Survivors in Indonesia grapple with trauma as they rebuild their lives 20 years after devastating tsunami

The story was supported by the Pulitzer Center.

The homes in a neighborhood near Lampuuk Beach, outside the city of Banda Aceh, Indonesia, were all built by a Turkish aid group, with a crescent moon and star symbol above each porch.

These houses are among the 140,000 homes built in Aceh province for survivors following the destruction of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

Now, many are in disrepair after being abandoned.

“After the houses were built, some residents only lived there for one or two months before moving out due to trauma,” said resident Zainul Asri, who was the sole remaining survivor in his immediate family after the tsunami.

Strips of building materials hang loose from the underside of a roof at one vacated house down the block from Asri’s home. Another has overgrown grass surrounding the empty structure. Asri said he also felt traumatized when he first moved into his new home after getting married.

“Hearing the sound of loud ocean waves felt like a reminder of an impending earthquake,” he said. “The environment was still barren, with few trees growing. The area was quiet and the sense of trauma lingered.”

Over time, though, he and his wife have adapted, and they have been able to respond calmly to subsequent earthquakes.

He estimates about one-third of his neighbors have left the homes built by aid organizations in the wake of the 2004 tsunami. Only around half of what are called aid houses in Banda Aceh are still occupied by the people who originally received them, according to a 2018 study.

“From an engineering point of view, it is such a failure. It is such a waste of resources,” said Ilham Siddiq, a PhD student in civil systems engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder.

“There were a lot of trees being cut down to build houses, and that might have a further environmental impact, which can create more hazards for people.”

Siddiq conducted research on the abandonment of these aid houses in Aceh province. He said aid groups thought it was better to rebuild in the same place where people originally lived rather than relocating them. This way, people could still fish in the same places and remain connected to their communities.

At least 90% of these homes constructed in Aceh after the tsunami were built at the pre-disaster location of the house, but Siddiq also found that trauma contributed to problems with this approach.

“It impacted them so severely that, until years after the tsunami, even just trucks passing by in front of their house in their original area could trigger them,” he explained.

Aceh suffered a massive population loss. Nearly a quarter of residents in the city of Banda Aceh died, which meant that family structures were immediately altered. Siddiq experienced this first-hand, when his parents and grandmothers died in the tsunami.

“It doesn’t make sense to build houses for orphans like us, at least not right at that moment, because none of us could live by ourselves yet,” he said. 

The house he and his sisters received is now falling apart, he added. 

There have been other problems with the materials used to build these structures. Rizqah Qurrata A’yun of Neuheun Village said her family’s home, built by a Taiwanese charity, has ceiling paneling and walls containing asbestos. Australian government-funded construction projects also used materials with asbestos.

Aceh has been able to rebound to some extent, and there have been some success stories, according to Siddiq.

Irdus, who goes by one name, is a community leader who was involved in the reconstruction of his village, Kampung Pande, near the city center.

“I wanted to build a village, not just houses,” he said. “That was the concept.”

He advocated for planning that included infrastructure, schools, a mosque and other community facilities, which has helped his community thrive. His 29-year-old son Kirkha Kaharsyah still lives in the original house they received.

“As a kid, it was just nice to be back in a familiar location, and the fact that I could live with my parents again and we had new hope for rebuilding,” he said. “The space is good enough as a beginning, as a start for our family to live in.”

They have expanded construction around the house on their plot of land to accommodate their multi-generational family. Two decades after the devastating tsunami, Kaharsyah said this small house and the community’s vision for the village helped his family start their lives again.