reedster: 08.2006

8.22.2006

colombo zoo - wild safari

she has no idea

water break + dirty bench % bf = free chair

trust me, it was really cool....

lunch at cricket cafe - sara & i...mrs m...gabby & evi

knuckles range - the people

jude simion & family - priscilla, jarod

umbrella rock

toothpaste + bitter fruit = bitterer fruit

check it

knuckles range: the up-country weekend

early morning tea - storm blowing in

sunrise & rain - trinco on the horizon

jude simion & I - my boss outside the office

typical knuckles scenery - tea plantations

8.17.2006

transitions

Dear Friends and Supporters!

Your prayers for Sri Lanka and me are greatly appreciated especially in this time of intense conflict. For whatever reason unknown to me, the Lord has not allowed me to continue my work in Trincomalee with any regularity because the constant violence and tension. Although this saddens me to see the country choose to pursue destruction over restoration, I have all confidence in Christ that His Kingdom will come and in His perfect will. It has been His blessing that He has given me peace and a sense of stillness in the midst of such conflict and confusion.

In the meantime, the Lord has proven Himself faithful and allowed me to become more involved with ministry in the capital city. It’s different than the work I have been doing but I have greatly appreciated the relationships and contacts that I have been able to build as a result of this change of environment. Since my relief/development role is shifting and changing, I was giving the opportunity to get involved at a local Methodist Church young adults fellowship and help out Sunday mornings at a local Four Square Gospel Church. This has been one answer to prayer considering that I wanted to get more involved in an intentional ministry which was difficult to out in Trincomalee. Our Lord is good.

This does not mean that I have completely abandoned my responsibilities dealing with Water & Sanitation. I still am actively involved with the Evangelical Alliance of Sri Lanka and their development/relief arm, Alliance Development Trust. It just means that my work is now stationed behind a desk in the head office instead of on the field and office in Trincomalee. Much of this work consists of proposal writing, program development and teaching/training a national Water & Sanitation Coordinator plus additional Water Technicians so that in my departure there will be others who understand the program which allows sustainability and continual betterment of the department. Although I like to be in the midst of the action, the Lord is giving me contentment with where He has placed me and I am looking forward to establishing better relationships with some of the guys at the office. He is faithful and sustains me.

Here are the recent prayer requests that fellow Sri Lankan believers and I are praying and fasting for:

1. For the nation of Sri Lanka to know Christ and be released from its bondage of violence
2. For the church to unite and speak the Gospel
3. For NCEASL/ADT staff as they serve the Lord and their fellow citizens
4. That the Lord might use me for His glory and Names sake

I gladly invite you to join us in prayer and fasting according to how the Lord leads you. Your support and encouragement has been a tremendous blessing and uplifting. I praise our Father for the fellowship He gives us in the body.

Recently I have been attempting to utilize my blog and updates in a way that provide a better flow of communication and understanding between those who are interested in the recent events in Sri Lanka and in my life. So if you have any comments or particular things that you would like to see and hear about please let me know with a short email or comment. These could be specific pictures of the work that I am involved in, personal testimonies of the people that I work with, background information on the country of Sri Lanka, personal profiles, and any other sort of interactive information.

Securely His,

Benjamin Reed

8.10.2006

kantale relief 3

three to a mat

those without a tent

unloading the lorry

i thought i would get in on the action

kantale relief 2

refugee camp [school yard] - now home to 3,900+ people

refugee camp - tents to the horizon

Minister's of Restoration - man in blue was friendly and the one in white to his right was grumpy but they did have nice rides...check out the bodyguards behind them

Muslim woman and children in the school

kantale relief 1

packing relief goods at the head office - our saturday & sunday

a family pack - 5kg rice, 2kg dhal, 1kg sugar, 500mg tea, 500mg milk, crackers, candles, and matches x 1000 = a whole lot of weight

loading the lorry in cmb when we should have been leaving for kantale

lost in translation...rather lost in kantale, waiting for our WFP contact to show up

midnight relief

In light of the recent violence in Muthur and the influx in refugees, the National Christian Evangelical Association of Sri Lanka [NCEASL] and their relief/development arm Alliance Development Trust [ADT], decided to put together a flash relief trip. I was fortunate enough to be part of it.

It all started on Monday, August 7th, when we put together a lorry of relief supplies. The relief goods consisted primarily of dry rations, toys for children, bedding, and clothing for the refugees fleeing the conflict in Muthur [South across the bay from Trinco]. We were carrying enough food for five days for approximately 1000 families. Most of the refugees fleeing Muthur are Muslim, Tamil and then Sinhala.

