Dateline ACT

South & south east Asia/Indonesia 10/05

Children of the tsunami in Indonesia write to children of Hurricane Katrina in the USA

During a recent visit by communicators from ACT members to a village in Meulaboh district where YTBI, an ACT member in Indonesia, is working in response to the tsunami, children in the village were told about Hurricane Katrina, a huge disaster that recently hit the southeastern part of the United States. When asked what they would say to children in the United States who had been affected by a massive disaster like they had been several months before, the Indonesian children offered to write letters to their counterparts.

The greetings from two of these children in Indonesia are reproduced below. Note that they have been translated from their native Indonesian language to English.

Background on Dila and Neni, authors of the two letters

Dila and Neni are two girls who live in the neighorhood of YTBI’s working group relief center in Meulaboh, Aceh Barat. After the tsunami, a few children saw that there was mineral water available at the relief center, so they came and asked for some. That was the beginning of the relationship between the children in Suak Seunebok and YTBI’s working group.

One of the volunteers for the YTBI working group is a teacher. Before school opened after the tsunami, he gathered the children and taught them to sing and write. Even after starting school, they still enjoyed coming to the relief center in the afternoon. Sometimes they brought their assignments from school and worked on them in the relief center with guidance from the volunteers.

Icut, a volunteer who joined the YTBI working group in August, likes to dance, so she is teaching some of the girls how to dance, including Dila and Neni. Now the girls always want to perform every time guests come to the relief center.

When they heard about Hurricane Katrina, they were very concerned. So they wrote a letter to be sent to children in the USA. They wrote poems to be sent with the letters because they believe that is the only gift they are able to send.

Letter from Dila, 10 years old

Greetings to my friends in America:

Dear friend, how are you? I hope you can always be tough in facing all troubles.

Friend, I’m sad because it has not been long since the disaster I experienced, and then I heard there was a disaster in your country.

I hope all of you there will always be strong and patient. Everything’s going to be OK.

My kind and sweet friend, I cannot give you anything to help you, because I am still receiving assistance from foreign countries to continue living, including your country. But I wrote you a poem [see below]. Hopefully reading it will make you smile and cheer you up.

Hopefully you will keep on smiling.

Regards from your friend

Dila

Letter and poems from Neni Nasita
School: MTsN model MBO-1
Class: II
Location: Meulaboh, lr. Beurambang

To my friends in America:

Greetings to friends in America. Please accept our condolences for what has happened to you. We have experienced the same thing.

Nothing special we can give to you since we’re only children. Our parents probably would not allow us to go there because we are poor.

With this disaster, you must be tough and patient, and hopefully you still can pray for us who are affected by the tsunami.

How are you there? Hopefully you’re getting better. Only pray that we can say to God so you can be strong, patient and tough in facing the disaster. There must be a blessing in disguise.

To my kind friends, even though we have different religions, we are all human beings, so can I be friends with you without caring about our different religions?

This [poem - see sidebar below] is the only thing I can give you. Hopefully it can cheer you up, and hopefully someone will reply to my letter! OK!

Signed by:
Neni Nasita
Meulaboh: 9-9-2005

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