OK, OK, OK… you all are right… i sit at the computer all day, read a few other people’s blogs, but somehow can’t manage to say anything myself. At the very least, i can offer a wrap up on what I experienced in Pakistan.

Winter was just beginning in those highlands when i spent a fascinating week getting to know some of the most hospitable and down-trodden people I’ve ever met. As my team left, a German team replaced up, to continue the effort — they planned on building an additional 150 shelters. We had used up all the supplies by the time we left, so the Germans had nothing to do until a helicopter came with more materials for them. They ended up having to wait 12 days (!!), but were able to complete the project.

Now winter is drawing to a close. All told the agency i workedA Pakistani man works on rebuilding a destroyed section of his home, stone by stone with was able to help build over 6000 shelters throughout the earthquake zone, which contributed to the well-being of over 30,000 individuals. Compared to the 4 Million who were left homeless by the quake, the number seems small. But for those of us involved, I see it as an awesome achievement (especially considering how quickly everything was thrown together, to be sure)!

And now spring is here. Those structures we set up are being converted into more permanent homes. The materials are being reused, or the existing shelters expanded to provide more living space. The agency i worked with is turning its efforts to longer term projects like training teachers (many, many were killed as the quake happened during school hours) and rebuilding roads that are still blocked by landslides. The Pakistani have weathered the worst of the damage, but the road to regaining the lost infrastructure is still long.

It is my ongoing prayer that the international community continues to recognize the responsibility we all have to one another. That those who were in some way touched by the tragic quake in Pakistan continue to support those directly affected. And that ground gained by the side-by-side working of neighbors near and far would not ever again turn back to relating through judgemental stereotypes or convenient reductions.

Merry Christmas to all! I hope your holiday was filled with love, and the joys of giving linger long. Personally, i really enjoyed my first married Christmas with Sarah’s terrific family. I love my in-laws, and all the rich holiday traditions they have so eagerly made me a part of. Thanks, Riggios!

Right now, Muslims in Pakistan are feeling the anticipation for Eid ul-Adha (Jan 10th, this year) where gifts are given, with a particular concern for the poor. Christmas is not widely celebrated in Pakistan, but while i was there, i heard many references to “December 25th”. It wasn’t in the context of presents, holidays, or shopping though. This is the oft-quoted date for when the winter snows get started - a very present threat in the mind of many a homeless mountain villager.

I was saddened by the negative association with one of my most joyful days of the year. I have been motivated to pray for a delay in the impending onset of winter. Right now, that seems like the best gift i can offer my Pakistani friends. Current weather reports seem to indicate that heavy snows have not yet started, thankfully. Maybe this year, Dec. 25th passed with a little joy after all!

May this gift continue to be given, day by day, as more shelters get built!

Just the other day there was a 6.8 quake, right through the same region that was blasted two months ago by The Big One. When i first heard about this one, i thought it was an “aftershock.” But it is now being classified as an independent event.

I experienced aftershocks just about every other night while i was in Pakistan. In most cases, they were over before i figured out what was going on, but by the end of my time, i learned that if i heard that rumbling in the distant mountains, i should get ready for the ground to quiver a little. While none that i experienced were severe, they had a tremendous impact on Pakistanis around me. The locals reacted immediately, hurrying out of buildings (many of which are cracked and just look ready to collapse as a result of The Big One), and checking in with loved ones in other cities. You could see the terror in their eyes. Having lived through a full FIVE minutes of swaying land, collapsing buildings, and no foundations, it’s more than understandable.

While causing little physical damage, these aftershocks are poignant reminders to the Pakistanis of all they lost, all they suffered. It is an on-going source of fear — many villagers i met would not sleep in their houses, even though the structures had survived The Big One. The possibility of an aftershock that could bring their house down was simply too real. So even those who didn’t lose their homes were greatly appreciative of our shelters, which are significantly more earthquake resistant.