Raju a young man from admin, Edward our IT guy, a liberal Muslim woman Sheen [our contact person] and I made up the team of four which went on this excursion. The plan was very basic and simple on paper. Drive to Kantale, located 40km outside of Trinco where 22,000+ refugees had massed, and drop off the supplies in the lorry and then return to Colombo that same evening. Simple it was not. Scheduled departure time was 9am but when I got to the head office the lorry had still not been loaded which we didnt finish loading until 11.30. This pushed our departure time to noon only complicated by the fact that we were told by the lorry driver that the load was disproportionate and that we had to rearrange it. So we stopped just outside of Colombo and the four of us did that. All this to say it was blazing balls of fire outside and I was sweating profusely.

To make matters worse the lorry driver said he needed to stop and get cloths along the way so I told him he could but he had to make that his lunch break. Up to this point we had been traveling in convoy at about 40 kph but often times much slower than that. For those of you that dont know that is painfully slow and you can imagine how I felt. At that point we decided to drive ahead to get lunch and then pick up some more supplies in Krunegula to load into the pickup that I was driving. By this time it was 3.30pm. We later linked up at Habarana, which is just before entering the jungle section of the road and decided to convoy the rest of the way from there since it was dark and the checkpoints would be increasing in number. We got stopped at the second check point at which one of the policemen was making it difficult extremely difficult for us. They searched us thoroughly. So much so that they made us not just open up the individual family relief packs but they also made us open the commercially foil sealed milk packets to make sure they were indeed powered milk. I was getting frustrated at this point especially when he began testing the wax candles. This check point added an extra hour onto our grueling slow trip. So by the time we reached Kantale it was 9.30pm and then there was the confusion of finding the right refugee camp that we were going to.

Our contact person in Kantale was with the WFP [world food program – UN agency] and it took us about an hour to get linked up with him because of the massive amounts of people and vehicles on the road. So by 10.30 we started unloading the lorry but the only problem was that most people had been unloading all day and were sick of it so they stood by and watched. Since we also had to unload the pickup truck, the Muslim woman and I split from the others and took all the bedding, toys, and cloths to another part of the camp. Its hard to describe what the camp was like and unless you've been in a fresh refugee situation its hard to explain. The one word that comes to mind is, crazy, because this town had no way of cooping with 22,000+ refuges so there were people everywhere. In tents, on lawns, in the streets and its 11.00pm at night. Some were sleeping while others were awake, there were kids without parents, injured, all mixed together as tuk tuks, motorcycles, vehicles, and trucks all buzzed by on the over crowed dirt roads. Quite a sight to see. Everyone including the relief workers looked very tired, dazed and confused. Amidst this chaos it was good to see that the most essential needs were being covered and (i)NGO’s were busy working although the conditions were less than satisfactory. This country is becoming experts in relief. All the previous fighting, then the tsunami and now back to war.

It was just amazing to see the high density of people in one area of all different economic and social statuses. I’ll send pictures when I can download them so that there is somewhat of an idea of what it looked like. Because it was night I wasnt able to get a lot of quality pictures of the grand scale of things and then it didnt help that my camera ran out of batteries 15min into taking pictures. A funny side note. When I was working on unloading the other relief items in the pickup, some ministers came by the refugee camp. These were members of parliament [equivalent to our president’s cabinet members] and they had their military escort and full bodyguard detail. What a contrast these guys made with their brand new land cruisers, tough-guy body guards and full press unit. Some how I happened to be standing right where they were coming by so I got caught up in their big entourage. Through the formalities of this procession I was eventually introduced to them. One minister was much friendlier than the other and we talked for a little while because he was curious as to why I was the only white guy around, especially since it was almost midnight. So after our quick chat they talked with other volunteers, coordinators and made sure their video guys captured everything. It was all very political with me in the center of it, getting my picture taken with the Minister of Restoration.

So with that all said and done we finished unloading both vehicles at around midnight. The relief workers and those in charge thanked us for our contribution and after the formalities [pictures, documentations, etc] we were free to head back to Colombo but we had one more stop at Raju’s cousins house. He had promised to give her money when he came and they also invited us to have dinner at their house. They were all well asleep when we showed up but had dinner waiting for us. Recently, his cousins lost their father a month back when he was shot in Trinco by the military for some reason. Their was no investigation and the few details and things were sorta pushed aside, so really no justice in the end. Sad story but in this part of the country stories like this are not uncommon. Finally, at 1am we left to head back to Colombo tired and sore from our long day. Soon everyone was sleeping and it was just me which was fine because I was just happy that I did not have to wait for the lorry on our way back. It took us over 9 hours to get to Kantale with the lorry and it only took my 3 hours to return to Colombo. No traffic, no cops, nothing. Arriving at 4am I had to drop everyone off so I was able to get into bed just before 5 which isnt to bad considering the circumstance. The next day I didnt show up to the office at the normal time of 9. I heard rumors that they want to send another load on Thursday or Friday. I think I might pass this time or not plan to be the driver.

