3/28/2006: Refugee camp in Somalia
 

http://cellar.org/2006/somaliahouses.jpg

This woman is in Somalia, just west of Mogadishu, in front of makeshift houses at a camp there, probably as people try to avoid the fighting.

When I saw this entry in today's Washington Post Day in Photos, I was struck by two things. One, how massive this encampment is, and thus how terrible it must be.

Two, how it eerie to see this one, after enjoying last Thursday's IotD.

http://cellar.org/2006/igloo1.jpg

Uhm.. I wonder where they go to the bathroom

That's a good question. I wonder a lot of things that have to do with logistics.

How do you choose the location for a camp? Do you take the resources of the area into consideration, or do you just set up camp where you get tired? Does the camp just naturally grow as people see a tent and decide to pitch one nearby, or is it planned by some tibal leader?

Where do you get water?

Where do you get food?

What is in the area? I don't see any people in the picture, except the one woman. Where is everyone? Are they in the shopping mall that is just outside the frame?

If you've been away for a while, how do you find your way back to your hut?

I have many more questions than observations with this image.

The sheer enormity of these camps is mind boggling... then stop and think about just finding the most basic needs - fresh water, food.... omg.

The availability of wood for framing the huts and for cooking fires is probably the first consideration for siting these camps. Once it's exhausted, then they move on.

I now feel officially guilty for even having thought of upgrading to a bigger camp trailer.

I dont know about this camp, but most camps like this are set up by an NGO. who will distribute aid suppies etc..
Unless the NGO is pretty well equipped, initially they will have to go to the toilet everywhere. Its a big problem. Eventually they will dig trenches for toilets.
Logistics and Disaster Response/ Risk Management for situations like this involve huge amounts of money and organisation, (you probably know that already). I am studying to work in this area. I find it extremely interesting and mostly overwhelming.:mg:

there are more people in the top left of the image.
toilet?: anywhere
why there?: the landscape is no different for the next 300km
food?: whatever is chewable
water?: dig under plants?

This puts my day into perspective.

I have a friend who worked for a few years running food aid distribution for the WFO in Namibia and Angola. She organised large shipments of food from donations, organised the transport of the food aid from the ports to the refugee camps, and she ran the monthly distributions at the camps. Each month she would go with a handful of other aid workers to the camps with trucks of food, and over the course of two or three days at each camp they would hand out a one month ration to each of the tens of thousands of people queueing up at the trucks. Obviously keeping track of which refugees already had their ration was tricky, as was making sure that people too sick to get to the trucks also got their share. So that's how people in massive refugee camps like this get food.

These are the people I was talking about in this thread. Taken from camps like this and plopped down in Massachusetts, in a school system that's unprepared to handle them. :(

now compare this to that Japanese indoor beach IotD. kinda puts the world in perspective. a bit. :neutral:

Indoor beach? Pah! That's nothing compared to the UAE indoor ski slope!

Notice how there is no cover, no shade, other than what these people have constructed? That has to be miserable.

Told'em to vote republican. Missed their tax cuts. BTW. That sucks. MIght be a preview of the VA homes for new vets.