Working in the Tsunami aftermath

January 14, 2005

US based Rodney Rascona is covering the troubles in Asia and writes after visiting Bande Aceh…

Its getting late here in Indonesia/Java…since the 1st day of the new year, I’ve been in the Indian fields of Cuddalore/Nagapattnam and Colachel. I spent about a week from Maddras down to the tip of India shooting digital stills/35mm film and minidv-14 footage.

I completed my work there and returned to Maddras outbound for Bangkok to stand down for a day while things were set up for my field visit to Indonesia which is just overwhelmed with journalists, military and most of the world’s humanitarian organizations, one of which I represent when in the field.

I’ve been here for the past week..having just returned from Bande Aceh yesterday and am now back in Medan, which is a major staging point for all NGOs and Government operatives. Tomorrow morning I head back to Aceh with a vip client to cover her in the relief fields and guide her thru the community as I’m one of the not so many that has been in to Bande Aceh already as its so hard to get up there via any form of transport due to the restrictions and rebel activity..a very complicated situation filled with a heavy dose of politics if you can believe it.

Overall..I don’t have enough words to relate the last 14 days on this path. Nor much time as its late once again and I have a difficult day ahead. Ths trip out I had to learn digital and endure a fairly large amount of duress to get in the field along with many many many others who are trying to get in there to do their work. The heat has been almost unbearable with equipment around my neck and in my vest pockets, heavy boots and heavy everything.

After a 2 day wait standing at the airport in sweltering temps I boarded an Indonesian Military plane after repeated problems trying to get a ride amongst the IDPs, the UN and all the journalists and cameramen and NGOS needing to get to Bande Aceh but finally…we took off with a load of cargo at our knees and a few new friends made along the way en route to Bande Aceh.

I can only tell you a simple visual for you…my first heart tug while in Nagapttnam India about 2/3rds the way down on the south eastern shoreline…where Sri Lanka shadows the shore of India. After slowly starting at the begining at the beach…this location was the main and hardest hit location with some 10,000 unoffical dead not to be confused withe the governments listing of 7,000+..so a large loss of life. After working the beach for about 4 hrs, my interpreter motioned for me to slow..and so I stood waiting for him and we made eye contact from afar so I waited for him…and he came and told me..”do you see that man laying on the beach”..and I did…

I stayed a distance away so not to disturb him…as he was laying there…with stark sections of tree branches torn to shreds around him…but quiet and motionless. Well my interpreter went on to say..”he is laying there..sleeping with his little boy he just buried”..and then I noticed the fresh mound of sand on the beach next to where he was laying.

And that made me stop…the saddness so complete…so enormous…so final…it made us all silent in the breeze coming off the coast.

I turned and cried…and felt completely at a loss for it all. And this was just the begining for me…with so much more yet to come from other locations in India and the Aceh region of nothern Sumatera laying ahead…

Photographic stuff…

For the first time, I brought a digital Mark 2 Cannon along. On hearing I was heading out …I called Sammys in LA and spoke to their digital guy and asked him to send me the best there is and that I needed him to tell me how to use the damn thing in about 30 minutes. Well 2 days in a tin can flying manages to give you just about enough time to figure out all the iconography..which buttons not to press etc and how to make it respond like a traditional camera…which of course its just not but I thought at 30 years in this profession I shouldbe able to read the manual and sort it all out in time before I actually had to use it..and I did well enough with only a few workspace issues which a call west sorted out. I’m sure I’m doing it all wrong but then…I dont really care..I’m getting results as i need so..leaving well enough alone for now.

Its been ok to use..although my left wrist will never be the same..such a heavy thing to haul around. I still took my Leicas and was remissed for not being able to utilize them as the idea was for me to post from the field. Well that hasn’t been easy..in fact in the end I sent a hard drive back to Phoenix as I couldnt manage to get the files up online. My last computer station still used floppies..so…it really is impracticle unless you invest in the global sattelite equipemtn that I would most definitely buy for some 700 USD that would have enabled me to upload on my own sat modem very quickly..so lessons learned I guess.

It works on many levels admittedly but it does feel different..looks different..and im not sure I’m very inspired by it, not the capability but well..I don’t know..maybe its like an “old sweater”…that I miss which it surely is not.

Its managed to hang with me though and they are the stock and trade out here amongst many others except for one shooter that had Leicas around his neck and I felt off that I had to use this monster…read..its great…but does take some getting used to.

It is…a terrible mess here and very hard photographically to render the totality of the devastation… and just as difficult to put it into words. Very much like fire bombing images of Dresden from WW2..complete..perfectly complete distruction and yet, to be involved out here with every walk of life makes you feel like you fit some how…we have all helped each other…tonight an NBC news crew is in my hotel room with nowhere to stay….and it just goes on and on like that…we are all helping each other out. A Medicine Sans Frontier Doctor sat in the hotel dinning room and I asked her…”what she was doing” and she said that she had been sitting in the hotel for 4 days as she couldn’t get to the field with her team of doctors. SO..I had this contact for a jet ranger…that came to me while the guy was looking for a CBS crew..so..the Doctors took me up on the contact and hired the craft and got out there yesterday…so its been one big hand to each of us from each other to get by..and that..has been one of the most interesting aspects of the crisis..people helping people to help people.

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