Thursday, January 26, 2006
A month ago...
This morning, at precisely 8:51a.m. PST, it will be a month since a devastating earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale struck the northern areas of Pakistan; or at least that is how most of us will see it. There will be some amongst us, who will choose to interpret it as 30 days since their fellow human beings were devastated by this calamity. However, for the three and a half million, whose lives were turned upside down on that fateful morning, all sense of time is lost. It is as if the earthquake broke all clocks in the region, and time now stands still with no needles to prod it on, no pendulum to help it swing from one minute to another. For most of these people, it has been one long painful moment of misery that refuses to pass.
Tragically, for many, as many as 73,000, time did stop that morning. Then there are those, who fervently pray for time to stop this instant, because every new second brings with it untold misery, unimaginable pain, unprecedented gloom, and new forecasts of doom. 73,000 dead is the official death toll, which has come under fire for being conservative to the point of understating the tragedy. The NGOs have near unanimously put the death toll in excess of 100,000 already; gangerine, pneumonia, diarrheoa and diseases of the respiratory tract threaten to kill untold numbers still, and looming over all of it is the harsh winter of the northern region which it is feared might freeze over a 100,000 people to death in the coming weeks.
Yet, these are not the gravest threats faced by the people of Azad Kashmir and Northern Pakistan. The greatest threat that these people face is human failure, our failure. Hundreds of hours have been lost in pledging this and that; in explaining why this cannot be done and why that is not feasible; in pondering if this might be the right course to take, or that; and in not believing that such a collossal tragedy has strcuk such a large section of the earth’s population. Countless hours have been lost in not pushing those who have the power to help and contribute to saving the lives of those struck by the earthquake and stuck in the face of fast approaching death. Innumerable failures have beset humanity as humans have struggled to put aside limitations they impose on themselves.
The earth has a population exceeding 7 billion, and every hour lost in not ensuring that those affected by this tragedy are saved, provided shelter, food and security is equivalent to 7 billion hours lost. I agree, it takes a utopian naivete to expect every person in the world to contribute to this cause, and that too with this urgency, but I wonder if it really must require a utopian world for each country of the world to take responsibility for the reconstruction and rehabiliation of a village, if not a couple of villages. The UN has 191 members. When something this tragic strikes humanity, humans must rise above themselves, and set new precedents with an urgency with which they would expect others to come help them if such tragedy befell them. I wonder if it is too late to set new perecdents now?
For to most of us, it was a month ago….!
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One Response to 'A Month Ago…!'
1SaadieNovember 9th, 2005 at 12:36 am
:), world may come or not but we have to be there, keep writing. ¶ 1/26/2006 02:26:00 AM
Tragically, for many, as many as 73,000, time did stop that morning. Then there are those, who fervently pray for time to stop this instant, because every new second brings with it untold misery, unimaginable pain, unprecedented gloom, and new forecasts of doom. 73,000 dead is the official death toll, which has come under fire for being conservative to the point of understating the tragedy. The NGOs have near unanimously put the death toll in excess of 100,000 already; gangerine, pneumonia, diarrheoa and diseases of the respiratory tract threaten to kill untold numbers still, and looming over all of it is the harsh winter of the northern region which it is feared might freeze over a 100,000 people to death in the coming weeks.
Yet, these are not the gravest threats faced by the people of Azad Kashmir and Northern Pakistan. The greatest threat that these people face is human failure, our failure. Hundreds of hours have been lost in pledging this and that; in explaining why this cannot be done and why that is not feasible; in pondering if this might be the right course to take, or that; and in not believing that such a collossal tragedy has strcuk such a large section of the earth’s population. Countless hours have been lost in not pushing those who have the power to help and contribute to saving the lives of those struck by the earthquake and stuck in the face of fast approaching death. Innumerable failures have beset humanity as humans have struggled to put aside limitations they impose on themselves.
The earth has a population exceeding 7 billion, and every hour lost in not ensuring that those affected by this tragedy are saved, provided shelter, food and security is equivalent to 7 billion hours lost. I agree, it takes a utopian naivete to expect every person in the world to contribute to this cause, and that too with this urgency, but I wonder if it really must require a utopian world for each country of the world to take responsibility for the reconstruction and rehabiliation of a village, if not a couple of villages. The UN has 191 members. When something this tragic strikes humanity, humans must rise above themselves, and set new precedents with an urgency with which they would expect others to come help them if such tragedy befell them. I wonder if it is too late to set new perecdents now?
For to most of us, it was a month ago….!
-->
One Response to 'A Month Ago…!'
1SaadieNovember 9th, 2005 at 12:36 am
:), world may come or not but we have to be there, keep writing. ¶ 1/26/2006 02:26:00 AM
