A Trip Report by Ted Kuepper, Executive Director of Global Water

  I arrived two weeks after the tsunami smashed into the Indonesian coast in the Province of Aceh. I then spent the next two weeks living in one of the many encampments that had developed just outside the city of Banda Aceh, the Provincial Capital. As many now know, Aceh is located in the extreme northern region of Sumatra, one of the island nations of Indonesia. It is this area that bore the brunt of the tsunami because the epicenter of the earthquake that spawned the deadly waves occurred just west of this region. Because of the direction of the earthquake, the maximum force was emitted towards the east and west from the epicenter. Although damage occurred to the north of the earthquake's epicenter (such as in Thailand), it was the Aceh Province of Indonesia, directly east of the quake's epicenter, that received the maximum force and height of the tsunami waves and it is the people of Aceh Province that now bear the brunt of the resulting damage.

Here is my trip report –

The Waves

   As was described to me by a local Aceh resident that lived through the disaster, an initial 30 foot wave hit the coast in the Aceh area about 30 minutes after the 9.0 earthquake struck. This wave resembled a “shore break” type of wave in that it came inland and “broke” on the shore, perhaps 100 yards or so inland of the beach. For those who lived close to the water and observed this initial wave, this was the first indication that something was very wrong. It made many people get in their cars and onto motorbikes in order to leave the beach community. As you can imagine, this created an immediate traffic jam on the little two-lane road leading inland from the beach communities. Within 3 minutes the “second wave” hit Aceh. This second wave didn't resemble a conventional wave as did the first, but looked like an upwelling of the ocean 10 to 30 feet high; this wave had enormous power and traveled onto the beach and inland without stopping.

  In Aceh, this wave and subsequent waves that followed (perhaps as many as 10 total), traveled as far as 2 miles inland beyond the beach. This extraordinary distance is why the Indonesian communities had so much life lost compared to other SE Asian nations that were also affected by the tsunami. The ocean surged into the low-lying Aceh landscape much further than in most other countries. Those that were sitting in that traffic jam on that little beach road in Aceh could only look in horror as that second wave traveled towards them, completely engulfing everything in its path without ever stopping. Apparently for those who were there and living through this horror, it was difficult to comprehend that the wave was not going to stop. Many naturally expected it to stop at some point, but it didn't. It just kept traveling inland. For those on motorbikes, there was a mad dash over the land inland of the road towards precious little high ground. The lucky ones rode their motorbikes up the few hills that are near the beach just as the wave reached them. For those who tried to run from the wave or sat in their cars on that beach road that Sunday morning, there was no chance to escape.

  I want to relay one other story that speaks to the depth of the trauma that many Aceh residents were subjected to. One fisherman I met had been fishing the day of the tsunami. He estimates he was out to sea about one mile or so during the morning hours when the waves had to have passed him on their way to the Aceh mainland. He remembers hearing something “slapping” the bottom of his boat every so often during that morning, but he thought it was dolphins hitting the bottom of his boat with their fins as sometimes happened while he fished. This husband and father spent the entire day fishing as he routinely did without ever noticing that the small ocean swells that passed under his boat (perhaps only 3 feet in height that far out at sea) could hold such devastating power once they came close to shore. At the end of the day, this fisherman came back to the beach to go home to find his world completely upside down with no obvious explanation . There were no explosions or sounds of destructive power to hear out at sea. His wife and children and home and neighbors and community and everything else were no where to be found. He came back to complete destruction that was impossible to understand. It would take days for him to comprehend that a wave could create this inconceivable level of damage that no one could imagine. And it was caused by those little waves that passed under his boat on that Sunday morning.

