Welcome to visitors from WaveOfHope.Us
The ‘Wave of Hope’ web site forwards to this address from today. A big thank you everyone who is supporting this cause. I will be updating the waveofhope.us site shortly, with specific information on the project.
Until then, please check these Sri Lanka Tsunami relief updates at this blog.
For more information, please email me at this link.
Or call Tanu and Angelo Fernando at 602-750-3476.
Just to give you an idea of the force of the tsunami in Hambantota, here’s a telecom tower –or what’s left of it.
Andrew Samuel sent these pics and a comment:
These pics are of the city of Hambantota which is now fully bulldozed.
You will notice there are more vehicles to be cabled out of the mud and
water. This is a really sad site. The telecom tower has just crumbled down to
ball of metal.
At Triton Hotel in Beruwala, several employees living in the area had their homes destroyed. These pictures, sent via Amanthi Dias Abeysinghe (whose dad is the General Manager of the hotel) tell their story. We visited Triton, a beautiful, sprawling beach resort, in June 2003, so I know exactly where these stories come from.
This picture shows you the hotel in the background.
And this one, how high the water has reached in the home.
Lest we forget the truly amazing stories, I encourage you to please post your own here. Or email me here. I have 2 today:
A health club in California RoughFit is planning to collect money for the four families affected along the southwest coast of Sri Lanka.
A Fulbright scholar Jeremy Gantz (from Cape Cod, Mass.) who had been in Sri lanka, is reportedly involved in relief work.
For the past three months he had been studying the history of Sri Lankan education and its connection to colonial and post-colonial political and economic developments! He had been on holiday in Thailand when the tsunami struck and he says “I felt fairly hedonistic on holiday in Thailand after learning of the tsunami… so flew back to Sri Lanka to help with the relief effort; my research feels very unimportant now”.
This was reported on the Relief For Sri Lanka blog, maintained by the Colombo Rotary Club.
As I reported a few days ago, Professor Joe Fernando (harendra) of ASU, is in Sri Lanka to study a model that would allow us to develop a tsunmi warning system.
“We want to know what the size and distribution of the wave impact was during the tsunami,” Fernando said. “By knowing that we can see if currently available wave models are correct. If the model works, then the science behind it is correct, and if the wave model is correct, then we will have a good idea of how to develop a tsunami warning system for the region.”
See the full article here on the ASU site.
India has already set a time frame (within 3 years) and a cost ($27 million) for a warning system. See BBC report here.
I have been getting mixed messages from people on visiting hard hit areas in the south and east. One of them –reinforced by some CNN coverage– is that Sri Lankans are coping well with the recovery and rellief efforts. I think there are different stories, and stories within stories, that the media cannot adequately get out, so before you make up your mind, read this from Ravi Ratnapala, a senior manager at Finlays, Colombo, who writes on a visit to Ampara and Kalmiunai. Rationing of food, shortages, monsoon rains etc make it still a very grim picture –at least as of last Thursday. Here is his story (with my emphasis).Having left Colombo at 4.00am we reached Ampara at 7.00pm. This after we had problems with one of the vehicles along the way. The same evening we unloaded the supplies consigned to Ampara which did not appear to be badly hit. The next morning with the help of Sarvodaya we reached Kalmunai around 10.00 am. What we saw in Kalmunai was total devastation. The pictures tell the story. I have a movie which is too large to e.mail
In the Ampara District there are about 125 camps and Sarvodaya has taken over about 25 camps. There are supposed to be over 400,000 people in the camps in Ampara Distric alone. We visited a camp giving shelter to about 850 people and also visited the Ampara and Kalmunai Hospitals with medical supplies. The disposable surgical gowns (about 100) which we gave Kalmunai Hospital was most appreciated by them. Surgery at the Kalmunai Hospital has just recommenced. The doctors appealed for water purification tablets as the water in the hospital is contaminated and fresh water supplies are limited. I think this is the same all over in the country and we should get some help from overseas if possible.
The approach road to the Sarvodaya Center in Kalmunai (washed away) was so bad that we had to stop the lorry and carry the supplies into the center. Infact the sea water had come into the Center in KalmunaiSarvodaya will be issung a coupon to the people in the camps and they will be given a weekly ration. The next big step is to get them back to the settlements. We left the eastern coast minutes ahead of flood waters as a result of the monsoon rains which had begun in the area.
Arizona State University’s Professor Harendra Fernando went to Sri Lanka yesterday with a large research team from the U.S. to study the tsunami and refinine a model that will predict what parts of the country a tsunami would affect most.
See William Herman’s article "Prof takes expertise to disaster site" in the Arizona Republic of Sunday, Jan 9th, 2005.
Rabbi Robert Kravitz, the Excutive Director of the American Jewish Commitee in Arizona said something that must put the popular misconception about Israeli aid being refused by Sri Lanka to rest.
He said that aid was never refused, and showed us a newspaper, the Jewish News of Greater Phoenix, which had it as a front page story. Check it out here. The story shows the picture on the left, of the Israeli army handing over aid to the Sri Lankan army. We build walls and rules in our world, he observed, but there are times when we must defy these rules and break down these walls, because we all belong to one human family.
Rabb Kravitz spoke at an inter-faith service for the family of Lal Fernando, a businessman in Arizona, whose wife lost several members of her family in Hambantota.
I have had several pictures sent to me from people visiting the area and have to hold back several. These are just too grotesque to be published. Also, they bring up another issue voiced by a victim who said this (in a story sent me from Tyronne Paiva)
They talk as though they do everything here. Many people come here; they just take photographs, but we don’t get anything,” said Ramzan Mohideen, a man in a Muslim cap and gown who lost his jewelry business.
The story was about a visit by US senators to the southern region.
The picture above (via Andrew Samuel,) is particularly tragic -and not too graphic. An ice cream truck on the east coast.
This one, via DigitalGlobe, shows the tsunami on the South west coast of Kalutara –the area populated by several beach resorts, including Tangerine beach hotel.
Another, shows the wave receding.
i was in galle yesterday and the devastation along the coast is heartbreaking and unbelievable. thousands of houses and buildings have been smashed to their foundations by the force of the waves.
yet, i saw signs of hope. people were returning to their non houses, sitting among the ruins, chatting, cleaning up and so on. in some places a single light bulb hung from a pole in the ground shedding light on the ruins.
just past abalangoda lie the remains of the death train and the army has moved in heavy equipment and tanks to lift it up. children were playing cricket on the beaches and on land laid bear by the waters. i had grit in my eyes.
actually people are pretty amazing in more ways than one.
Andrew Samuel, also travelling travelling south from Colombo –Jan 4th
Andrew, is volunteering with an NGO called Community Development Services. He can be reached at 94-777-341110 (mobile)
We will be assessing areas in Wadduwa, Bentota, Hikkaduwa, Galle, Matara, Tangalle and Hambantota and areas in between.
I’m more keen in developing a long term framework for capacity building, trauma management and mental rehabilitation work. Whilst physical needs are still important, in the months to come capacity building will be the priority.
Hoipolloireport 