Similarly, i have been experiencing the aftershocks of my time in Pakistan. I find myself drifting back to the pictures i took, and the significant memories they represent. Stories from my friends (like Greg, Jeremy, and Danger) keep my experiences fresh. And perhaps most powerfully: my dreams. While my body sleeps, my mind is still engaged in the on-going work of building shelters, trudging through snow, taking tea, and desperate attempts to save lives in a handful of different circumstances. I’m still sorting through so much of the emotion, the destruction, the cultural distinctives, and the ways that i personally both gave of myself and built into who i was. I’ll let my subconscience sort it out while i sleep, but when i awake i feel connected in a small way to my friends in Pakistan who are reminded of the harsh reality and essential instability of life with every aftershock.

We did it. After what felt like just a few moments among the amazing people of the Hindu-Kush mountains and what felt like two weeks on airplanes, I have safely returned home. It is such a relief to be reunited with my Bride.

The trip was simply amazing. Neither words nor the dinky pictures i took with my camera phone will be able to adequately communicate all that i experienced (but as a teammate demonstrates, a camera is enough to engage a small army of children!). I’m hoping that the stories i share here over the next few days are able to communicate some small elements of the truths i learned, the beauty of the people i met, what was accomplished, and what remains.

We did it — the various teams worked to get hundreds of shelters built through out the earthquake zone. We got the materials we needed. We beat the snow. We kept an emphasis on developing relationships with the locals. We trained them in the construction. Lives will be saved. Thank God.

My team (including Jon W) spent two days bending pipes to be used in shelter construction, and then about a week in a mountain valley helping villagers set up the shelters. We returned Monday to Phoenix, AZ for a debrief.

The Pakistani people are not terrorists. They are not nuclear war mongers. They are not stoic, unfriendly, or hateful. While i always doubted these negative stereotypes, I had nothing with which to replace them. Before i found out first hand, i believed these lies (at worst), or forced myself to think blankly about Pakistanis and other middle easterners (at best).

But now I have real faces with names, real stories and lives, real interactions and experiences that give me a much more factual and positive picture of who exactly it is who lives in Pakistan. I am very grateful for this, and hope that some of this alternative vision is communicated as i share my stories in future posts.

Stay tuned for more soon!

An early morning flight took me to Arizona today for Pakistan earthquake relief orientation. There were about 50 other men going in this first wave. We got to hear a lot more details about what the situation is in-country. We will be setting up a base camp in a town that was not completely demolished by the quake. From there we will drive/fly/carry shelter building supplies into small villages that need them higher up the mountains. The shelters are made from 4 bent steel pipes (we will carry the pipe bending machines with us), covered with a half-cylinder of corrugated steel. A layer of foam provides much needed insulation. They can be set up in as fast as half an hour.

I leave in 2 hours for yet another early morning flight… PHX -> LAX -> Hong Kong -> Bangkok -> Islamabad. It’s really happening. I’m very sad to leave my beautiful bride behind — she is always such an awesome travel companion, with excellent cultural and spiritual insights. I love her so much. I’m so grateful for all her support of me in this endeavor.

I will be working primarily with a team of 3 other guys, Jonny included (Greg is with a longer-term group). I was honored to be chosen as team leader. I think that will be a good experience for me.

Please pray that we are able to get all of the necessary supplies to the base camp, and then get them to where they are most needed. With so much happening in the country right now (including 5.5 - level aftershocks), logistics can be horrendous.

Thank you again to all who so generously contributed to this effort. I really couldn’t do it without you!

I don’t know how much internet access i will have… but rest assured that i will post as often as i can!

peace.

+brooke

Today, I had the opportunity to let my church know about my trip to Pakistan (one week away!). St. Joseph Parish is known for being concerned for the poor and the hurting, and the parishners proved this true once again! People were very enthusiastic in their support for my trip.

I created an info sheet that i was handing out. I had a journal in which people could write prayers for Pakistan that i will take with me to pray while i’m there (feel free to leave similar in the comments!). Many people offered financial contributions. In total, just over $500 was generously given! It came in the form of donations from $1 to $100. I’m so grateful for each one of these gifts. A lot of people had a decent awareness of the situation, and expressed sincere gratitude that they could help send me, and that i was going.

