Former Bristolian Experienced Myanmar Cyclone And Aftermath

Bristol Herald Courier
Published: May 16, 2008

BRISTOL HERALD COURIER

Brent Rowell, a native of Bristol, Tenn., currently lives in Yangon (formerly Rangoon), Myanmar. He and others knew Cyclone Nargis would hit the Southeast Asia country on May 3, but no one expected the storm to kill more than 43,000 and leave tens of thousands missing and more than a million residents homeless.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies estimated Thursday that the death toll is between 68,833 and 127,990. United Nations officials say more than 100,000 might be dead.
The U.N. and the Red Cross say between 1.6 million and 2.5 million people are in urgent need of food, water and shelter. Only 270,000 have been reached so far by the aid groups.
Rowell, 54, moved to Myanmar in 2006 with his Thai wife “Al” and their 15-year-old daughter, “Andie.” He has been training Yangon-based field staff in sustainable vegetable production through International Development Enterprises, a nonprofit partially funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Rowell’s mother, Frances, of Bristol, Tenn., got word two days after the cyclone hit that her son and his family were safe.
“All I can think of are the parents who have children in Iraq and how apprehensive they are every day,” Frances Rowell said Thursday in a telephone interview. “All you can do is pray; there’s nothing else you can do.”
A 1971 graduate of Tennessee High School, Rowell transferred to the University of Tennessee from East Tennessee State University. He got his undergraduate and master’s degrees from UT.
Later, he earned a doctorate from Cornell University and spent 12 years working at the University of Kentucky as a state extension specialist.
One of the seminal events in Rowell’s life, his mother said, came when he was a junior or senior at UT and went to Urbana, Ill., as part of a youth crusade for Christ. An American missionary to Bangladesh spoke of world hunger.
Rowell was so moved that he changed his major to horticulture and “became very aware of feeding starving people all over the world,” Frances Rowell said.
His work has taken him to Bangladesh, Thailand and Cambodia. Right after the storm, he e-mailed the first of two messages to his family, including his mother in Bristol. The italicized portions of this article are excerpted from Rowell’s e-mail messages and are in his exact words.
Wednesday, May 7
The cyclone story is a long one. We knew it was coming so had time to prepare a little (extra food, water, etc.) but no one expected it to be so devastating. We had a long, scary night and morning when it passed directly through Rangoon. None of us slept.
Large trees in our neighborhood were going down everywhere and a big one behind our house came crashing through our bedroom roof. Then we were bailing water to keep the room and downstairs from flooding as rain was pouring in the hole in the ceiling and roof. But our brave guard/gardener climbed up into the rafters during the strong winds and was able to wedge in some old corrugated roofing sheets with bamboo and broomsticks in order to stem the deluge.
After a couple of hours we got things under control. It continued with high winds and rain until mid morning when we were finally able to walk outside and see what had happened. Nearly every large tree in the city came down – and this city was full of beautiful, old trees, one thing that made it a very green and beautiful place. 
Trees were down on roads everywhere in the city but people got out their machetes and saws and went to work (mostly individual families). Now, amazingly, most of the streets in town are clear. But there are many other very serious problems. There’s no electricity and it’s going to be a long time before it’s restored – maybe a month or more. Power lines are down everywhere (including our street) and there are very few crews out working on them.
There is also a critical fuel shortage. There are lines of cars 2-3 miles long for gasoline (at $5/gallon) from government stations, and prices on the street are nearly $20/gallon – if you can get it.
We’re hoping conditions will get better instead of worse. So far there has been complete order with no chaos, no looting, no panic. People are repairing their houses as best they can. Damage to houses and buildings in the city doesn’t look so severe, although the government reported that 600 people died here. We haven’t seen any evidence of that, but it’s undoubtedly true (or perhaps worse).
The really bad news is what you have no doubt heard about. The greatest destruction has been to villages and small towns in the path of the storm from the coast and into the “delta” region which borders on Rangoon. It’s been reported today that 40,000 have died and a million are homeless. While there may be food for them for a few days, they have no shelter in most areas and drinking water has become contaminated (dead animals, etc.).
Saturday, May 10
We are healthy, but tired, and also saddened by what has happened. Last night we played some card games at the dining table by candlelight. Fortunately, Rangoon (Yangon) is now getting better rather than worse. The streets are clear of trees for the most part, markets are back open, and fuel seems to be available again (at least for now). This is much better than some (including the “experts” at the US embassy) predicted. There has been little or no violence, no looting, and some aid agencies have been able to distribute food and supplies to the poorest parts of the city. Rice (i.e. food) and other prices did go up by about a third and there was fear that these would increase further (making everything unaffordable to the poorest), but this doesn’t seemed to have happened and prices appear to be stable – for the time being.
We’ve camped out in our house all week with no power, telephone etc. It’s been extremely hot and hard to sleep and now we’ve learned that our pump will no longer fill the water tank.
All this is trivial compared to what’s happening only a couple hours away in the delta. I’m sure you’ve seen the news reports that not much aid has come in because of government reluctance to accept the foreign aid workers that come with it.
The UN discontinued shipments from Bangkok after the gov’t. took control over what little was sent earlier. They (the gov’t./army) are insistent that they should be the ones distributing aid here (esp. with the cameras rolling). The tragedy is the lives that are being sacrificed during this process.
Rowell and his teams have been working to provide relief, mainly by distributing water-sanitation kits and assembling water baskets and showing the locals how to use them.
A water basket works in conjunction with rapid chlorine treatment and is a cheap, rudimentary 200-gallon container made from plastic tarps. A single filling via a pump can provide the minimum daily water requirement for at least 250 people; rapid filling and reuse can easily provide clean water for up to 1,000 people per day, Rowell wrote.
Some of our field staff volunteered to go on what could be a dangerous mission to get to those areas, set up the water baskets, and demonstrate how they are used. None of us white “foreigners” could go because of the likelihood of us being stopped at various checkpoints along the way, thus endangering the whole project. Foreigners have not been allowed in these areas so far. We would only be a hindrance.
It’s hard to express the dedication of the men and women working for us and their willingness to put aside their comforts (many of them also have damaged homes) in order to help strangers – we are humbled by them!
Rowell’s mission, his mother said, is to raise the standard of living in Myanmar and help feed the country.
“The saddest thing about the country is that it’s ruled by warlords, and the people have almost no say about anything,” Frances Rowell said.
Rowell and his family will visit Bristol for two months starting in June. It will be the rainy season in Southeast Asia, and there’s little he can do about crops.
“He’s just dedicated to what he’s doing,” Rowell’s mother said. “It’s what he thinks he needs to do, and he will stay there as long as he’s needed.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.