Germans came as strangers, left as friends

FROM GERMANY WITH LOVE Paramedics from Germany—Steffi Reiche, Lars Fehrentz, Nina Stucke, FayeWollny, Anneli Droste, Joern Berneburg, Steffen Hemer and Astrid Heidl—members of amedical mission of Arbeiter-Samariter-Bund of Germany pose in front of the Palo Cathedral in Leyte. At right, Berneburg and Fehrentz whoop it up on the last day of their volunteer work in Palo, Leyte. DANNY PETILLA/CONTRIBUTOR

PALO, Leyte—They came as total strangers but left for home with new friends and warm memories.

The 30 volunteers of the Arbeiter-Samariter-Bund (ASB), a German mission which literally means “help a neighbor group,” departed on Sunday after providing free medical services to some 4,500 people here for six weeks.

Supertyphoon “Yolanda” sent the nongovernment ASB mission half a world away to travel and come to the aid of Palo residents on Nov. 22. A total of 1,200 people were killed when the storm swept the town on Nov. 8.

Backed by a million volunteers in Germany, the ASB supplanted humanitarian efforts of the Belgian First Aid and Support Team (B-FAST) and the German-based International Search and Rescue (Isar), which went to Palo two weeks after the storm to help local authorities in searching for the missing and the dead.

“The friendliness and the thankfulness of the people of Palo and their incredible will to stand up again is what I will take home with me,” said Dr. Nina Stucke, one of the two leaders of the mission composed of doctors, nurses and paramedics.

Martin Kunstmann, 36, the other leader, deemed the group’s work done after observing marked improvements in the health and well-being of the survivors.

He said the local health unit was ready to take over in providing primary health-care services.

19 tents

When Palo was plunged into darkness after Yolanda (international name: Haiyan), ASB’s quartet of globe-shaped lamps between the roofless municipal hall and the Palo Cathedral became a beacon of hope for most of the 67,000 survivors here.

A steady stream of patients lined up as early as 6 a.m. in front of the 19 ASB tents. The team treated 200 to 300 day, mostly for wounds, waterborne illnesses, cold and flu symptoms, and trauma.

Six-year-old Wendelmae Flores, whose mother, Wilma, died in the storm in Barangay (village) San Joaquin, recovered from a weeklong bout with diarrhea after ASB nurses rehydrated her.

“My sister and I thank them (German mission) for helping us,” said Wendelmae’s 10-year-old brother Welbert in Waray-waray.

Local hires

The ASB also hired some residents as interpreters, drivers and cooks.

For Filipino-German teenager Kim Emily Jurgen Pedrosa, the temporary work provided her with a rare chance to reconnect with the land of her birth and the culture she grew up in.

“I came to appreciate better the two worlds where I came from,” said Pedrosa, 16, who was born in 1997 in Lorrach, Germany.

She and her 48-year-old mother, Imelda, have decided to return to the Philippines for good. They were the only ones hired by the ASB to do English-German translations because some of the team members do not speak English well.

During a farewell party on Friday, volunteers exchanged German and Philippine flags, souvenir T-shirts and personal tokens.

“Everybody was crying. Nobody had a dry eye inside the tent,” said Stucke, 35, a resident of Cologne, Germany, who holds a master’s degree in humanitarian assistance. She was also active in helping Syrian refugees in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq last year.

Dr. Red Nose

Most of the Palo patients talked about Joern Berneburg, 32, a paramedic from Mainz, Germany, and a licensed pilot.

Known as the team clown, Berneburg regaled the mostly traumatized children with his antics, like wearing a fake bulbous red nose in the examination room.

“They know me as Dr. Red Nose (Berneburg’s clown character), but I really would like to stay and be a pilot for Cebu Pacific,” said Berneburg, a first-time volunteer.

The medical team turned over most of the 1.7 tons of equipment they brought, such as generators, refrigerators, computers, printers, medical emergency kits and tents, to the local health unit and the local government.

“This is indeed a generous gift for us,” said Councilor Ciriaco Agner Jr., head of the municipal council’s health committee.

For Kunstmann, the end of the ASB relief work would mean reuniting with his wife, Akhila, and their two sons in Cologne after missing Christmas with them.

“It would be nice to be home again,” he said.

RELATED STORIES:

Foreign aid workers carry out task under rain in Tacloban

World behind PH, says UN

Chinese teams relish ‘touching moments’ with Yolanda victims