ML161643
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Subject 1: (Environmental Recording). Subtitle: Ocean surf. Timecode In: 00:04:06. Timecode out: 00:10:27. Subject 2: (Environmental Recording). Subtitle: Ocean surf. Timecode In: 00:16:13. Timecode out: 00:17:10. Subject 3: (Interview). Subtitle: Sanjayan Muthulingam. Timecode In: 01:22:32. Timecode out: 01:58:48. Notes: 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami; Coral reef damage. Habitat: ; ; Equipment Notes: Decoded MS Stereo to 3:35; Spaced Omni Stereo to 15:37; Decoded MS Stereo to end. SRI LANKA DAT #4 SJ = Sanjayan Muthulingam EA = Elizabeth Arnold 1:22:37 start of SANJAYAN intv 1:22:40 SJ "I feel better about things today in terms of spirits. We're finally in natural areas that don't have human presence I feel more comfortable there. It was pretty tough dealing with being and seeing that thinking your driving right through there to get to these natural areas basically there all these people whove lost their lives and livelihoods and all that and then doing the diving was hard. It was harder than I made it out mostly because there wasn't anyone on the team who was diving with me it was always the local person. 1:23:20 EA Is it hard I mean as just as a person to reconcile being here and seeing all the human loss and saying well actually I'm going to be focusing on whether the trees are coming back and what's happened to the coral reef. 1:23:40 SJ surprisingly no it isn't that hard for me um you know I firmly believe in what I do and what my colleagues do in terms of conservation and I honestly think that we're doing not only because of nature but also because it gives people a better quality of life in the long run. So I don't ever have a problem of reconciling you know I had this discussion particularly in developing countries a lot where people say how can you work toward saving elephants when we're trying to make a living out of the forest. If someone showed me that getting rid of these forest solved world poverty it's a bargain I'm willing to make but I truly believe if we got rid of this forest all you'd have is no forest no elephants and still a lot of poor people. 1:24:36 EA can you relate that to this situation? 1:24:45 SJ to be absolutely honest for me personally this is the only way I know how to contribute. I can give some money and my family has, you can do the sort of work with the NGO's and all that. But if you want to directly help you have to ask yourself what do you really know how to do. I can't set up a medical clinic or be a doctor, but this is the kind of work I've prepared all my life to do, so I can come here with a team from the conservancy and others and we're contributing meaningfully to this country's ability to get back on its feet. 1:25:47 SJ When I was in the park I saw a letter from the head of the dept of wildlife that's been posted on the notice board and it made some sort of statement like you know in this moment of tragedy there's also opportunity, there's also a chance to make change for the better. So the head of the dept of wildlife was basically telling his staff look I know there's pain in terms of the tragedy here but also see it was a way of doing things better in the future. Well great. If I can help them do something better in the future then that will significantly affect the lives of the people..as long term as we can. 1:27:09 EA so what are we trying to do here 1:27:14 SJ what we're trying to do is figure out the extent of the damage, the damage on the natural systems caused by the tsunami, the extent of it the severity of it and the ability of the land to regenerate so the reversibility of that impact. That's number one. Number two is think about what kind of management options we might be able to help the park service help the NGO community implement in terms of conservation and restoration to some extent. 1:28:08 EA how to prioritize¿ 1:28:24 SJ you... (Notes truncated)
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- Cataloged
- 14 May 2010 - Ben Brotman
- Digitized
- 14 May 2010 - Ben Brotman
- Edited
- 14 May 2010 - Ben Brotman