pedro san pedro
14th January 2005, 08:29
below is an email from a friend working in logisitics for MSF (doctors withour borders) in sri lanka at the moment
Thanks to the media, you fucks! I've been sitting in a stinking hot hotel room in Colombo for the last 24 hours trying to find 4WDs to carry our teams to the worst affected areas and being told that between the embassies out scouring for missing tourists and the media there are simply none to be had. This is adding insult to injury - in the first 24 hours after the disaster, many aid agencies (including mine) found it difficult to get flights into the country because all the available seats had been taken by the press.
Thanks a lot arseholes.
This morning was the worst though, watching some smarmy instant expert harrassing a UN twat over why the aid hadn't arrived yet:
"There are people starving here you know"
Pass me the barf bag. Self righteous twats banging on about the need for water and sanitation as if they even have a fucking clue how hard it is to organise hundreds of rigid water tanks and thousands of blankets and then get them to where they're needed. It's easy for these Amex heroes to dump a wad of cash in somebodies lap and get to the disaster zones, it's another thing entirely to get effective aid there.
On top of this, hundreds of well meaning but useless twits from all over the world have begun flooding into the zone on the supposition that being white or rich means that they can be of use even though they have no skills or experience to offer.
Perhaps it's time to send in the clowns (http://www.clownswithoutborders.org/) they could certainly be a lot more use than the media.
Thanks to the media, you fucks! I've been sitting in a stinking hot hotel room in Colombo for the last 24 hours trying to find 4WDs to carry our teams to the worst affected areas and being told that between the embassies out scouring for missing tourists and the media there are simply none to be had. This is adding insult to injury - in the first 24 hours after the disaster, many aid agencies (including mine) found it difficult to get flights into the country because all the available seats had been taken by the press.
Thanks a lot arseholes.
This morning was the worst though, watching some smarmy instant expert harrassing a UN twat over why the aid hadn't arrived yet:
"There are people starving here you know"
Pass me the barf bag. Self righteous twats banging on about the need for water and sanitation as if they even have a fucking clue how hard it is to organise hundreds of rigid water tanks and thousands of blankets and then get them to where they're needed. It's easy for these Amex heroes to dump a wad of cash in somebodies lap and get to the disaster zones, it's another thing entirely to get effective aid there.
On top of this, hundreds of well meaning but useless twits from all over the world have begun flooding into the zone on the supposition that being white or rich means that they can be of use even though they have no skills or experience to offer.
Perhaps it's time to send in the clowns (http://www.clownswithoutborders.org/) they could certainly be a lot more use than the media.