News from the front line

Dada Laliteshananda is a yogi monk and has been the main co-ordinator for AMURT in Burma. Here is his account of the cyclone.....

--- On Fri, 5/9/08, Dada laliteshananda wrote:

Namaskar all:

I want to thank all of you who wrote concerned about my situation here, and I want to apologize for not replying individually to each one of you. At the moment there's a huge relief operation on the way, we are just waiting for the amurt team to arrive here. It is outrageous that Myanmar government is blocking the visa of the aid workers.

Last Friday evening I saw on the Internet a satellite animation of the approaching storm. I didn't take it seriously as every body did here, because there are not storms is Myanmar. I even went back walking to the monastery. After I went to bed I tried to sleep but the wind was very strong, finally past midnight I got up and found out that every body was up, but still we didn't think it was serious. The power was off but we are used to the black outs here in Yangon, so we didn't mind.

By 1 AM the windows glasses started to break, I went down stairs (I stay on the 2nd floor) and got a piece of glass on my foot. I went back to my room and when I was trying to extract the glass, tress started to fall down. I have to admit that I found a kind of beauty in the amazig power of the storm. But thinking about the poor housing conditions of people here, I knew that it was already a tragedy. But that time the roof of the building where the nuns and family people stays started to fly away and every body there run to other building. The roof from other building occupied by monks also flew and they move to the same building where others were taking shelter.

I went down stairs and found that few families from the neighborhood have taken shelter there. A woman came shouting that her house has collapsed. This monastery has wonderful fruit and aromatic trees, I saw many of them falling. Metal rood sheets and pieces of decoration were flying in the air. It was very dangerous to be outside still some people went out and pick the mangoes from a fallen mango tree. It was all dark and wet. We were cramped in the ground floor waiting for the storm to pass but it didn't.

Around 4 o clock the wind changed direction, now was blowing from the opposite direction, I understood that because the storm was spinning the first part just passed. Before 5 AM I want up stairs, my room was the only one which was dry, so I decided to do meditation. When I was still doing sadhana I heard a terrible noise, a huge tree fell in the direction of my window, I just jump and got out. I came to see and saw that it missed my window for one meter. If it had hit my window it could have been very dangerous due to the broken glasses (if you look at the picture you can see my orange cloth on the window) After that trees were falling like dominoes, one after the other. It is amazing that nobody got hurt.

By noon time the storm started to recede and I decided to go out to see the situation of my friends. All of the houses lost parts of the roof, but it was incredible that most of them were still standing. I did saw few crashed by trees and people trying to take shelter. I was completely socked with the water up to my knee, I visited several houses, every body was totally wet but the kids still could smile. I went back to the monastery because I didn't want to catch a cold. That day we went to sleep early because the weather was still bad and it was very dark. Next day morning, I took my camera and went around taking pictures and seeing the extent of the damage. People invite me to see their homes. It is amazing that after such a mess nobody was crying or showing distress, they even smile when I took pictures. To see the conditions of the houses was heart breaking, I started to think that, if here in Yangon it was such a mess the area where the storm touched land must be in a terrible condition. The government announced that the electricity will be cut for two or three weeks, the electricity lines were on the ground and it was very dangerous. Without electricity people cannot pump water, so water supply became a serious problem. With all the fallen trees, vehicles couldn't circulate, even to walk was difficult. I went back to the monastery and help the monks to clear three trees which smashed the boundary wall and were blocking the street. Next day there was some more tree removal and I decided to go looking for a working telephone. there was some private cars taking passenger but they were very crowded and I decided to walk to a 5 star hotel, the telephone was working. I call Dada Viitaraganandaji to tell that I was OK and inform Amurt coordinator of the situation here. Next day I went again and manage to talk directly to him. After that I went to the school, the roof was open but the damage was not so serious. The children helped me to clear debris and rotten tamarinds which came from a tree which fell across the street. Yesterday, Sister Cirismita and her father came to fix the roof, after helping them I knew that the internet was working so I came back to town and manage to make contact with the Amurt coordinators.

At the moment we are without electricity, the Internet shop has electric generator, that's why it works. Only mobile phones are working, land lines are still off. The transport is becoming normal by the day, but in the beginning it was very expensive. The price of food is very high. The situation is still quite hard, but the conditions of the people in the worst affected areas is terrible as you can see in the news.

Tomorrow I will go with a small group of local volunteers to see the situation in the village area across the river and if possible we will start to do some relief, We have already got some funds to begin with the activities, but until the big donors send us cash we will need the support from margiis and sympathizers. At the moment we need only cash. If we need goods we will let you know.

Thanks for your concern

Brotherly
Dada
www.amurt.net