Devastation

The first thing that hit me when I arrived in Aceh was the scope of the devastation; it was simply overwhelming. I couldn't comprehend, especially at first, the amount of damage that had occurred. Basically, every home and every building within 1 – 2 miles of the beach was destroyed for as many miles along the coastline as I could travel. Before the tsunami, the area just inland of the beach was occupied by hundreds of thousands of people and tens of thousands of small wooden homes located close to one another for as far as you could see. The homes were now all gone, as well as most of the people who once lived in those homes. When I arrived two weeks after the tsunami, all that was left was the remnants of those houses, countless thousands and thousands of wooden planks, broken tree trunks and debris of every kind scattered everywhere and all covered with thick mud.

   The estimate of people killed in Indonesia when I left Aceh was approaching 200,000. In the first three weeks after the disaster, workers had unearthed tens of thousands of bodies that were exposed after the waves receded for the final time. Large pits, located surprisingly close to the main roads, had been dug just outside Banda Aceh to create impromptu mass graves. However, it is evident bodies will continue to be found for many months, and perhaps years from now, as the cleanup and rebuilding processes develop in earnest. The reality is many bodies are already buried under the tons of sand and mud that the waves brought with them and will never be found.

Making Contact

  Through Global Water, I had been contacted by a colleague of an NGO (non-governmental organization) based in Jakarta, Indonesia. That colleague is a professor at the University of Hong Kong and a member of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Organization or APEC. The NGO was created by four concerned individuals that went to Aceh two days after the tsunami in order to help. They were so moved by what they saw they decided to create encampments for some of the displaced people left homeless. The founders of the NGO and the University Professor collected funding from themselves, friends, family and colleagues to create and support the encampments.

Through coordination with the Jakarta NGO and the University of Hong Kong professor it was decided that water purification equipment would be brought to the Aceh region with us, although it was not known exactly what equipment was actually needed. As a result, a team was formed with Global Water, the Jakarta NGO and the University professor and together we purchased and shipped a wide variety of water treatment equipment to Aceh including a reverse osmosis membrane system, a variety of media and cartridge filters, chlorine dispensing strainers and chlorine tablets, collapsible water tanks and an assortment of pumps, hoses and fittings. We tried to come prepared for anything and that preparation paid off.

Posko Jenggala

  As I was helping a particular local NGO that had built a specific encampment in Aceh, I concentrated most of my efforts during the first week of my visit in one particular encampment called “Posko Jenggala.” By the way, all the encampments for displaced people in the Aceh region are called “Poskos” as the local meaning of Posko is something similar to “command headquarters.” This encampment is located just west of the city of Banda Aceh in an area known locally as Lhok Nga (pronounced Lock Na). The waves destroyed all around a small portion of this area, including inland of it. I suspect this area had slightly higher ground level compared to its surroundings, but if it was higher ground, it was not perceptible by looking at the road leading to and away from Lhok Nga; it all looked to be the same elevation. But for some reason the waves traveled around this little area that now resembled an “island” in the middle of all the devastation.

There was about 100 people at the camp called Posko Jenggala when we first arrived and when I left there was over 300people with tent accommodations for another 200 (500 people total).

  The meal preparation facility was already making meals for almost 400 people so folks from other encampments were coming to Posko Jenggala for meals. This is no surprise since the vast majority of other encampments had no meal preparation facilities and so every family was left up to their own devices to cook food and boil water. As you can imagine this created a wide variety of makeshift camp stoves and small cooking fires all over most of the other encampments.

The leaders of Posko Jenggala appeared to me to be, by far, the most resourceful of any of the leaders of the many Poskos in Aceh. Initially, they had contacted a variety of Indonesian companies in order to request support. As a result, the state-owned oil company donated tents for the camp, as well as cooking equipment and fuel. The leaders of our encampment contacted many friends and colleagues in Jakarta and created a team of volunteers to come to Aceh to initially build the camp and to maintain it on a continuous basis.

  The Jenggala leaders contacted an international medical organization called Global Doctor that quickly installed a medical clinic in the camp and donated the services of their doctors on a rotating basis. In addition, representatives of UNICEF were contacted and that has resulted in the installation of a Children's Center at Posko Jenggala for children staying in the encampment, as well as those from surrounding camps in the Lhok Nga area.

