Posted by mair on December 30, 2004, at 1:04:54
In reply to Absolutely sickened saddened, anyone else?, posted by jasmineneroli on December 29, 2004, at 20:16:11
Yeah, I know what you mean. Sometimes I'm riveted by the details, and overwelmed, but it's hard to stop thinking about it. I worry about the fact that the warm weather and lack of help and large numbers of dead means that in some places they're just throwing people into mass graves without even being able to take the time to identify them. So for so many survivors, there may not be the closure of confirming the death of a loved one. And for me, it's very hard not to picture my brother and sister and their spouses and children all being there, which was not so far off. My brother is a middle school science teacher; I find myself wondering if he would see danger in the way the water receded right before the deluge. Would he have figured out that they needed to get out of there; would he have been able to get everyone mobilized quickly enough. It sounds like everyone had so little time.
Some of the affected beaches in Thailand are ones where my sister has been many times. I (and I've discovered, she) wonder whether she can ever go back to Phuket; or whether it will always now carry too many awful reminders of tragedy on such a large scale.
But beyond personalizing it, I can't get my mind around the sheer incomprehensible numbers of dead. Look how our country reacted to the very tragic death of 3000+ people on 9/11. This catastrophe will likely kill more than 30 times that number.
Somewhere on the yahoo news page I got directed to the names and addresses of a number of different private agencies engaged in relief work. But whatever I can do feels just so inadequate.
Mair
poster:mair
thread:434245
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20041226/msgs/435596.html