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http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/03/30/news/quake.html

Trapped in rubble, listening to death New Feature
By Seth Mydans International Herald Tribune
Thursday, March 31, 2005

GUNUNG SITOLI, Indonesia

Trapped on her back under the ruins of her house, Destriani clutched her
2-year-old son to her belly with one hand and scraped at the debris just
above her face for air.
.
A few meters away in the rubble, she said Wednesday, she could hear her
9-year-old daughter, Rahimi, calling out. As her baby screamed and Destriani
shouted for help, the voices of the family mingled with the barking of dogs
in the black silence that followed an earthquake late Monday night.
.
Moments earlier, Destriani had been wrenched from sleep by what seemed at
first to be a bout of dizziness. Then, as the whole house shook, she rushed
to save her children, but before she could reach her sleeping daughter, the
floor collapsed from under them and they fell.
.
When rescuers pulled her and her son to safety three hours later, she could
still hear the voice of her daughter, calling from somewhere deep inside the
ruins. "I don't think she is alive anymore," Destriani said.
.
All around the little island of Nias, off the western shore of Sumatra,
people are still lying under piles of rubble as their neighbors, with almost
no heavy equipment, tear with their hands at blocks of concrete and piles of
brick.
.
So far, only a few hundred bodies have been counted. This time, no big waves
were generated. But officials now agree that the death toll on Nias and the
islands closest to it could be well over 1,000.
.
One of the most recent to be rescued was Teresia Gan, 60, who spent more
than 30 hours pinned between her bed and her television set.
.
In the darkness of her ruined house, she fell into despair, she said. "I
kept saying, 'God, if you want to take me, take my life, but don't leave me
to suffer in this place."'
.
Every time she heard a car pass by, she said, she banged on a water tank and
shouted, but until midmorning Wednesday nobody responded.
.
When she was pulled to daylight, she told her rescuers: "Sir, there's still
people in there. My mother is in there."
.
Her husband is also still missing, along with one of her children, an in-law
and two grandchildren.
.
As she lay now on the floor of a shelter, pale and thin and staring at
something only she could see, a nurse gave her a painkiller and told her she
could go home.
.
Gan said nothing for a long time. Then she said, "I have no home."
.
Because of its remoteness, little food, shelter or assistance had yet
arrived on the island of Nias. But aid workers said that because so much
material had been stockpiled on the mainland after the tsunami three months
ago, supplies and medical care would be plentiful once the flow got under
way.
.
Catholic Relief Services, for example, sent an assessment team to the island
by helicopter on Wednesday and prepared a shipload of supplies that was due
to leave the mainland on Thursday for the 10-hour trip across the sea.
.
In the pause before relief and reconstruction begins, the streets of this
little city had a heavy, enervated feel as bicycles and small motorcycles
swirled slowly through the streets and people stared listlessly from the
porches of ruined houses.
.
.
A row of bodies, covered in sheets and speckled with black flies, lay in the
courtyard of Santa Maria church alongside its toppled steeple. A nearby
kindergarten had been converted into a shelter and laundry, its playground
filled with blue plastic tarpaulins and drying clothes.
.
Here and there, the tapping of hammers could be heard - not the sounds of
reconstruction but of coffin makers.
.
The body of Inatany Angelina Hulu, 33, lay on a table at the side of the
road Wednesday afternoon in front of the small house where she and her
husband had run a snack shop.
.
Around it, mourners wore masks or held handkerchiefs to their faces as her
husband, Haogombowo Hulu, 39, stood and stroked her forehead. Their daughter
Tanti Angelina, 10, stood beside him, a green surgical mask across her mouth
and nose.
.
"I am sorry I could not invite you all into my house," Haogombowo told his
visitors, "but my house is ruined."
.
Seizing her by the legs and back and shoulders, a group of men heaved and
struggled as they dumped the body of his wife into a roughly made wood
coffin. As they did so, the sounds of weeping rose from around it and the
voice of a child could be heard crying out, "Mama! Mama!"
.
Haogombowo threw back his head and began to keen, a high-pitched wail like
that of a child, as if this were his own mother who had died.
.
Clutching his two smallest children, aged 2 and 5, in his arms, he buried
his head between them and said, "You don't have your mother anymore.
.
"So don't call her again, and don't be naughty."
.
Then someone closed the coffin where his wife's body lay, and the familiar
sound of hammering resumed.
.

Indonesia reconsiders plan

Indonesia said Wednesday that it would have to rethink its grand plan for
rebuilding the tsunami-ravaged province of Aceh since key funds may have to
be diverted to help victims of the quake that struck the region this week,
Agence France-Presse reported from Jakarta.
.
Vice President Yusuf Kalla released a draft last week of the so-called
blueprint, touting it as a document which would shape the future of the
region where almost 220,000 people were left dead and missing following the
December 26 earthquake and tsunami.
.










