Apa Kabar (how are you?)...I made it after a long, long trip. 1.5 hours to SF, 13 hours to Taipei, 4 hours to Jakarta, hours to Medan, and 1.5 hours to Banda Aceh, and that doesn't include the many hours in between - I'm a long ways from home. I arrived last night, and made it to Karla's family's house by 11:30 pm. Believe it or not, I was up at 7 am to get ready for work, and to work by 8.
Karla wasn't kidding with prayer call being loud. It started at 5 am. They must live right by the mosque. I could sleep through it if it were consistent, but it stops and starts for about a half hour.
I've met lots of people here at Mercy Corp's office in Banda Aceh (8 or so of which are American). In fact, I've already been on a site visit to the beach area that will be one of my primary projects for the next 4 weeks. There are so many small projects that I could work on, 105 going right now, all of which need to be designed and constructed by the end of the year. Each of the 40 villages has come up with their own planning priorities for which they will receive money from Mercy Corps to construct. Each has also come up with a concept plan.
The projects I will work on include conducting a community vision and master plan for a small scale beach resort that will provide the community with economic development / job creation. From what I understand the program will include a kitchen and cashier where families can order food to be delivered to 10-15 person open but sheltered beach bungalows. They are intended to be non-overnight - I need to follow up with this. There are some religious based concerns driving this which is tricky. They don't want to encourage non-married couples, but what about families and tourists...hm. I will meet with the community group and discuss the program more.
They also want to design a standard store module (like a pod) that is unique and improved for Mercy Corps. This is one of the other village's priorities so that MC funds would pay for the first one, and then other modules would be connected next to and above the structure. They are little spaces for retail shops, called Tokos.
I will also look at land entitlement, but only for my last 1 to 2 weeks towards the end of my stay. There seems to be a lot of talented locals working here, including civil engineers and an architect - from what I understand, it is the creativity component that could use some help from me...just saying "what about this". I'm officially part of the Engineering and Construction division.
Everyone was on vacation last week to celebrate the end of Ramadan. From what I understand it was a bit slow last month, but that everyone is ready to work now. My timing is good.
I went to lunch and had rice and veggies - well, I picked out the meat. I guess I may have a hard time here as a vegetarian. Maybe I'll lose a few pounds...maybe I'll just end up eating too much rice. I brought a box of protein bars with me. I also had watermelon juice. It was less than $3.
A MC driver picked me up at the airport, along with MC's Aceh Director (Rod) who was on my flight, last night and took me to Karla's house. Karla and her 5 year old son were asleep. He is very cute (and not 8 like I thought, though he was thrilled with the robot toy Steve got). Karla's Italian husband, Sandro, is nice. They have a nice house with tile floors and tall ceilings. The bathrooms, however are quite rustic, although they do have real toilets, just no sinks. I brush my teethe and spit onto the floor and wash it down the drain. There is no mirror. It'll probably be good not to look at myself for 2 months.
Karla said it's a good idea to use a mosquito net. Emily, an American civil engineer sitting next to me, currently has dengue fever. Apparently this is more common than malaria and the season is just starting. Emily said I will see dengue mosquitoes, they are black and white. Good thing Steve bought me a mosquito net, which I swore I wouldn't need.
Karla has a vespa that I can use, or I can call a MC driver during the week, day or night, for free. But it might be more convenient and fun for me to scoot around. She said there are no rental bicycles. I can't exactly get a driver and have him wait in the car as I go eat dinner and shop and look around.
Everyone is really nice and I'm excited to be here. I've already seen quite a bit today just from being able to talk to the English speaking MC staff and going with them to this site.
This is what's happening for now...
The photos are of the beach resort site, taken earlier today on a site visit. It's about a 20 minute drive from Banda Aceh. The entire village, except for the mosque, was wiped out in the tsunami.
