New Jersey immigrants mourn the passing of friends abroad

"We hope to be able to get more and help more people," said Meitha Tumengkol, deacon of the church and father of parents on the island. "There are many people who need food."

The earthquake, combined with the tsunami and aftershocks that followed, left 2,000 dead and thousands more dead in the surrounding cities of Palu.

Tumengkol said that his great-uncle was in Palu when the earthquake occurred. Her relatives survived the earthquake and tsunami, but there were cracks in the roofs of their homes, she said. They left the city, fearing that the house could not resist the aftershocks.

Among those killed were Lauren Kowaas and her nephew Frankie Kowaas, two athletes who had lived in Avenel before returning to Indonesia, according to church members and news. They were in Palu for an annual paragliding festival when the hotel where they were staying collapsed.

Frankie Kowaas also hiked and participated in rafting competitions, according to the International Rafting Federation. They say that he has launched a local RFI in North Sulawesi.

"It was under the direction of Frankie that Indonesia first participated in the FIR International Rafting Championship held in 2001 in West Virginia, USA," said FRI in a blog published on his website.

Their death struck the community of Indonesian Christians who sought asylum in New Jersey as a result of religious persecution in the predominantly Muslim country. Many of them are from North Sulawesi, a two-hour boat ride from Palu, said Reverend Seth Kaper-Dale.

Highland Park Reformed Church members, including many from Indonesia, held a food fair on Saturday to raise money for those affected by the recent earthquake and tsunami. (Photo: Courtesy of Harry Pangemanan)

Kaper-Dale and locals said the Kowaase had stayed in Avenel before being deported to Indonesia and that he was worried for other Indonesian Christians who returned to Indonesia under the Trump government.

"The full experience of this tsunami and this earthquake was experienced by CNN, but for me, my experience has been lived through Facebook posts and the real and direct lives of people," he said. Kaper-Dale. "This gives a very present, very personal feeling to this very remote disaster, these are people I love and connect to here, whose closest relatives are suffering there."

"In the last few years, with all the disasters in the United States since Sandy, I've been volunteering, and now it's happening in my country," said Pangemanan, 48, of Highland Park. "It totally upset me."

RELATED: An Indonesian immigrant rebuilt his homes after Sandy. Now he fights expulsion

Pangemanan said that if he had his green card or his citizenship, he would be in the first plane for Indonesia.

Instead, he coordinates relief efforts with a group of former college friends in Indonesia. Pangemanan and the church will donate $ 2,000 to friends in Makassar, where a friend will buy blankets, food and other supplies and bring them to Palu. They plan to ask a friend of the Indonesian Air Force to refuel supplies, a one – hour trip because roads and big bridges are destroyed.

"We want to lighten the burden of survivors," said Pangemanan. "Thousands and thousands are still living in tents and the current situation of the earthquake continues."

The church also donated $ 250 to the Kowaas family. Lauren Kowaas had two children in high school and Frankie Kowaas had three children aged 7 to 9 years.

Willem Rampangilei, chairman of the National Council for Disaster Management, said earlier this week that nearly 5,000 victims could be buried in the mud in Balaroa and Petobo, two neighborhoods close to Palu. Their bodies will be difficult to recover and identify because the earthquake caused the liquefaction of wet soils. Moist soil has probably resulted in faster decomposition of the bodies.

This article includes papers from the Associated Press.