Tuesday 28 December 2004

Pic of the day: Sometimes I can not honestly say "I feel your pain" because, well, I just don't. But even so, it can't always be ignored. Even if we weren't there, we will still remember. (Screenshot from the anime Aishiteru ze Baby.)

Tsunami in paradise

Today I will take a step aside from my self-centered musings and reflect on a recent event that may have a steadily growing impact on the society I live in.

On the second day of Christmas, an earthquake of unusual strength (possibly 9 on the Richter scale) hit the sea floor outside northern Indonesia. In addition to being strong, the quake was also quite long. It caused a tsunami, a great wave, that crashed into the countries around the Sea of India. Indonesia was badly hurt, of course, but also Thailand got heavily hit by the wave. On the other side of the sea, Sri Lanka experienced great losses. India seems to have weathered the onslaught better, and from Burma (Myanmar) there is as usual little or no information forthcoming. Although we know that the parts of Thailand closest to the Burmese border were hit particularly hard.

This matters because this part of Thailand is a favorite tourist resort for Scandinavians (although many other westerners come there as well). So far 21 Norwegians are found dead, but 430 are missing in the direct hit areas of the wave, and more than 800 more were probably in the vicinity or passing through. It is a distinct possibility that several hundred Norwegians and around 1000 Swedes may have been killed in the "tidal wave".

(Tsunamis are not really tidal wave, but are compared to the tides because of the enormous amount of water in them. The waves are usually low, at least until they reach land, but they just keep coming and coming and coming. Depending on the shape of the coast, they may rise to towering walls of water, or they may just slide in and rise and rise and rise. In either case, they are deadly, although in the second case a good swimmer may get lucky and not hit anything when dragged around by the currents.)

***

This may not be obvious to the casual reader, but I am Norwegian. I have lived in Norway all my life. I am not a nationalist and do not even truly consider Norwegian lives more important than other human lives (although I generally consider my own life more important than others, but that's different). Would I have even mentioned this catastrophe if none of the more than 100 000 dead were Norwegians? Perhaps, perhaps not. As it is, it totally dominates the news media here in Norway. Papers, radio, surely TV too (although I don't have that) and of course the Internet news pages. The Prime Minister looks very serious and kinda sad on behalf of the people, because this may well be the greatest tragedy to hit our nation in peacetime. That's a fascinating thought, given that it happened so far away: If you center the globe on the epicenter then Norway is not nearly visible from space (and the other way around, of course).

In addition to all the white and mostly somewhat blond Norwegians who happened to be in the tropics at the time, there are also a large number of immigrants – mostly Tamils from Sri Lanka – who have lost their families and friends. Of course, they kinda lost that when they fled the country, but they probably intended to meet them again someday.

***

I did not intend to say this when I started writing, but ... isn't it soon time to abolish this idea of nations? Even the wars these days are more often than not within nations, or the ethnic groups involved live in several countries which are then pulled into the conflict. Same goes for religious groups. And nature has never respected the borders of men. Diseases, pollution and sudden disasters like these, none of them care a whit about lines on the map. Endangered species know no other borders than those fashioned by nature. Unless we want to join them, we should reconsider as well.

***

There are rumors that American scientists realized the magnitude of the quake and tried to warn their colleagues in the countries that were at risk, but could not reach anyone. There are rumors that Thailand's meteorological institute considered warning the populace but decided not to because it could scare away the tourists. The fact remains that they decided not to issue a warning, but most likely this was because they did not believe a tsunami could happen there. It hasn't in recent history, usually they happen in the Pacific (that's why the name is Japanese). Of course, if they believed the wave would hit with any noticeable force, they would have known that the effect on tourism would be much worse than any warning. After all, even though the average Thai is less educated than we in Scandinavia (or even North America), meteorologists are still highly educated professionals. They just aren't experts on earth and sea as much as on atmosphere. Thailand probably doesn't have a milieu of scientists dedicated to studying seismology, like the countries more likely to depend on it.

There will be many more rumors in the days to come, I am sure. There are already two markedly different opinions on how much help the Norwegian government gave to its citizens abroad. The government claims to have done all that was possible and certainly more than our Nordic neighbors, while tourists interviewed in radio and newspapers say they saw nothing of the supposed Norwegian support but got help from Swedish officials and travel companies. Those who return from Thailand also praise the Thais for their heroic efforts to help strangers. On the bright side, there is no doubt that the Norwegian government is rolling out quite a bit of financial aid to the countries asking for it.

The best aid we can offer, though, is probably to continue visiting and continue to trade with them. (Not counting the sex tourists, who should probably be put out of their misery for the good of all, since they kill a lot of people by spreading diseases quietly around, not least among children.)

***

Of course, in the end we are all going to die, whether we live in a hut or a castle. Still, there is a time for everything, and this was an untimely death for many. You may ask why God allows things like this to happen. Then again, God may ask why he allows us to live in the first place, and we really don't want Him to think too hard about that. The simple fact is that we don't live in Paradise, and even when we make one after our own fashion, it is not the real thing. If there is a Paradise in this world, it is in the heart, not on the beach.