.
See more of the world that matters - click here for home delivery of the
International Herald Tribune.
.
< < Back to Start of Article
GUNUNG SITOLI, Indonesia Trapped on her back under the ruins of her house,
Destriani clutched her 2-year-old son to her belly with one hand and scraped
at the debris just above her face for air.
.
A few meters away in the rubble, she said Wednesday, she could hear her
9-year-old daughter, Rahimi, calling out. As her baby screamed and Destriani
shouted for help, the voices of the family mingled with the barking of dogs
in the black silence that followed an earthquake late Monday night.
.
Moments earlier, Destriani had been wrenched from sleep by what seemed at
first to be a bout of dizziness. Then, as the whole house shook, she rushed
to save her children, but before she could reach her sleeping daughter, the
floor collapsed from under them and they fell.
.
When rescuers pulled her and her son to safety three hours later, she could
still hear the voice of her daughter, calling from somewhere deep inside the
ruins. "I don't think she is alive anymore," Destriani said.
.
All around the little island of Nias, off the western shore of Sumatra,
people are still lying under piles of rubble as their neighbors, with almost
no heavy equipment, tear with their hands at blocks of concrete and piles of
brick.
.
So far, only a few hundred bodies have been counted. This time, no big waves
were generated. But officials now agree that the death toll on Nias and the
islands closest to it could be well over 1,000.
.
One of the most recent to be rescued was Teresia Gan, 60, who spent more
than 30 hours pinned between her bed and her television set.
.
In the darkness of her ruined house, she fell into despair, she said. "I
kept saying, 'God, if you want to take me, take my life, but don't leave me
to suffer in this place."'
.
Every time she heard a car pass by, she said, she banged on a water tank and
shouted, but until midmorning Wednesday nobody responded.
.
When she was pulled to daylight, she told her rescuers: "Sir, there's still
people in there. My mother is in there."
.
Her husband is also still missing, along with one of her children, an in-law
and two grandchildren.
.
As she lay now on the floor of a shelter, pale and thin and staring at
something only she could see, a nurse gave her a painkiller and told her she
could go home.
.
Gan said nothing for a long time. Then she said, "I have no home."
.
Because of its remoteness, little food, shelter or assistance had yet
arrived on the island of Nias. But aid workers said that because so much
material had been stockpiled on the mainland after the tsunami three months
ago, supplies and medical care would be plentiful once the flow got under
way.
.
Catholic Relief Services, for example, sent an assessment team to the island
by helicopter on Wednesday and prepared a shipload of supplies that was due
to leave the mainland on Thursday for the 10-hour trip across the sea.
.
In the pause before relief and reconstruction begins, the streets of this
little city had a heavy, enervated feel as bicycles and small motorcycles
swirled slowly through the streets and people stared listlessly from the
porches of ruined houses.
.
.
A row of bodies, covered in sheets and speckled with black flies, lay in the
courtyard of Santa Maria church alongside its toppled steeple. A nearby
kindergarten had been converted into a shelter and laundry, its playground
filled with blue plastic tarpaulins and drying clothes.
.
Here and there, the tapping of hammers could be heard - not the sounds of
reconstruction but of coffin makers.
.
The body of Inatany Angelina Hulu, 33, lay on a table at the side of the
road Wednesday afternoon in front of the small house where she and her
husband had run a snack shop.
.
Around it, mourners wore masks or held handkerchiefs to their faces as her
husband, Haogombowo Hulu, 39, stood and stroked her forehead. Their daughter
Tanti Angelina, 10, stood beside him, a green surgical mask across her mouth
and nose.
.
"I am sorry I could not invite you all into my house," Haogombowo told his
visitors, "but my house is ruined."
.
Seizing her by the legs and back and shoulders, a group of men heaved and
struggled as they dumped the body of his wife into a roughly made wood
coffin. As they did so, the sounds of weeping rose from around it and the
voice of a child could be heard crying out, "Mama! Mama!"
.
Haogombowo threw back his head and began to keen, a high-pitched wail like
that of a child, as if this were his own mother who had died.
.
Clutching his two smallest children, aged 2 and 5, in his arms, he buried
his head between them and said, "You don't have your mother anymore.
.
"So don't call her again, and don't be naughty."
.
Then someone closed the coffin where his wife's body lay, and the familiar
sound of hammering resumed.
.
.
Indonesia reconsiders plan
.
Indonesia said Wednesday that it would have to rethink its grand plan for
rebuilding the tsunami-ravaged province of Aceh since key funds may have to
be diverted to help victims of the quake that struck the region this week,
Agence France-Presse reported from Jakarta.
.
Vice President Yusuf Kalla released a draft last week of the so-called
blueprint, touting it as a document which would shape the future of the
region where almost 220,000 people were left dead and missing following the
December 26 earthquake and tsunami.
.
.
See more of the world that matters - click here for home delivery of the
International Herald Tribune.
.
< < Back to Start of Article

