Both disaster and recovery from it live on in the stories of individual survivors. These must be pondered and preserved. But there is a dynamic tension between the need to remember and the equally urgent need to forget. A society that fails to ponder the lessons of disaster is, of course, doomed to repeat the mistakes that may have worsened its suffering. And yet, at some point the narratives central to that society's sense of itself must move beyond tales of suffering and begin to chronicle a more hopeful vision of the future. Our experience in New Orleans -- matched, I believe by the experience of Kobe and other catastrophe venues -- is that narratives of disaster and recovery are not limited to verbal accounts. Both disaster and recovery can be expressed symbolically and ritually. Kobe's wonderful earthquake museum and the festival of lights begun within a year of the disaster have been matched in New Orleans by hurricane exhibits, the restoration of our largest sports arena, the Superdome, and by the early revival of Mardi Gras, even as much of the city lay in ruins. It is interesting to note that after its most recent previous brush with disaster, the 1965 hurricane called Betsy, New Orleans erected no significant monuments in its memory. Perhaps the city was in a kind of psychological "denial". It is heartening to see that this time New Orleans is processing its grief more publicly and more fully. The Louisiana State Museum's Katrina exhibit is one indication. Artists in every medium also have focused intently on the disaster, and even homeowners have chosen to memorialize their ordeal by, for example, preserving the markings that were spray-painted onto their homes by search and rescue crews. It can only be hoped that the city's heightened awareness of disaster will eventually be translated into a fully adequate flood defense. That requires keeping alive the stories of suffering even as we collect new narratives of recovery. But so far Washington has committed only to build a substandard levee system, one that would not have repelled a direct strike by Katrina. And it is noted with disgust and dismay that Louisiana State University has fired its most high-profile hurricane expert, Dr. Ivor van Heerden, an outspoken critic of the Army Corps, the government agency that built the levee system that failed. Before he was fired, Dr. van Heerden was ordered to gag himself, lest his criticisms of the Army Corps jeopardize the university's access to federal grants. In this example we see the potency of individual disaster narratives and the need to preserve and disseminate them.

The Panos Sri Lanka office conducted and concluded in June 2008 a survey of the role of the media and community voices on the Early Warning System established in Sri Lanka after the December 2004, Indian Ocean tsunami. Sri Lanka before the tsunami did not have an early warning system. Currently there are Early Warning towers set up across the island. This survey was conducted with the aim of finding out community responses to the newly established Early Warning Systems, which looked closely on the impact of technology at village level. The other objective of the survey was to learn and discuss with the local people their own ideas and opinions for a community-based Early Warning System that can reach out at a grass ?root level. The survey was conducted by local journalists with the guidance of disaster management officers. The project was funded by the UNDP Sri Lanka office.

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