Thank you, my St. Joe’s community, for all the love and support!

(this puts me about almost half way to my goal of $3000… any beyond this will go to supporting my team members).

Aftershock In Pakistan
CBS News Online

Even if you’ve read about the earthquake, even if you’ve seen the pictures, nothing can prepare you for being there. It’s hard to imagine that all the destruction happened in two minutes.

The towns look like they had been bombarded by a brutal air force for weeks.
It’s hard to believe that this happened five weeks ago. It could have been yesterday. Nothing has changed. Even the horizon is still strewn with rubble.

There are sights which defy belief. Streets are littered with clothing, sent up by charities and discarded by people. They don’t need tattered shirts.
They need shelter, food, water, medical care.

The large relief agencies and governments are doing what they can in the cities and the towns, building tent cities for the homeless and handing out food.

But go up into the mountains and you will find a different story.
Helicopters drop food to villages, but there are no relief workers on the ground. Except for 13 paramedics from New York City.

They came to Pakistan with no backing or support or agenda except to help.
They wound up in Pakistani Kashmir, a disputed territory of undisputed beauty.

When they were dropped off here, Chris Summers was surprised to learn they were the only aid workers there. “I can’t believe we haven’t seen anyone else in this valley,” Summers says. “There’s such a need here. You know? And we’re isolated here. I don’t really know what’s happening in the rest of the country. But in this valley, Jeelum Valley, an enormous need and how is it possible that it’s just us, you know, 13 knuckleheads from New York here?”

Knuckleheads? This is Osama bin Laden country, dotted with training camps for jihadists, where Islam is at its most radical and America is seen as the enemy.

But now, people were walking for miles to be treated by the Americans. Some 200 a day were making their way to the clinic, people who were being cared for for the first time since the earthquake.

Joe Connelly works at St. Vincents Hospital in midtown Manhattan but is now cleaning wounds and treating infections that could kill if left untreated.

“I mean we’re saving lives, many lives, every single day. You know, as a paramedic in New York City once in a while you have a direct influence on life and death. Here it’s happening every half an hour,” says Connelly.

In New York their job is to keep a patient alive and drive that ambulance to the nearest hospital. Here there are no hospitals or ambulances. No stretchers, either, except one which they made out of floorboards.

Their clinic is a tent next to a military hospital which had been demolished. There was no running water and no electricity, so they were operating by flashlight. And there were tremors and aftershocks all the time.

Yaser Bashir Coker brought his little sister to the clinic and says he had never seen Americans before coming to the clinic.

His first impression? “They are very cooperative, beautiful and handsome.”

And we called 4 days of delay an inexcusably long time for relief to reach New Orleans…

Earthquakes don’t get names, like hurricanes do. They aren’t as rare or exotic as Tsunamis. Live video footage of the action is never captured. And we just don’t know that much about Pakistan anyway (at least nothing good).

So it was easy for the world-wide media to let it drop from the headlines. It was easy for Americans to say “Oh, i already gave money after the hurricane”. It was easy for me to assume that the relief efforts would be taken care of by the “international community” (i.e. not me).

The earthquake struck on 2005 Oct 8, near the contested Kashmir region of Pakistan and India. The immediate death tolls were 20,000. It soon doubled, then reached 60,000. it now stands at more than 80,000. With over 3 million people made homeless in one day, this count will surely continue to rise as the cold Himilayan winter descends.

With areas no where near as accessible as those affected by the tsunami, rubble blocking roads, aftershocks undoing vital clearing efforts, and freezing temperatures working their way down the mountains this is simply will not be easily dismissed.

But the international community came to the rescue, right? Money from national and individual donors should make clean up a snap, right? Well, it might, but much of promised money is not getting delivered, and individuals are suffering from “compassion fatigue”. Helicopters, supplies, cash, support people, etc. are scarse in Pakistan.

WFP Regional Director for the Middle East, Central Asia and Eastern Europe, Amir Abdulla said: “We must have much more funding, much sooner, to gain as much speed as humanly possible in the face of gigantic logistics difficulties.”

