With a long tradition of giving and volunteering at levels that far exceed the average for richer, Western nations, Czechs can be found operating field hospitals in Iraq, were seen helping the locals dig out and rebuild in Sri Lanka (where they also set up a children's field hospital after December's tsunami) and rolled up their sleeves and emptied savings accounts to help victims of flooding right here at home in 2002.

The People in Need foundation, to offer just one example, has long been active in all of the above places, plus Chechnya and Iran — and, in concert with this publication's own Prague Post Endowment Fund, it stepped in to help raise funds to restore books, schools and libraries after the Prague floods. This, in addition to its usual role running human rights, social work and education projects right here in the Czech Republic.

Thus, while well-funded emergency management agencies like FEMA were still sorting out where to deploy their efforts in the wake of Hurricane Katrina last week, Czechs and other Europeans were already organizing help for the millions of victims in New Orleans and around the Gulf Coast.

The response of Czech expatriate Jim Hlavec, who lives in Louisiana's state capital, Baton Rouge, was typical. He offered immediate aid to stranded Czech tourists and students who were in the state when the floods struck, providing accommodations, food and a telephone to call those back home with the news that they were safe and dry. But the spirit of reaching out among Czechs goes far beyond helping out your own people.

President Václav Klaus and Prime Minister Jiří Paroubek have already come forward to announce to U.S. Ambassador William Cabaniss a 25 million Kč ($1.07 million) aid package for Katrina's victims and the deployment of two special rescue teams that are well experienced in the special problems of flood damage, having honed their skills firsthand during the devastating Prague floods of 2002.

As the United States comes to terms with the demands and human cost of the worst natural disaster in American history, people from around the world are joining them in their response — sometimes overwhelming disaster management officials.

Sweden has offered millions of liters of safe drinking water that no one knows how to deliver to the people in New Orleans who need it. So many volunteers have offered to personally help mop up and rebuild that FEMA is urgently asking them not to "self-dispatch." And, as with disasters everywhere, officials urge those wanting to help to consider donating cash, which for logistical reasons can be used to get help to where it's needed far more easily than blankets, medicine, food or building materials.

If the recent past is any indication, Czechs are sure to be first in line again to offer their help.

Here are a few useful information sources on how best to go about it:

www.redcross.org

www.mercycorps.org

www.networkforgood.org