Chaos is Good

I was watching the Wednesday night documentary on National Geographic channel. This series called Nat Geo Reveals, is an impressive line-up including the one I was watching - Katrina: Unnatural Disaster. The documentary uncovers the decisions and circumstances that lead to the sytemic failiure on the part of state and federal authorities in delivering relief and rehab for victims of the hurricane, especially in New Orleans.

I could not stop making comaparisons between the hurricane victims in New Orleans Super dome and the Tsunami victims in Nagapattinam who were housed in marriage halls and temples across town.

However, there is a key difference. Victims in the New Orleans were stuck without food and water for days. No relief reached them.

When we visited the Tsunami victims, the day after the big wave, most of them were well taken care of. The authorities were slow to reach, but food and water was supplied by people flowing into Nagapattinam to offer help. Each of the marriage halls and temples were adopted by some random group who came into help to help. It was chaotic, but it worked. Looking back, most of the relief that was happening in Nagapattinam, immediately after the Tsunami was driven by private citizens and organizations.

In comparison, the documnentary spoke about one group of aid workers, who came in from Texas, to help the hurricane victims. They even had proper certifications. But, they were made to wait two days before they can be given permission to help with the relief effort!

I guess Tsunami relief was one situation where chaos was good.