More on Disaster Tourists

Aid agency officials have a disparaging expression to describe the thousands of foreign volunteers who showed up here independently in the weeks after the tsunami. They call them "disaster tourists." It's true that many of the volunteers contribute little to the relief effort, and are onlookers rather than real participants. But some have found a real niche for themselves, and have probably done more to help Sri Lanka, in a shorter space of time, than many professional aid workers.

Take Jane Thompson, a 40-year-old Englishwoman who rents out holiday villas in her other, more normal life. When the tsunami struck on Dec. 26, she was celebrating Christmas and New Year on a small farm in France that she is renovating with her partner, Steve Coles, and 18-year-old daughter, Jessie. Her holiday plans went out the window when she turned on the television and saw the horrifying pictures from Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

"It wasn't really Christmas after seeing all that," says Steve, who also is 40.

A friend put her in touch with a Sri Lankan living in France, who found her a place to stay near Weligama, a beach cabana overlooking the sea that Jane calls "the palace." She was out here by Jan. 10. Steve followed a week later, leaving Jessie in charge of the farm.

As I've mentioned before, a government ban on building within 100 meters from the sea has delayed reconstruction work here. But by asking around, Jane stumbled across a fisherman resettlement project begun a couple of years ago under a previous government, and then abandoned for lack of funds. Since all the official planning permissions were already secured, it was the perfect place to launch a pilot post-tsunami construction program, one of the first of its kind in Sri Lanka.

Around the time that Jane found the unfinished village, she also ran into Geoffrey, who was looking for projects to support. He put up the first $50,000, drawing on a $100,000 donation to Adopt Sri Lanka from the Washington law firm of Akin Gump. That's enough money to complete the first 16 of 104 houses in the village. The remaining 88 houses have been put up for "adoption" at www.adoptsrilanka.com.

As part of the deal with the villagers, every family has to contribute their own labor to the program. Local masons, block builders, plumbers and electricians have been hired to do the more difficult work, but the villagers will have to finish off their own homes. Steve and Jane both feel that people don't appreciate something they are getting entirely for free.

If all goes well, the project will become a model for other villages elsewhere. We'll let you know how things go.

-- Michael Dobbs

By washingtonpost.com |  February 10, 2005; 11:00 AM ET  | Category:  Michael Dobbs
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