Danish Scientologist Documents the Work of the Scientology Volunteer Ministers in a Book called "After The Tsunami" - Part I

'After The Tsunami,' by Danish Scientologist Thorsten Overgaard is not just a beautiful book, it is a journey - one made by hundreds of Scientologist from around the world to help the people of South East Asia recover from one of the worst natural disasters in recorded history

After The Tsunami, by Danish Scientologist Thorsten Overgaard is not just a beautiful book, it is a journey - one made by hundreds of Scientologists from around the world to help the people of South East Asia recover from one of the worst natural disasters in recorded history.

Featured on the web site, Overgaard's odyssey is described in the following terms:

"Danish photographer and feature writer, Thorsten Overgaard, traveled 12,000 miles throughout South East Asia after the tsunami, a virtual fly-on-the-wall, documenting the day-to-day lives of the Scientology Tsunami Relief Team Volunteers. After The Tsunami presents in detail a behind-the-scenes look at relief work when everyday western people - from a real estate agent from Germany to a student from Los Angeles - leave behind families, studies, careers and businesses to help strangers in crisis, whom they only know from media reports.

"It is a heartwarming story of the spiritual bonds between religions, ordinary western world people engaged in dangerous but important work that will change their lives forever, and daily miracles. It is a story in pictures that is in sharp contrast to the seemingly endless pictures of overwhelming devastation that played again and again on televised newscasts and on the front pages of the world for weeks and months.

Danish photographer and feature writer, Thorsten Overgaard, traveled 12,000 miles throughout South East Asia after the tsunami, a virtual fly-on-the-wall, documenting the day-to-day lives of the Scientology Tsunami Relief Team Volunteers

"It is a story that brings hope to the world and shows how ordinary people can make a difference - that something can be done about it."

The web site describes the devastation the volunteers confronted when they arrived in the area:

"When the tsunami crashed into the coast of Sri Lanka on the morning of December 26th [2004], over 30,000 people were killed and 1 million people became homeless in one stroke. Despite the unprecedented death and destruction along the coastal areas, a major portion of Sri Lanka's critical infrastructure remained intact, allowing government and rescue workers to head off further catastrophe from widespread starvation and disease."

Overgaard describes what motivated him to interrupt a thriving career and travel to the disaster zone, taking on this project.

"'The wrong thing to do is nothing.'

"That is a quote from L. Ron Hubbard that resonates as a profound truth for me and how I think and how I work.

"My two biggest regrets in this life were (and are) that I didn't drive to Berlin the night the Berlin Wall fell and that I didn't go to New York after September 11. In both cases I had a strong urge to go, but something in me said, "be sensible."

"We all carry an urge in us to reach out and do something as well as a voice urging us to be sensible and behave as if everything wrong is somebody else's problem.

"In the instance of the tsunami in South East Asia my urge to reach out and help conquered all my fears of strange diseases, pictures in my mind of dead bodies floating in a sea of chaos and a generally low knowledge about Asia and the people living there."

In the following days we will feature photographs and stories from Mr. Overgaard's book, available as an ebook, which can be ordered free of charge at eBook@afterthetsunami.org.

Resources:
- Volunteer Ministers Official Site
- http://www.afterthetsunami.org