8.09.2006

paradise

the couple in paradise

8.03.2006

text messages

Here are samples from the last two days of text messages that I get from our security tree in Trincomalee. These are the current ongoing events in Muthur, just south of Trincomalee across the bay.

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/1/2006 6:45 AM
Confirmed. 18 Soldiers killed by claremore attack on bus, many injured near Kantale on Seruvila Road.

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/1/2006 2:24 PM
Stay away from navy base and down town

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/1/2006 2:46 PM
Reported :.Artilery firing at the Trincomalee Naval base from Sampoor continues. 5 suicide boats approching the habor were destroyed by the Navy. 9 cannons fell on the Naval Base.

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/1/2006 7:50 PM
Inbetween pudavakatu and pulmodai area navy and ltte in the sea area are fighting on going confirmed. Msg received 835 pm.

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/2/2006 6:48 AM
Reported:.Kattaparichchan and palathopur army detachments and Muttur Police under LTTE attack.

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/2/2006 6:52 AM
Reported:.LTTE advance to government controlled palathopur, Kattaparichchan areas. Fighting in three fronts. Palathopur detachment, mutur police and Kattaparichchan camp being attacked. Shells falling on mutur town and even ali oluva junction Seruvila.

Contact: +94773…….
Date: 8/2/2006 6:56 AM
Muslim leader in muthur advised by elilan that muslims should leave muthur. Fighting is ongoing.

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/2/2006 7:10 AM
Confirmed: ltte entered mutur town!and tries to capture polis station and jetty.At least 20 injured,number of casualties unknown.civilians gather in public places like schools etc. Heavy fighting is on for last 7hrs

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/2/2006 9:58 AM
PIN will leave Tco at 1430. If somebody wants to join, can contact me 0773…... Jana

Contact: +94773……
Date: 8/2/2006 10:04 AM
Can you pass on the message that gtz will leave trinco today at 1100 am if other agencies want to join our convoy be at our office at 1030 nepc building inner harbour road and let them contact me: 0773……

8.01.2006

volatile trincomalee

once again the Trincomalee district and the city where i am suppose to work has been victimized by escalating violence. i dont have time to go into all the details tonight so i will post pictures showing where the incident occurred and links to what went on at that marked location.

history was always a subject that i enjoyed very much. so here is a quick geography and current events lesson.

first is a picture of sri lanka. i have highlighted the Trincomalee district where i work, i live in Trincomalee the city when i am not in Colombo [Sri Lanka's capital on the southwest coast]. by the Lord's grace He allowed the Maultsby ladies and myself to be in Colombo when all these things started happening.

second is a zoomed up portion of the Trincomalee district with all the cool little village names, half of which i never even knew existed [click to enlarge]. the area highlighted in yellow represents high tension where there has been physical clashes between the government and the rebels. the red stars represent specific incidents which i will link to a web site. they are numbered according to the basic time line of events. the green star is where my house is located in Trincomalee.

incidents since July 25:
1. the rebels blocked the sluice gate on the Mavil Aaru river blocking water to over 50,000 acers of padi fields and neglecting water to over 60,000 people in government controlled areas. In retaliation the government launched multi-barrel artillery, airstrikes and advanced troops towards rebel controlled area in order to reopen the sluice gate and restore water to communities. rebel leader considers this an act of war. tamilnet article here

2. military bus was attacked by a fragmentation mine killing 19 soldiers. bbc news article here. tamilnet article here.

3. Sampoor is a rebel controlled area that is a focus of Sri Lanka airforce attacks. reports from rebels say 5 cadres killed with some civilian casualties. government reports suggest of 30+ rebels killed.

4. rebels launch mortor and naval attack against Trincomalee naval base. reports of multiple Sri Lanka navy ships damaged, 8 Sri Lanka troopers killed, 9 rebel suicide boats sunk with additional reports pending. tamilnet article here. bbc article here.

5. [green star] this gives perspective to where my house is in regards to all that is going on. if i were to be in Trincomalee i would be able to hear all that was going on very clearly, seperated by only a few km.

i'm sorry this is just a quickie update. i will keep you all informed on what continues to happen and when i plan to return to Trincomalee. at the moment we shall wait and pray for when we shall make our return.

there should be more pictures of Sara, Mrs. Maultsby and i coming up soon. ciao

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reedster