  The UNICEF staff of the Children's Center creates special supportive programs for the many displaced children who are now trying to cope with a completely changed life.

There is no question in my mind that Posko Jenggala is the model encampment for the Aceh area (or any crises situation) in terms of sleeping accommodations, meal preparation and feeding facilities, medical support, religious support, providing special assistance to the needs of traumatized children, and in the area of water, sanitation and hygiene facilities. It was simply the best organized by its capable leaders and that always makes a big difference. And again, this camp had no significant support from any major aid organizations or the government; just a handful of volunteers from Jakarta formed a team to make it happen.

I should mention - another camp is now being built by the Posko Jenggala leaders on the beach so people from the poskos can return to their land and begin the painful job of cleaning up and rebuilding. Of course, money must become available from some external source before anyone can rebuild as the landowners who are left have lost absolutely everything of value (except their land).

Water System

   At first we thought our water supply was going to be a seawater source since the NGO wanted to create a camp very close to the destroyed beach area. When we arrived we found the first camp (Posko Jenggala) was actually about two miles from the beach. The water source turned out to be shallow groundwater accessed through an old hand-dug well. Unfortunately, that well was positioned next to two toilet facilities that were equally old and I was convinced that the well was contaminated with microorganisms from the toilet facilities.

  The water source's total dissolved solids (or TDS) measurement was very low, at 150 mg/L. This TDS level is actually better than many water supplies in the US, and is a measurement of the salts and minerals contained in the groundwater. However, this measurement does not reflect contamination by microorganisms (protozoa, bacteria and viruses).

  I was very pleased to learn that the NGO leaders had already decided to drill another well and had hired a local well drilling team. On the morning of the new well drilling activities, the camp leaders and I met with the well drillers. We choose a site that was as far away as possible from the original toilet facilities, about 200 feet away from the old toilets and original well.

    The new well possessed an even lower TDS content (at 35 mg/L) than the first well. My guess was that both wells may have been drawing water from the same shallow aquifer (at a depth of about 50 feet and less) but that the water from the first well had an elevated TDS measurement as a result of its close proximity to toilets.

 I could see what was needed was a filtration and disinfection system for the camp. So with the help of the Jenggala utility men staff, a University professor and one of the camp leaders, that became the mission during the first week - to install filters and chlorinators on the two water sources and to install pumps and tanks and PVC pipes to receive supply water from the wells and distribute it throughout the camp.

Water and Sanitation Needs Assessment

  During the second week I stayed in Aceh, I was able to perform a water and sanitation needs assessment for encampments east of the city of Banda Aceh that were not being supported adequately (this is on the opposite side of Banda Aceh from where I was staying at Posko Jenggala, which is to the west of the city). Some of those encampments were home to over 2,000 people and it was obvious they were not being supported adequately with food and water shipments; needless to say, bathing and sanitation facilities were very meager or non-existent.

  Since UNICEF is the official coordinating organization of the United Nations and the recipient of the funding donated by countries throughout the world, I met with UNICEF officials in Banda Aceh to discuss the poskos east of the city. I gave them my water and sanitation assessment notes with the understanding that they had to get better support for those encampments. The UNICEF officials were obviously trying to do a good job, but like everyone else, they were overwhelmed by the scope of the disaster.

  Since returning from Indonesia, I have learned that UNICEF hired the local person I had helping me translate my questions at the poskos during my water and sanitation needs assessments. He is a very capable person who was with me all the time I traveled through the encampments and I'm in contact with him now to make sure those folks east of Banda Aceh are not forgotten.

  One characteristic of the Acehnese culture that is really helping to curtail water-borne diseases in the encampments is that the residents of Aceh routinely boil water before drinking it. Since boiling water kills all microorganisms, I believe this cultural feature is allowing the people of Aceh to drink microorganism-contaminated water safely. However, water used for bathing cannot be boiled but should also be disinfected in the encampments since invariably water is ingested during bathing/washing.