Pakistan is finally getting help from the UN to publicize the ongoing need. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is personally touring the country today:

Annan will attend a donor’s conference on Saturday aiming to raise the US $5.2 billion Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf says is needed for the Asian nation to recover from the disaster. Musharraf has called funds received so far from international donors “negligible”…

“We received some resources, but need much, much more to be able to help the people,” Annan said on arrival.

How things are still this bad FIVE weeks after the event i do not know. But it is clear that no more time can be wasted. It is clear to me that i need to give, not just my money but my time, my energy, my strength, my self. i can offer some practical love to those who are feeling forgotten by the world. It is an honor to do so.

I feel as though it was not only the mountains that trembled. Among the houses and lives that were shaken apart, my complacency, self-righteousness, and blindness to the needs of my fellow humans has crumbled. i didn’t hear the earth tremble, but i know the sound as that of a wake-up call to the complete interdependance of all humanity. i suppose that if i were to name this disaster, i would call it “WARNING” — a reminder that we cannot live our lives solely for our own nation, our own families, or even ourselves.

Today my application to join an organization to assist in earthquake relief in Pakistan was officially accepted. i mailed my visa application, and bought travellers health insurance. This is really happening! I’m going to leave on November 28th, which is coming up fast!

But i can’t do this alone. Sarah and i both need the loving support of our community of friends and family. We need your prayers. i am also accepting financial contributions, since no funding is provided. A round trip ticket costs about $2000, which is my primary expense. Please consider this unique way to contribute to the relief effort. $500, $50, or $5 — any amount will help get me there! You can send me; i will be your delegate to the muslims of the mountains that the quake left homeless. Let’s do this together!

Encouraging messages and PayPal donations can be sent to brooke <at> wantmorelife <dot> net. Or you can mail a check to Brooke Bassage-Glock / 409 23rd Ave South #601 / Seattle, WA 98144 (i am changing my last name to Riggio, but it isn’t in effect yet). Unfortunately, because of the rapid response required for this trip, i can’t set up an account with the agency, so this isn’t tax deductable.

Thank you for your partnership in this effort. I simply wouldn’t even attempt a thing like this without knowing that my friends and family are behind me.

blessed to be a blessing,

+brooke

Well, after thinking, praying, weighing the options, Sarah and i decided that i should go to Pakistan to assist in setting up shelters for homeless earthquake victims.

The quake left 3 million homeless. Pakistan’s national army has been heading up the reconstruction, but their resources have quickly become tapped out. They continue to call for international assistance. FrontRelief, the organization i will go through, has had contacts in Pakistan for many years, and has a good working relationship with the government. FrontRelief has about 1,500 shelters that could be set up immediately if they had the personnel to distribute them. Rather than further taxing the efforts of those already coordinating so much, they are offering to bring in people to assist.

It is a very exciting decision. The hardest part is definitely thinking of spending that much time apart, especially since we are still feeling very “newly-wed” still. My work situation should provide enough flexibility to let me take the time off, and we are trusting that the money will be provided somehow.

The plan is currently to leave on the 28th of Nov, do one day of orientation, 2 days of travel to Pakistan (20 hours of flying, plus some time zone shifts), 14 days of in-country work setting up shelters where mountain-dwelling families can spend the winter, and then returning for one day of debrief. This time line is one of the earliest teams going. We want to leave as soon as possible to start to get things set up before the weather worsens (and so i can be back for some of Advent, my favorite liturgical season). If i can assemble my own team, we might be able to leave a day or two earlier.

So, first of all, i am looking for a team. Culturally speaking, women can’t really do this kind of work in Pakistan. I want to bring three other guys with me, men i know and trust with whom i can face the mountains, the cold, and the hard work. Guys, if you are reading this, you need to consider coming with me. The need is urgent. This is what we are made for.

Financial contributions are also appreciated. This isn’t a funded position, and we are covering the costs out of pocket. Please consider giving to this unique relief effort.

More news to come soon!!

+brooke