Brick by Brick:
Rebuilding Houses for Tsunami Victims
19 August 2005 — Vellannathuruthu, Alappad Panchayat,
Kollam District, Kerala
As the morning sun finds its way through the
canopy of coconut trees that shade Vellannathuruthu,
a group of Amma's devotees and disciples plods
back and forth along one of the seaside village's
dirt pathways carrying loads of bricks—mostly
upon their heads.
It's hard work. But the men, women—and
occasional child—work steadily and without
complaint in an effort to complete as quickly
as possible the 1,400 houses the Ashram is constructing
in Alappad Panchayat as part of its tsunami-rehabilitation
programme. |
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The construction has been going on for the past couple
of months, and with 1,360 foundations already complete,
the work currently at hand is erecting the brick walls.
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The problem is that
the interior locations of Alappad Panchayat are
accessible almost exclusively via various cramped
and winding dirt pathways—pathways that
often pregnant cows have trouble negotiating,
not to mention lorries carrying a several tonnes
of bricks. To make matters more difficult, the
monsoon season has rendered the land very muddy,
and small ponds are now overflowing, often submerging
the paths altogether. Therefore the lorries have
unloaded the bricks in central locations throughout
the panchayat, and
the ashramites are spending their mornings schlepping
them from point A to point B, over and over again.
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To be frank, at the end of a four-hour shift,
the men and women look quite warn out, but spirits
remain high, as their motivation lies in helping
families that have been homeless for eight months
return to normalcy. "When I first saw the
images of the tsunami on television from Europe,
I felt so sad that I couldn't be there to help
in person," says Ed De Wilde, a 54-year
old Belgium man who is currently visiting Amritapuri
with his family. "I gave a donation, but
it wasn't the same thing as being there to help
in person. So now I am happy that I can be here
and really help the tsunami victims."
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Most of the Westerners still prefer to carry
the bricks with their arms, either cradling a
stack in front of their body as they walk or
filling up a large burlap rice sack and slinging
it over their back. But a few have taken to the
traditional Indian method—filing a basket with seven
or eight bricks and carrying it on top of their
head. One Westerner when asked how he felt after
using the Indian method for several hours joked, "About
three inches shorter."
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Using a wooden board as a platform, some of the brahmacharis
regularly make trips with as many as 16 bricks piled
up in this fashion. Adding to this a nice wade through
knee-deep water can make each trip a real exercise
in mindfulness. But according to ashram history, 16
bricks is nothing. When Amma's first batch of brahmacharis
were constructing the Amritapuri temple, one of the
current sannyasins set the Ashram record,
carrying 45 bricks atop his head.
The brick seva will most likely
continue for several more months. With each house
requiring 13,000 bricks, it means that there
are 18.2 million bricks to be moved about in
all. But this figure in no way daunts Amma's
workforce. "We are not doing anything," says
one of the senior brahmacharis helping with the
work. "Amma is doing everything, so what
is there to worry about."
—Tulasi |
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