Posko Encampments and their Obvious Problems

  When I left Aceh it was over a month since the tsunami had hit and the vast majority of people living in dozens of encampments I visited were not being supported with the basic survival needs - adequate food to eat and safe water to drink (although, I must say food distribution was much better than safe water distribution). Medical needs were being met as the medical emergency lasted only about two weeks in duration. As one can imagine, the number of people seriously hurt was less than the number of people killed from this particular tragedy.

  A month after the disaster, sanitation and hygiene needs were still not being met throughout the encampments. In some of the camps there was a pit dug in the ground with a makeshift latrine hole built above it; but there were probably 100 – 200 people for each such pit latrine. At the time I was there, the goal described by the large aid organizations was to have a pit latrine for about 50 people (while the “official” international aid planning factor is one toilet per 20 people). It would have been great if their actually was one pit latrine for 50 people, but by and large, that ratio wasn't even close.

  In addition to these observations, it was obvious that each camp needed its own cooking facility with cooks to help prepare meals for the people so they all received enough food and nourishment. As you can imagine, the people of Aceh were severely traumatized from all the death and destruction they had just witnessed. They weren't in a frame of mind to adequately take care of themselves and it showed.

  Makeshift tent structures and cooking on little camp fires for every meal appeared to be a struggle for the people in all those encampments that were not adequately supported. They needed help with the basic needs of survival and it was obvious they weren't getting that help despite all the good intentions of the world.

What is Needed Now

  Immediately, water wells should be dug in all the encampments and filtration, chlorination and simple water distribution systems should be installed supported by a 15kW electric generator set. Posko Jenggala has such a system now, but water treatment and distribution equipment need to be installed in all the encampments in Aceh to provide safe water for their residents. I have created a water supply and distribution design based upon Posko Jenggala that can be used for all the camps in Aceh and Global Water is sharing this design with all international aid organizations.

  Posko Jenggala also has a buried sanitation toilet facility and a separate bathing facility with waste pit. Although these facilities are head and shoulders above all the other camps, even Jenggala does not dispose of its wastes in a disinfected sanitary manner, and Global Water continues to work with them to correct this deficiency. I have created a sanitation facility design that can be used in three different ways to accommodate all the disposal alternatives that Posko Jenggala may find itself in over the life of the encampment (which I believe may be two years or so). The tank configuration design that can be used in three disposal methods include: 1) a pump-out tank that eliminates on-site disposal of wastes; this disposal option can readily convert to 2) an on-site anaerobic septic tank if on-site disposal is needed but electricity is not available, or to a 3) very effective aerobic digester for on-site disposal if electricity is available. The septic tank and aerobic digester designs allow for on-site disposal, while significantly reducing organic materials and allowing disinfection of their liquid effluent before exiting the system (disinfecting liquid effluent will prevent microorganisms from contaminating groundwater). These are important design features that are necessary to create a safe sanitation facility with the capability to function effectively beyond short-term operation. Because of its three alternative operational configurations, this design would satisfy the encampment's short-term, as well as long-term needs.

    Global Water will be working with the leaders of Posko Jenggala to implement the water and sanitation designs we have created. Being a volunteer-based organization, Global Water does not have the funding resources to implement our designs without assistance so we will strive to receive support from one or more of the large international aid organizations that have received significant donations in the name of tsunami relief. I would hope that our water and sanitation equipment designs could be implemented in many of the encampments in Aceh as the larger aid organizations eventually realize, as we do already, that these camps will be needed for an extended period of time.

Volunteers

  I was humbled and honored to be part of a team of individuals and organizations that helped create one of the encampments for the people of Aceh. In the process I met many volunteers from around the world that, like all of us, were there to help in any way they could. An architect, a retired oil company worker, a business consultant and a bodyguard all from Jakarta, a University professor from Hong Kong, doctors from everywhere, including Australia, France, Singapore and Turkey, crises specialists from Australia and Germany and many Islamic Nations, a small church group from Oregon, and many skilled utility men from Jakarta and throughout Indonesia; the list goes on and on. These wonderful people came to Aceh to help without fanfare of any kind, without being paid, and, in some cases, without even being asked.

