CRAIG GIMA / CGIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM The Institute for Islamic Studies in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, is shown in January, with mud and debris covering the campus.

---

The East-West Center helps
a university's tsunami recovery

When an Islamic university in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, reopened a little more than six weeks after the Dec. 26 earthquake and tsunami, some of the chairs and desks were still caked with mud.

Teachers and students were grieving over the loss of family members and friends.

"We were lost at that time. We were confused," said Luthfi Auni, vice-rector for external affairs for the state-run Institute Agama Islam Negeri.

Some donations helped on that first day. An Australian university gave each lecturer and professor a small briefcase with an English dictionary, paper, pens and other supplies. Each student got a bag with a T-shirt, shoes, paper and pens from a newspaper in Jakarta.

Six months after the tsunami, "the situation is becoming better and better," Auni said, estimating that the campus is about 60 percent of what it was before Dec. 26.

This week, three administrators from the Islamic institute are in Honolulu to meet with the East-West Center to see how Hawaii can help the university rebuild.

When the Star-Bulletin visited the campus in Banda Aceh with Terry Bigalke, director of the education program at the East-West Center, the university still looked like a disaster area.

Some cleanup had begun, but mud and debris, including desks, chairs and books, covered the campus.

The library lost about 20 percent of its collection of 40,000 volumes, and about 40 percent of the books sustained some water damage, said Rusjdi Ali Muhammad, rector of the university.

But the institute's biggest loss was the 39 staff members killed by the tsunami, including those who died when a faculty housing complex on campus was flooded.

CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM Amirul Hadi, left, Luthfi Auni and Rusjdi Ali Muhammad, visiting from the Institute for Islamic Studies in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, are meeting with the East-West Center to see how Hawaii can help the university rebuild from damage suffered in the Dec. 26 tsunami.

The staff and students also are still recovering from the psychological effects of the tsunami.

"People tell me I started smiling again last month, in May," said Amirul Hadi, director of the graduate program, who lost his wife and two children. "Before that I wasn't smiling."

Hadi apologized for being emotional at a discussion yesterday at the East-West Center gallery. He had just viewed photos from the tsunami that are now on display, which brought back memories.

One of the photos is of students living on the campus in tents because there is no student housing.

Not all of the buildings have been repaired, and the main administration building might have to be torn down because it is unsafe.

About 4,000 of the more than 5,000 students returned to school after the tsunami and earthquake. Hadi said about half of his 200 graduate students have re-enrolled.

Some of the students, who speak English, have put their schooling aside to work at higher wages for nongovernmental organizations helping with the reconstruction.

Other students, who are finishing dissertations or thesis papers, have gone to universities in other cities like Jakarta or Medan, where they can use the library.

Using tsunami relief funds raised in Hawaii, the East-West Center paid for about 50 students to finish their thesis papers in Jakarta.

It has been difficult to replace the teaching staff, Hadi said. Other universities in Indonesia have loaned out professors and lecturers. But they have had to combine classes, so lectures that used to have about 20 students now have 60.

Bigalke said the administrators will see what is available at the East-West Center and the University of Hawaii at Manoa. One of the things being discussed is bringing potential faculty members from Indonesia to Hawaii for graduate studies so they can return and teach at the institute.

UH-Manoa might also help with training library staff and provide some materials to rebuild the library at the institute.

The university held its first graduation after the tsunami on March 27, Muhammad said. Students, faculty, parents and representatives of some of the NGOs helping the institute attended what he described as an "emotional" ceremony.

The theme of the graduation speech, Auni said, was "working together."