HORIZON INTERNATIONAL SOLUTIONS SITE

Back to School, One Month Later

Fifty-seven year old Jalaludin Sulaiman arrives at school at 8 o'clock sharp. He has been a teacher of Islamic Law for over 30 years and has the bearing of a strict yet fair school master. But as he picks his way through the wreckage of his school's playground, there is a look of profound sadness in his eyes.

"It is a month since the tsunami and I don't know how many of my pupils died," he explained. "On 26th January we will open the school again to begin registration. Only then will I know who survived."

Man Rukoh Kota is an Islamic high school in the Darusalem district of Banda Aceh, Indonesia. Its 500 students and 29 teachers had Sunday December 26th off and were due to return the following morning. That Monday, the eleventh graders expected an English language exam, and the basketball team was due to play a home game. The tsunami hit Darussalam at 9.00 am, the three deadly waves obliterating the entire neighbourhood. It left no houses left standing for miles around -- just piles of timber, twisted metal, and rubble. A seven foot wave of water poured through the ground floor classrooms, breaking down doors and washing away chairs, desks, and blackboards.

Say Uthi, a 32 year-old religious studies teacher, arrives at the school. On December 26th, he was playing badminton with friends on a sports field near his house.

"We felt the earth shake very violently and ran to a nearby coffee shop to find out what was happening. Soon hundreds of people started running past us saying that the sea was rising. I jumped on my motorbike and drove to my family's village 30km away. It is on high ground and nobody died. I feel so very lucky but my city is gone. Banda Aceh is lost." Say Uthi is one of 80 men employed by Concern to clean up this school and two others in the neighbourhood.

Wheelbarrows, shovels, brooms and buckets have been supplied and the teams work through the day, salvaging furniture and scrubbing it down in the school fountain. Piles of sodden copy books, papers and registers are burnt in huge bonfires. As they work, the men hum a haunting tune. Three unidentified bodies were found in the playground and many thousands more remain buried across the city.

Abdul Hamid, the school's headmaster, watches the cleanup. "A lot of work has been done in just four days," says Hamid. "The government has told us that school will start on 1st February and we must be ready. Registration starts tomorrow but we have no computer. We do have a building though, and must be strong in spirit."

Concern's Ted Shine has been implementing the school clean up program. "Of 120 schools in Banda Aceh it would seem that there are only 52 left. We have chosen to start work in schools that are structurally sound so that the kids can go back as soon as possible. We have cleaned up three schools and plan to work in another 20. We intend to supply them with computers and science kits. The scale of this disaster is vast and the problem is deciding where to start. But if you don't start somewhere nothing gets done."

There is some graffiti scrawled on the school desks drying in the sun. In a child's hand it reads "26.12.04. Tragedy. Banda Aceh is weeping."

Concern works in 29 countries around the world to support the poorest of the poor in achieving significant and sustainable lifestyle changes. Concern Worldwide US Inc. is a 4-star rated organization by Charity Navigator. 100% of all funds raised through the US Asia Disaster Appeal will be given directly to our responding teams so that they can acquire necessary resources to respond to community needs quickly and effectively. For more information, please do not hesitate to contact us at 212-557-8000, or visit our website at www.concernusa.org.

Media Contact: Laura Wiessen, 212-557-8000