  In the third week after the tsunami, heavy machinery was being used to clear the streets and a short distance on either side of the streets. I was told that the heavy machinery and their operators were sent by a major Indonesian contracting company, again, without being asked. The company executives just took it upon themselves to go and try to help. As I mentioned, I met many volunteers in Aceh with the exact same attitude. No one “officially” asked the many volunteers in Aceh I met to go to Aceh; they came from every corner of the world because it was obvious they were needed; they were there to make a difference. I can tell you, this “step up and make a difference” attitude was absolutely necessary in order to save lives in Aceh as it was obvious to me that the government and many of the large international aid organizations were ill prepared to support the thousands of people immediately displaced by this horrific natural disaster.

“Aceh's Children are Our Children”

 As mentioned, I met many wonderful, dynamic people in Aceh. The residents of Aceh, themselves, are the most resourceful people I have ever met in my life. Despite the horrific trauma they have been through, they continue to live and plan for their new future - a future very different today than it was just a short month ago. Many of Aceh's children are able to laugh and play now as they become busy with a new school term that has just begun in Aceh with the daily support of the Posko's leaders and the UNICEF Children's Center located in the camp.

 Just before I left, the Posko leaders distributed “T” shirts to all the children in the area with the incredibly moving and supportive words on the front: “Aceh's Children are Our Children.” It is clear to me that Posko Jenggala has been built with these words foremost in every volunteer's mind.

A Little Humor

Realizing that the Aceh region had not been accessible to foreigners for many years due to a civil war that has waged over the past 30 years, I must have looked pretty strange to most Aceh residents. Thinking about that when I first arrived in the encampment, I made a point to say “hello” as a friendly gesture to everyone I passed as undoubtedly everyone made eye contact with me. In the beginning of saying “hello” to everyone I typically received curious stares in return, but a transformation occurred during my two weeks there. Little by little, I started receiving responses back to my “hello's.” By the time I left, everyone in the camp (and I mean everyone) was saying “hello” to me wherever I went. I'd walk from one side of the camp to the other while working on a water system and would hear “hello” at least 20 times from everywhere. It was great.

Final Thoughts

a) Appreciation of Aceh Residents –

An overwhelming feeling I had during my stay in Aceh is that the residents really appreciated the people from around the world who had come to help them. You could see it in their eyes that no matter what horrors they had just experienced, they were happy to see that people from around the world had not forgotten them and were there trying to help.

b) Allowing Aceh's Displaced Residents to Move Back to Coastal Communities –

I am convinced that many of the camps I saw in Aceh will be needed for years to come unless the government and the large international aid organizations who have received many millions of dollars under the banner of tsunami relief step up to accelerate coastal clean-up efforts and start the community and more specifically, the home rebuilding process. This is what many of the Acehnese people I met want. Perhaps not all of the members of the coastal community will want to move back to their original land, but many I spoke to do want to move back and they'd like to move soon. They do not want to spend years in resettlement camps with their lives on hold. I hope they will be given that opportunity.

I was told that the office of land ownership records in the nearby city of Banda Aceh was completely destroyed and all the records were destroyed with it. That means it will be difficult to prove land ownership. This difficult situation is exacerbated by the Indonesian government's stated desire to relocate all displaced people into large encampments far inland in the Aceh Province away from the coast.

The Aceh people I spoke to did not want to move farther inland; they wanted to go back to their communities and their only asset – the land where their house once stood. Of course, it is going to be very difficult for the people of Aceh to actually move back to their land if the Indonesian government does not want them to. But I am hopeful that the government will not stand in the way of coastal community residents who want to return to their land. Whether the government will help residents prove land ownership is another question that will have to be answered in the future.

