Floods in Taiwan

The last 14 days or so.. I lie awake at nights watching the disaster scene replied on our tv channels over and over again.

The full extent of the floods are really quite horrible. 2 entire villages were washed away by the mudslides. In the worse of the 2 : Xiaoling village, some 400 people out of 1000+ were buried alive. They still lie there, under 4 storeys of mud. Soldiers are digging - initially by hand, now by bulldozers in a recovery process of pure pain, dragged out pain to the surviving familes and even the rescue workers - mostly 20year old conscripts.

Everyone in Taiwan's hurting from this. The Taiwan president and his government has faced widespread criticism on being slow and ambivalent about its efforts.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/world/asia/24taiwan.html?ref=asia

Initially I was thinking we can't fault the government since in Taipei, the typhoon effects were mild. In fact, Saturday, the day Xiaoling village was wiped-out, I had gone out to climb at my usual climbing gym because it wasn't even raining. Taiwan has basically gone on a witchhunt, demanding the resignation of the president (for being slow and cold about his reaction), premier (for going for a haircut & then dinner on Saturday evening - even though he had on Saturday morning gone to the affected area), secretary-general of the cabinet (for eating a Father's day dinner at a 5-star hotel). Saturday 8 Aug, was celebrated by Taiwan as Father's Day (88 sounds like Papa).

My colleagues later explained to me that if you were a public servant, your salary comes from the people. More is expected of you.

I suppose that makes sense.

Please send your prayers to Taiwan, it's leadership for wisdom and speedy recovery of the affected areas. That the survivors are re-settled and their future taken care of by the government or by any necessary aid agency.