The first team from Family Care arrived in Banda Aceh 8 days after the tsunami.  They started out in the Neuhnen refugee camp north of Banda Ache where 2,500 people were living under plastic sheeting on a side of a hill overlooking what was once their houses and 5 villages.  Over the next few days those who are bi-lingual worked as translators for a team of Korean volunteer doctors, plus began doing impromptu activities with the hundreds of children in the camp.

"When we first got to Banda Aceh, we were so struck by it all that we wondered if it would be appropriate to be happy and to try to spread joy and hope at this time. But when we got to the camps, we actually found that this is really desired by all those there, just to smile and and laugh a little and have their spirits lifted."

A week later another team of volunteers from  Family Care joined the team in Banda Ache.  Keeping a tight schedule the were able to visit up to 5 or 6 camps each day, with sometimes two or three different teams going out, counseling, distributing goods, checking on those with special needs, organizing children’s activities, surveying camps, translating for doctors and other volunteers, etc.

At the same time we were able to go with a team of doctors into Lhoong, which is only accessible by helicopter. Our teams have been back and forth there, doing a series of children’s shows while also helping with the translating for the doctors.

As time went on, we teamed up with some folks from some well known international agencies who specialize in working with traumatized children and mothers. This collaboration has become one of our most fruitful ways of actually ministering personally to individuals.

In mid-February, the fourth team arrived in Banda Aceh to continue where the previous teams had left off -- visiting refugee camps to give a hand in humanitarian support and emotional comfort. 

Dispensing clean food and water and medicine was a primary objective at this time—a time when there were still no toilets, and the survivors slept in leaking tents on waterlogged ground. But once these initial essentials had been taken care of, Family Care continued on a more psychological level. 

Family Care has continued sending teams of volunteers to Aceh and has taken on several more long-term projects in the area.  Some of these include building boats for fishermen who lost their livelihood when the tsunami destroyed their boats, and an ambulance that serves as a free mobile clinic to the villages surrounding Banda Aceh, to name a couple.

Family Care has set up a rolling plan to ensure a constant presence of our members in Aceh until time when we feel it is no longer necessary, or the people are stable enough to continue their lives on their own. Rebuilding the physical aspect of Aceh will take several years, but it is the minds and emotions of those who suffered that we wish to soothe and heal. Our goal, other than providing food and water and medicine, is to revive hope in the lives of these who have suffered and lost so much to the greatest tragedy of our time. 

(Click here to see more photos of our projects in Aceh.)