GUNUNG SITOLI, Indonesia Trapped on her back under the ruins of her house,
Destriani clutched her 2-year-old son to her belly with one hand and scraped
at the debris just above her face for air.
.
A few meters away in the rubble, she said Wednesday, she could hear her
9-year-old daughter, Rahimi, calling out. As her baby screamed and Destriani
shouted for help, the voices of the family mingled with the barking of dogs
in the black silence that followed an earthquake late Monday night.
.
Moments earlier, Destriani had been wrenched from sleep by what seemed at
first to be a bout of dizziness. Then, as the whole house shook, she rushed
to save her children, but before she could reach her sleeping daughter, the
floor collapsed from under them and they fell.
.
When rescuers pulled her and her son to safety three hours later, she could
still hear the voice of her daughter, calling from somewhere deep inside the
ruins. "I don't think she is alive anymore," Destriani said.
.
All around the little island of Nias, off the western shore of Sumatra,
people are still lying under piles of rubble as their neighbors, with almost
no heavy equipment, tear with their hands at blocks of concrete and piles of
brick.
.
So far, only a few hundred bodies have been counted. This time, no big waves
were generated. But officials now agree that the death toll on Nias and the
islands closest to it could be well over 1,000.
.
One of the most recent to be rescued was Teresia Gan, 60, who spent more
than 30 hours pinned between her bed and her television set.
.
In the darkness of her ruined house, she fell into despair, she said. "I
kept saying, 'God, if you want to take me, take my life, but don't leave me
to suffer in this place."'
.
Every time she heard a car pass by, she said, she banged on a water tank and
shouted, but until midmorning Wednesday nobody responded.
.
When she was pulled to daylight, she told her rescuers: "Sir, there's still
people in there. My mother is in there."
.
Her husband is also still missing, along with one of her children, an in-law
and two grandchildren.
.
As she lay now on the floor of a shelter, pale and thin and staring at
something only she could see, a nurse gave her a painkiller and told her she
could go home.
.
Gan said nothing for a long time. Then she said, "I have no home."
.
Because of its remoteness, little food, shelter or assistance had yet
arrived on the island of Nias. But aid workers said that because so much
material had been stockpiled on the mainland after the tsunami three months
ago, supplies and medical care would be plentiful once the flow got under
way.
.
Catholic Relief Services, for example, sent an assessment team to the island
by helicopter on Wednesday and prepared a shipload of supplies that was due
to leave the mainland on Thursday for the 10-hour trip across the sea.
.
In the pause before relief and reconstruction begins, the streets of this
little city had a heavy, enervated feel as bicycles and small motorcycles
swirled slowly through the streets and people stared listlessly from the
porches of ruined houses.
.
.
A row of bodies, covered in sheets and speckled with black flies, lay in the
courtyard of Santa Maria church alongside its toppled steeple. A nearby
kindergarten had been converted into a shelter and laundry, its playground
filled with blue plastic tarpaulins and drying clothes.
.
Here and there, the tapping of hammers could be heard - not the sounds of
reconstruction but of coffin makers.
.
The body of Inatany Angelina Hulu, 33, lay on a table at the side of the
road Wednesday afternoon in front of the small house where she and her
husband had run a snack shop.
.
Around it, mourners wore masks or held handkerchiefs to their faces as her
husband, Haogombowo Hulu, 39, stood and stroked her forehead. Their daughter
Tanti Angelina, 10, stood beside him, a green surgical mask across her mouth
and nose.
.
"I am sorry I could not invite you all into my house," Haogombowo told his
visitors, "but my house is ruined."
.
Seizing her by the legs and back and shoulders, a group of men heaved and
struggled as they dumped the body of his wife into a roughly made wood
coffin. As they did so, the sounds of weeping rose from around it and the
voice of a child could be heard crying out, "Mama! Mama!"
.
Haogombowo threw back his head and began to keen, a high-pitched wail like
that of a child, as if this were his own mother who had died.
.
Clutching his two smallest children, aged 2 and 5, in his arms, he buried
his head between them and said, "You don't have your mother anymore.
.
"So don't call her again, and don't be naughty."
.
Then someone closed the coffin where his wife's body lay, and the familiar
sound of hammering resumed.
.
.
Indonesia reconsiders plan
.
Indonesia said Wednesday that it would have to rethink its grand plan for
rebuilding the tsunami-ravaged province of Aceh since key funds may have to
be diverted to help victims of the quake that struck the region this week,
Agence France-Presse reported from Jakarta.
.
Vice President Yusuf Kalla released a draft last week of the so-called
blueprint, touting it as a document which would shape the future of the
region where almost 220,000 people were left dead and missing following the
December 26 earthquake and tsunami.
.
.
See more of the world that matters - click here for home delivery of the
International Herald Tribune.
.
< < Back to Start of Article