The people of Aceh have been through a life-altering horrific experience and have lost literally everything they own and they deserve to be treated with the greatest compassion and with support for all their needs. That's not happening yet. Entities, such as the Indonesian government and the international aid organizations who have so far been the beneficiary of the world's donated money, must step up and help those who want to rebuild to do so. The outcome for the resources that have been donated around the world for tsunami-related relief efforts should include the rebuilding of homes in Aceh and throughout the other tsunami devastated countries. Those resources should now include a focus to help the hundreds of thousands of displaced people rebuild wherever they want to rebuild. If tsunami relief resources do not include a significant home rebuilding component, I don't see how these people who have lost everything will ever be able to rebuild and restore their life back to some level of normalcy. Having said that, I fully realize that resources donated to international relief organizations are not routinely spent for home rebuilding; yet that is a primary need.

The bottom line is - The people of Aceh should not be forced to move inland into large barracks-style encampments to satisfy the organizational, and perhaps control, intentions of the Indonesian military and government. Living in an Aceh camp, as I did, I had the opportunity to speak with many people about what they wanted for their future. As mentioned previously, the majority of those I spoke to wanted to move back to their properties and the beachside communities where they were from. The last thing they wanted to do was to be herded into large residential camps in the interior of the Aceh Province. It's interesting to note that much of the civil war action that has occurred in the Aceh Province over the past 30 years has happened in the interior of the province because the rebel organizations interested in an independent Aceh State are apparently located in these inland areas. One has to wonder if the displaced people of Aceh are actually moved far away from their land if they'll ever be able to return.

c) Increase the Level of Urgency for Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Equipment Support to Equal Medical and Food Relief Support -

 International relief agencies are obviously very good at some things and, understandably, not as good at other things. One area where relief agencies excel is bringing medical resources very quickly to a crises situation. Within hours after the tsunami, medical teams from all over the world were flying into the devastated areas with as much equipment as they could carry. Some days later, quickly erected expeditionary clinic equipment arrived and medical resources were made available throughout the damaged regions, as transportation resources would allow. Another area where international relief agencies excel is the distribution of food supplies. Compared to other commodities, food is relatively easy to package, store, transport and distribute. And because of droughts that occur with a disturbing ever-increasing frequency, food is already in a dynamic “emergency system” in support of periodic relief efforts.

Water and sanitation and hygiene equipment, on the other hand, is not so well defined, understood or anticipated for use. However, I believe an increased sense of urgency for water, sanitation and hygiene equipment support could be created. It is further believed, this heightened awareness can approach that of the medical response and food distribution capabilities of international relief agencies in support of crises situations.

Specifically, I believe standard mobile water supply, sanitation facility and hygiene facility equipment should be created and warehoused in anticipation of future crises situations around the world (as is done now with medical and food supplies). Likewise, what is needed is an organization to implement (transport, install and maintain) that equipment on site with trained workers able to quickly establish water points, as well as sanitation and hygiene facilities in multiple locations.

An overwhelming observation I had in Aceh was the fact that most relief organizations that were there to help were not actually organized to help quickly. In fact several relief workers told me their respective organizations were “organizers” not “implementers.” Needless to say, there was an apparent lack of “implementers” in Aceh when it came to equipment of any kind. In the area of water, that lack of support was partially compensated by foreign military equipment and soldiers. I met soldiers from the Australian and German armies while in Aceh that were using their military water purification equipment to produce as much water as they could. But the simple truth is they weren't able to produce enough water or distribute it to the many encampments in the area. One would think that such an important commodity as water would be better supported by the international relief agencies with equipment and trained personnel. Relying on foreign military organizations for water purification should not be acceptable for worldwide humanitarian crises situations.

d) Positive Impact of Local Organizations and Individuals –

 Another observation topic is the fact that it was apparent that some local NGOs and other very small local organizations and small groups of individuals were making a big impact in terms of bringing support to many of the encampments around Banda Aceh without much support from the international relief organizations whose intent was to support these types of activities. In some cases, local groups and individuals were not taken seriously because they weren't an “established” organization. I was continually reminded that it was such a group of four individuals that created the camp I worked in and who introduced me to many local people who helped me in my work.

