I felt the first earthquake in Bali but it wasn’t until I received messages from friends at Gili Trawangan, the tiny island off Lombok, explaining buildings had crumbled and they’d evacuated up the island’s only hill in fear of a tsunami that I realised it was serious.
The following morning it became clear just how destructive this earthquake had been in Lombok, the island east of Bali, as the death toll started to rise.
Watch my Instagram Stories highlights here to see how it unfolded.
Lombok Earthquakes Timeline
This 6.9 magnitude earthquake on August 5 was the second and most damaging earthquake within a few days but it wasn’t the last.
The first quake, of 6.4 magnitude, struck a few days earlier on July 29 killing at least 16 people and damaging and weakening buildings.
A third earthquake within 8 days happened on Aug 9th, measuring 6.2 magnitude, adding to the destruction.
More than 500 people were killed and 7000 people injured from these earthquake and the aftershocks that followed.
Travel bloggers in Bali fundraise for Indonesian earthquake victims
I was shooting a video project at the time with some prominent American travel bloggers, Alyssa Ramos and Gloria Atanmo.
As full time travellers who have frequented Indonesia, they felt a responsibility to help and jumped into action to set up an online fundraiser.
They used their combined social media platforms, along with We Are Travel Girls, to raise $6,500 USD for the relief effort within one day.
Time to go shopping! We bought supplies in Bali, loading up a truck with bedding, tarpaulins, ropes and food to send over to the neighbouring island.
We’d tried to arrange a boat to take our load directly to the charity at Lombok as we’d heard rumours of chaotic harbour scenes with supplies getting sent all over the place.
But while I was in the truck en route to a harbour in Amed in Bali’s far north east, the boat commission fell through.
I asked our driver if he’d be willing to work into the following day and we lined up the truck in a queue at Padang Bai harbour and drove straight onto the overnight freight ferry to Lombok.
I needed to ensure the donations got to the people who needed it most, just like the fundraising campaign had promised.
So I accompanied the delivery myself to arrange logistics and document it for the generous donors.
The overnight ferry to Lombok
After about 5 hours at sea, getting limited sleep laying on a bench and then a small carpeted cubicle, we arrived at Lombok.
I felt such relief seeing the land for the first time. Not for the night at sea but because I had felt such an uncomfortable juxtaposition being in a luxury villa when I’d learnt of the devastation so close by and I didn’t know what to expect to see.
We delivered a load of supplies to an expat-run charity called Team Action Amed, which was collecting supplies for another charity Project Karma to distribute.
The earthquake ravaged road to Lombok Utara
I then travelled to a remote village in the far north region of Lombok Utara.
The entire three-hour drive from the harbour consisted of stretches of ruined homes turned to rubble and pop-up camps with tarpaulins providing makeshift shelter for families.
74,000 homes have been damaged or destroyed, leaving 430,000 people displaced.
Seeing those numbers now, makes me realise why I felt so overwhelmed seeing the scale of this destruction.
The tiny mountain village Rempek
Some local freelance volunteers helped us find the village of Rempek and our driver managed to manoeuvre the truck around a windy mountain rocky road.
We finally arrived and families gathered around. We all started to unload the boxes of supplies. I handed out tins of milk formula and baby beds to the mothers. Would you believe there were seven infants at this tiny village!
The were no buildings left standing in this particular area and all 200 people were now living under tarpaulins.
I felt guilty knowing that I could leave at the end of the day, while these makeshift shelters of plastic strung up with rope, were now their homes.
It also hit me when people lined up to received packets of toothpaste from me, when I’d just had the luxury of buying some at a convenience store near the undamaged harbour after my unexpected overnight journey on the ferry.
The local school had also been destroyed.
The young girls asked me if I had any pencils and books that I could give them. I didn’t.
Their faces lit up when they told me how much they love school and writing.
They reminded me of how I was as a child – so eager to learn and excited to have stationary to create.
So the next day, after staying at a local volunteer’s house near Mataram in central Lombok, we went shopping for more supplies.
I didn’t want disaster to impact the education of bright, young girls so I made it my mission to find notebooks and pencils.
I also bought medicine and went to a local food market and bought bags of fresh vegetables, bulk tofu and fish because the normal market trade in the north had come to a halt so I thought a fresh food delivery would be useful.
After another night on the concrete floor of another local’s home, we took a local open tray utility and journeyed back up to Rempek.
Trauma relief for children after the earthquake
My Indonesian friend Jerry, who travelled with me from Bali, had also volunteered in the aftermath of the Yogyakarta earthquake in 2006. He said it was important to provide trauma relief for the children in these situations.
It was Indonesia’s Independence Day so we spent a couple of dollars on ribbon and flags and Jerry led some singalongs and prayers.
It actually made a big impact with the children laughing and playing and it even made the adults stop work and laugh with their families.
The women got straight to work preparing a feast for the village with the fresh food we’d delivered. They’d only eaten instant noodles, rice and vegetables since the earthquake, so the fish, tofu and fresh vegetables were much appreciated.
Lunch was ready and the families insisted I eat with them.
I didn’t feel right eating their food but I’d be offensive to decline so I sat down and scooped up a couple of mouthfuls of rice with my hand, like they do, while chatting with the local women in my broken Bahasa (Indonesian language).
One woman told me she gave birth to her baby just a few hours after the first earthquake hit. What a crazy welcome to the world for that little one.
Another woman had twin babies and this village proved that proverb that it takes a village to raise a child with everyone passing the babies around as they needed attention.
Another woman had a beautiful baby boy born with Downs Syndrome who was very entertained by the flags we’d brought.
Leaving this village was hard.
After two days there, I felt a real connection with the women and children I’d befriended; even one of the grandmas wanted a selfie together before I left.
These villages are poor to begin with so when disaster strikes they don’t have a contingency fund to go out and buy basic supplies to build a new shelter like we probably would.
The businesses are also affected, with shops in ruins, and everything coming to a standstill while they work to rebuild their homes.
The Indonesian government didn’t declare it a national disaster which would have allowed foreign aid to stream in, so local charities are helping in addition to the government relief.
The scale of this disaster is so big that it’s probably going to take years to rebuild.
I had to leave Indonesia because I had onward travel plans already booked but I’m looking forward to getting back there soon to try to do something more for these beautiful people.
I just want to say thank you so much to everyone who donated to this cause.
And of course special thanks to Alyssa Ramos from My Life’s A Travel Movie for organising this incredible fundraiser, Gloria Atanmo from The Blog Abroad and Becky van Dijk from We Are Travel Girls for helping to promote it, and everyone who volunteered to assist us on the shopping trips and deliveries.
View this post on Instagram
