Built to Last

by David Snyder

Like everyone in this strip of beachside villages in Indonesia's Aceh province, Fatimah and her family know they are lucky to be alive after the tsunami that devastated these coastal communities in late 2004. Though she and her four teenage children survived the waves, their home and all of their possessions did not.

"Two days after the tsunami, we came back here," Fatimah, who goes by only one name, recalls. "It was distressing to see the condition of the house, but at least my family was safe."

Living in a nearby military barracks with her children and husband, Fatimah struggled to adapt to her new life. The months that followed were crowded and cramped, offering little privacy for her and her family.

"Each barracks had two or three families together," Fatimah says. "We cooked together, we lived and slept together in the same room on boxes on the floor."

Having lost everything, Fatimah and her family had little in the way of comfort. Thoughts of the future filled Fatimah with doubt.

"After the tsunami we thought we would not be able to build a new house," Fatimah says. "There was no money."

But then, Fatimah was approached by a CRS assessment team, who met with her and other villagers in Kampung Belakong. Luckily, Fatimah's family qualified, along with 357 other families in the community, to receive a permanent home. Construction began two months later.

Iron Walls

As the house was being built — one of 6,000 permanent homes CRS is building across Aceh province — Fatimah and her family came by often to see the progress and to help clean up the area around the house. Still traumatized by fears of another tsunami, Fatimah took notice of the construction. All of the homes built by CRS are made to resist future earthquakes, common in this region of the world.

"When the house was under construction, sometimes we visited," Fatimah recalls, "And I know that there is iron in the walls, so I know the house is strong."

It is a point that gives Fatimah great comfort. Settling in with her family, she bought some furniture and basic electronics on credit. Her husband is using scrap lumber to build on an additional kitchen space, providing more room to the 135-square-foot house. But living in the same community in which she lived before the tsunami brings with it thoughts of another disaster. Her fears, at least, are eased by her knowledge that the new house is built to last.

"I cannot predict if another tsunami will come," Fatimah says. "But I know that the quality of this house is good."

David Snyder has traveled to more than 30 countries with CRS, working in such crisis zones as Pakistan, Sudan, Angola, the West Bank and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Most recently, David visited those devastated by earthquakes in Kashmir and Indonesia.