Working at Sarvodaya
Note: I am posting pretty steadily at www.sarvodaya.org.
I think my last email was a little sad. Now I feel more hopeful. The site has done well, and helped people, I hope.
Apple and Google have given Sarvodaya space on their front pages along with the big charities like Red Cross, OxFam, etc It’s the only Asian NGO to be featured on both. I don’t think that has much to do with the site but rather the fact that Sarvodaya is an established and effective organization, but it does make me a little proud.
www.apple.com
www.google.com or (http://www.google.com/tsunami_relief.html)
Those pages will change, but sarvodaya.org was there.
We have 315 photos up on the site, from all over. Some of them I can’t look at, but photos of us getting the relief out make me very happy. Tomorrow I’m going to visit a camp to see first hand for the first time. Some Fulbright scholars are in Sri Lanka, and I’ve got them uploading the photos and the news. It takes a lot of the load off me and I like talking to them. Tomorrow we’re going to visit the camps for the first time. I’m a little nervous. I’ve just been working 24 hours and the destruction has been sort of an abstraction to me. I don’t know if I want to see.
I find it strange cause in Colombo people are very quick to return to normal. My publisher wants me to launch the IT Magazine this month. I find it very hard to care. I am actually very angry at them.
Sometimes I think that I just want to work in the orphanages and get the kids to blog. Maybe get some of the poorest of the poor on the Net. But then I won’t have any money. I won’t be able to visit any of you.
These last few days I think I’ve done something that’s OK. But I don’t know what to do now.
indi
The Mahavamsa (a history of Sri Lanka) is full of conflicts between generals and kings. Usually, the more bloodthirsty and unscrupulous would win. Our current (elected) ruler Mahinda Rajapaksa has had his own general conflicts, namely with one Sarath Fonseka. In the old days Fonseka would have staged a coup, as in literally try to cut of Mahinda’s head, and Mahinda would – if that failed – tie him to four elephants and split his parts asunder. Can’t do that shit anymore. Instead Fonseka ran for office and lost and Mahinda tossed him in jail.
Today on the 
Janith has updated 
This is highly dubious. Miss Travel is a travel/social networking site that connects ‘Generous’ and ‘Attractive’ travelers. To, like, travel together, I guess. It all seems a bit like arranged prostitution and trafficking. This is part of a broader online trend to connect rich men to younger, attractive women. Sites like 
It’s good to know that Asian relief groups have been given recognition. Google has also provided a link to another Lankan organisation that is provding relief – the Karuna Trust http://www.karunalanka.org/index.html The more I read the news reports and watch the news, the more I begin to think that this horror is far from over. It will take a long long time to get things back the way they were.