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The stench of death is hanging heavily over Yangon and Myanmar's main city is littered with thousands of naked, blackened bodies rotting in the tropical heat, a cyclone survivor told the Herald yesterday.
"People are struggling to breathe as the smell is getting unbearable, but other than a few monks, no one else is helping to clear the bodies of people and animals," Hla Yee, 52, said in a telephone interview from Yangon.
The bodies were naked because survivors had taken their clothes and scavenged for everything else they could use from the dead.
The Herald spoke to Mrs Yee with the help of her New Zealand-based daughter, Htike Htike Wut Yi, 27, a human resources systems specialist.
"No one in Burma has ever seen anything like this before," Mrs Yee said. "They have lost everything - their families, homes - they have nothing to eat and drink and they don't know what the future will bring."
She said people were shell-shocked when the weekend storm struck, but it had been a journey from horror to sorrow, and many had lost all emotions.
"They don't even feel sad any more, only that there is nothing left to live for," she said.
"Their greatest wish is just for another cyclone to come and kill the rest of us, so that we can all die together."
More than 60,000 people were killed or are missing, and as many as 100,000 are feared dead after Cyclone Nargis slammed into the Irrawaddy delta, before storming through Yangon.
Mrs Yee said what happened during the storm was like scenes from a horror movie, and "zinc roof pieces were flying in the strong winds and slicing people's heads off".
She saw a 13-year-old boy she knew being killed by a falling tree.
"Aid still hasn't arrived," Mrs Yee said. "People are trying to do what we can to help each other, but the military government is making it very hard even for us to do that."
She tried to take sacks of rice in a truck to the hundreds who were taking shelter at the temple, but soldiers confiscated the rice.
Drinking water was scarce, she said. Many people were surviving by drinking coconut milk and eating coconuts, but these too were becoming scarce.
Mrs Yee's other daughter, Dr Ei Ei Khine, 29, a doctor at the city's General Hospital had told her that the hospital had no medicine, first-aid supplies or medical equipment.
"People are not getting helped, and the injured are not getting treated ... many are just left to die," she said.
"We are desperate, very desperate, for any help the outside world can bring us."
Prime Minister Helen Clark said yesterday that New Zealand would contribute another $1 million to the United Nations efforts to help Myanmar.
This will be in addition to the $500,000 pledged on Wednesday to New Zealand aid and relief agencies involved in Myanmar.
"Reports suggest that 40 per cent of those killed, injured or left homeless by this disaster are children," the Prime Minister said.
"It's important that New Zealand does what it can to assist.
"Children in the affected regions will be vulnerable to disease and infection and immediate assistance is required to ensure more lives are not lost."
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade has traced the last New Zealander unaccounted for in Myanmar.
It has accounted for 15 New Zealanders registered with the NZ embassy in Bangkok, and 22 others who were not registered.
A 24-hour hotline for concerned family and friends has been set up on (04) 439 8000.
Use the links below to donate to aid organisations helping in the relief effort Red Cross World Vision Salvation Army Oxfam Tear Fund
