May 27, 2006

• I was pretty stunned to see this on the am news, last night it was "dozens dead and scores wounded" this is a terrible blow a mere 1.5 years after the big quake and tsunami
• yeah, I vote that Indonesia gets a break from catastrophes for a while... although, with the prevalance of cases of bird flu there right now, too, I'm not optimistic.
• Yeah, and things are pretty nasty in nearby East Timor as well..
• smt, i hope your people are okay
• sugarmilktea, think most of the world feels Indonesia's experienced more than enough tragedy recently. Hope you hear from your friends soon and that they came through safely. Early pictures of the destruction, well, the physical destruction seemed worse than a 6.2 to my eyes, but I realize building codes vary from country to country. And after all this, the damn volcano is still just (I hope) sitting there, 20 miles away.
• It's just mind blowing to hear about something like this. Poor Indonesia, they have been having such a rough time. A large team of Japanese disaster rescue workers left yesterday afternoon. The news is very focused on it here. Terrible scenes.
• .............................. .............................. .............................. .............................. .............................. .............................. (and so on)
• Another one of those times when you realise how much worse the impact of a natural disaster can be in a poorer nation, as I had a reaction similar to bees on hearing it was a 6.2 quake and had hoped the effects would not be nearly so bad. China is sending USD 2 million cash aid.
• Good for China. Reuters and BBC reporting two strong quakes rocked Tonga and Pappua New Guinea as well on Sunday. For pity's sake -- enough of this.
• What bees said. Enough already. Hope your friends are ok, smt. .
• Thankfully my niece, who has been staying in Yogyakarta, just returned to Jakarta a few weeks ago. Other friends in the area are harder to get in touch with (they don't really use the internet much), so it's harder to say if they are all ok. My heart goes out to all of the people in the area... Yes, building code is far from even existing as "code."
• This is awful. That part of the world is on God's hit list lately. I'll contribute what I can; too many disasters to keep up with.
• Earthquake toll passes 5,800 All of a sudden, I felt like I had this new, extraordinary power. I could lift all those big wooden blocks that had buried my husband and my baby