But it appeared these small groups often did not have the wherewithal to request support from the large international relief organizations because it was unclear what support the large relief organizations had to offer. It would have been very useful for these large relief organizations to reach out to local groups to see how they could help them. In many cases, the local organizations had technical knowledge, language translators, transportation assets and other essential information that was very useful to me in my work in Aceh, in particular during my water and sanitation assessment travels.

A Draft “Plan for Action”

As one can imagine, I had many observations and experiences during my stay in Aceh that have molded the opinions I now have. These opinions have resulted in what I'll call a draft “Plan for Action” that could help in future crises situations:

•  Create water, sanitation and hygiene equipment and complementary facility components that are effective, modular, mobile, inexpensive and easy to use and support; an obvious weakness in the capabilities of relief organizations in Aceh was their lack of on-site water, sanitation and hygiene equipment;

•  Warehouse this equipment to be used during emergency situations in “mount-out” boxes ready for transport;

•  Create an organization to purchase and maintain the equipment and have a small trained staff able to install and implement the equipment on short notice; augment staff members with a list of volunteers that are trained on the equipment and able to travel with the equipment in order to help with implementation; an obvious weakness in the capabilities of relief organizations in Aceh was their lack of staff who could implement equipment;

•  Conduct water, sanitation and hygiene assessments quickly; it was unfortunate that a month after the tsunami, these types of assessments were still being performed in camps that were obviously not being supported adequately by any relief organizations; water, sanitation and hygiene assessments should be conducted by staff members bringing equipment to an area in crises;

•  Make it a normal part of a relief organization's action plan to reach out to local organizations that are providing support during an emergency situation; these organizations can provide essential skills and resources very quickly and often know an area's specific needs better than anyone; by supporting these local organizations, a relief organization can expand its ability to help quickly;

It is believed that the capabilities identified above could be funded by the United Nations and/or a consortium of international relief organizations.

Thank You

  I'd like to thank the leaders of Posko Jenggala for their incredible commitment and all their work in creating the best encampment in Aceh. They are: Ms. Dinna Erwinn, Mr. Barayani Muskita, Mr. Ardito Kodijat, and last, but not least, the organizational genius of Posko Jenggala, Mr. Andi.

I'd also like to thank some of the individuals and organizations that helped Global Water with our tsunami relief effort. Thank you to Aaron Salzberg at the U.S. State Dept. for directing organizations to Global Water for coordinating purposes, to Janet Jaworski, Administrative Director, American Membrane Technology Association, and their members who generously have donated their equipment and money for this effort, to Village Marine Tec. and Parsons Brinckerhoff for their offers to donate desalination equipment.

A special thanks to Dr. Paul Cheung, Lead Shepherd of the APEC Industrial Science and Technology
Working Group for providing the initiative, funding and logistics to bring water equipment to Aceh. If there is one person that is responsible for making the effort described by this Trip Report successful, it is Dr. Paul Cheung. His motivation and “heart” was, and continues to be, an inspiration to us all.

Thank you to Mr. Kieran Twomey and the owners of the Shangri – La Hotel in Jakarta for graciously donating rooms free of charge to us before and after we traveled to Aceh. The hotel's location in Jakarta and well-equipped business center allowed us to organize, meet and plan for our work in a beautiful and functional setting.

I'd also like to thank Global Water's own Ms. Katheryne Smith and Ambassador John McDonald for all their help, creative suggestions and support during the Aceh trip and everyday. Through their support, Global Water was able to reach out to the world immediately after the tsunami devastation first became known by communicating with government officials, aid organizations, and NGOs around the world. That communication allowed us to realize that the conditions in Aceh were not well known and gave us the “heads-up” to bring a wide variety of water equipment to Aceh to handle any situation.

And a special thanks to Dr. Kate Bruck of Global Doctor for reminding us of the importance of our work and encouraging us to document all the water and sanitation needs of the poskos throughout Aceh.