Sumbangsih Nuansa Lamno
first in,
last out...
A Brief History
Few hearts were left untouched by
the scenes of devastation emerging from Aceh at the beginning of
2005.
Working with YPB,
Millennium Relief and Development
Services was able to quickly send a number of volunteers to Aceh. Recognizing from the start that we did not have the capacity to
engage in the wide-scale relief work that was desperately
needed, we began by offering our services to other international
NGOs. MRDS volunteers served as translators for some of the
first medical teams to go into the local city of Lamno, and one of those same
volunteers now lives with his family there, employed by MRDS and
working with SNL.
2005 has been a long year
during which we have not been able to do as much as we would
have liked. Nevertheless, we also recognize that our role is
very different from that of larger relief agencies. Now that
the flood of aid has passed, there are just a handful of
agencies left behind working in Lamno. As far as we know, we are the only one with
a vision to be there even after the 'tsunami funds' have dried up.
In line with our work in
Tasikmalaya and Madura, our long term plan is establish an
authentically Acehnese – (even “Lamno-ese”) NGO, staffed
largely by local people but including enough Indonesians from
different backgrounds to ensure a pluralistic make-up. The
thirty years of what would be seen here as 'occupation' by the
Indonesian military has bred distrust and antipathy towards
other Indonesian ethnic groups, particularly those from Java. We
hope to change that by seeing people from a multiplicity of
backgrounds working together.
We have been able to recruit
expatriates who have now all relocated to the area, along with, in most cases,
their families. Some of
these persons have already lived in Indonesia for many years, while others
have significant experience working in development programmes in other countries. The challenges
of recruiting a team of four different nationalities, possessing appropriate experience in Indonesia or elsewhere, securing
visas, moving families, has all taken its toll - but we are now in
position to 'kick-in', as it were, and the nascent programmes that
we have begun are beginning to gather momentum.
We recruited our first Acehnese
workers by way of early co-operative efforts with another international NGO
- thereafter, four of these staff travelled down to Tasikmalaya
in order to learn from the
staff of SNT; this extended over a period of two months. We feel we are just now
'hitting our stride' as we begin to
involve local communities in a variety of projects. We seem set to recruit many more staff as these programmes expand, and it
is they who will draw in members of the local communities as we
work together to learn what they need – what they feel is
important.
You can read a brief synopsis of
our programmes here, but check
back in a few weeks or months for some more news.
