Bay, looking southThe golf course, towards the dam, from the hotel balcony

I just had a very good weekend. Not only did I manage to get pretty much 3 days off (it was a long weekend anyway), but I ate bacon, a big steak, had a hot shower, drove for more than 10 minutes (it was hard work though), corrected my golf swing and got drunk twice. Huzzah!

I went to Colombo on Thursday – took about 8 hours to drive 300 km – and went out with Fergus, Mick and his girlfriend Naoise (I think that’s how it’s spelt – sounds like Neesha, damned Irish) and got horribly drunk, making it home at about 3 the next morning. So work was pretty much a write off for that day, I made it to the office at about 1pm then left at 3 to go and open a bank account. As I’m not from Colombo no-one really missed me, so it was all OK.

On Saturday Fergus and I drove to Kandy, which is up in the hills and about 100km from Colombo. But it took almost 4 1/2 hours to get there, due to everyone in Colombo also heading to Kandy for the long weekend. And Sri Lankan drivers are stupid and dangerous, so there was much cursing and wailing and gnashing of teeth until I actually accepted the fact that they have no idea what they are doing and to be ready for any sort of stupidity, no matter how amazing.

On the way we stopped in at a place with cane furniture for the house, and bought a couch/2 chair/coffee table set plus a couple of lounger chairs which are mighty comfy on the porch. And cheap too. Although we looked like a bunch of gypsys driving around with the back of the pickup stacked up with furniture.

We stayed at a golf course complex on the shores of Lake Victoria (behind a dam) which includes many chalets, “guesthouses” and private houses that you can rent. Anywhere else in the world you’d probably pay thousands of dollars for a night in a place like that, but we were paying about $50 per night.

I got a golf lesson and fixed my grip which made things much better, next time I go back I’ll get my swing tweaked then after a few rounds I’ll be off to join the PGA…We played a round on Sunday which was probably better than the last one I played (god only knows when that was). We had to tip the caddys and the ball spotter dude a fair bit though as we took a fair while to get around and the ball finder spent more time off looking for balls (mostly Fergus’, I might add) than spotting on the fairways.

Sunday night we went to “The Pub” – billed as the only place in town to be, which it pretty much is – and watched the World Cup final which was a pretty good game after all the beer we drunk. Rolled out of there around 2.30am for a half hour plus Tuk-tuk ride back to where we were staying which was great fun.

Monday was a bit of a write off with hangovers and some outstanding work pressing, although Fergus managed to get in some time on the driving range. Tuesday we drove back to Arugam Bay via Ampara for a meeting. The first 60-odd km took around 2 hours – the road was over a “mountain” range (not sure if they were mountains or large hills) so was pretty narrow and twisty (including the section with 17 hairpin bends) but it was nice to have a decent drive, even though I was a bit stiff from the golf and having to work the clutch so much didn’t help. The road after that was pretty good, by Sri Lankan standards.

Fergus has been here the rest of the week and is leaving tomorrow. We have been putting together a proposal for another road which will be around $1 million and pretty much outside my front door if we get it which will be good. Hopefully the donors approve the money. Also a fridge arrived from Colombo yesterday so I will do some shopping over the weekend to fill it up with stuff that I couldn’t keep at the house before – milk, cheese and most importantly beer. Next time I go up to Ampara I will buy some other home comforts such as a toaster. I’ve also got our guys in Colombo finding me a water filter to filter out all the sand and stuff that comes from the well – once they get that I can get a water heater and start having hot showers. I’d forgotten what they were like!

Work is pretty much under control now, I might even get to take a week off in August which will be nice. The claim for the month of June, where we spent only around $100k, currently runs to 4 lever-arch files, which is completely rediculous and I’m glad I’ve only got 2 more to do, although I’m sure they will be even bigger again.

Fraser’s original blog is on:
http://intheeyeofthetiger.blogspot.com/