Above: In the tsunami’s wake, a fishing boat was swept up and deposited in the center of a Nagan Rayan village. Below: Children in Aceh’s Nagan Raya district leaf through a book of messages and drawings prepared for them by second-grade students at Liberty Elementary School in Pittsburgh’s Shadyside community.

To help make sure that Pittsburghers continue to remember victims of last December’s South Asian tsunami, Pitt faculty member Robbie Ali is working to forge a sister-city relationship with communities in Aceh, the Indonesian province hardest hit by the killer sea waves. (The death toll there has passed 160,000).

“The important first step is to generate continued interest in helping tsunami survivors. When the interest is there, the specific relief and rebuilding activities will happen,” said Ali, a visiting assistant professor in Pitt’s Graduate School of Public Health and director of the school’s Center for Health Environments and Communities.

Ali has a long-standing working relationship with Indonesian communities and agencies and has visited Aceh since the tsunami to investigate potential projects for the Pittsburgh Indonesia Partnership Fund, established by GSPH and Pitt’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs (GSPIA) soon after the tsunami to aid survivors. To donate to the fund, send a check payable to the University of Pittsburgh, indicating the Pittsburgh Indonesia Partnership Fund, to Wendy Wareham, director of development, GSPIA, 3403 Posvar Hall, Pittsburgh, PA 15260.