Rajesh Veeraraghavan, an AID Bay Area volunteer, reports from his visit to Chennai & Thirukadaiyur in January.
Seeing is believing. My objective for writing this note is to give a picture based on my observations to give you folks a sample of what is it like to be in the AID house in Chennai & Thirukadaiyur. The enthusiasm of the people is amazing. I can bet that whoever is visiting will be completely blown over by the number of people who are showing to volunteer!
I went to AID house in Chennai – it was a rented 2-storied house. There were medicines boxes being stacked by a volunteer, there were people whose task is to receive materials and stock them properly… cell phones were ringing constantly. To quote one volunteer, “It is like driving on the streets of India. You just need to know the rules of the game there and it won’t appear chaotic.”
I met a group who came in from some donor agency. She mentioned that they had done extensive research and chose AID as the group to work with!
I saw a clear transition between the short-term focus to a medium-term focus. More clear structures are being put to place. Clear responsibilities and tasks are being identified. There was a coordination meeting among all the teams – medical team, media team, volunteer task coordination team, loading/unloading team, feedback gathering team, etc.
AID Ration Card has been given to every affected family, to note information on the number of members in a family, human and material loss incurred by the family, type of assistance received from the government and other NGOs. This is a simple way to keep track of what the family has received and to figure out future course.
The coordination center at Thirukadaiyur is very well organized. When you enter the office you get a booklet where it lists a detailed write-up of tasks you can do. I went to Chinangudi village to do a survey. This was primarily a fishing village. I heard that around 80 people had perished in the tsunami. There were around 550 families living here. During the day, we did the detailed survey, managed to build 2 make-shift toilets, played with the village kids, and then met the sub-collector!
There is clear need for volunteers to go spend time in these villages. There is plenty of work to do and there is an existing infrastructure and team to support you in this. I am optimistic that there will be among us who have the will and the time to go and spend the time in these villages…
