By now you've all heard of the earthquake disaster that has hit so many heavily populated coastlines in Asia. Thankfully, I wasn't affected, but, many were not so fortunate. The death tool so far as accurately as I can get is:
Sri Lanka: 10,800 dead
Indonesia: 4,500 dead
India: 2,958 dead
Thailand: 839 dead
Malaysia: 44 dead
Maldives: 32 dead
Burma: 30 dead
Bangladesh: 2 dead
The first I heard of it was an email from my brother. I quickly asked some of the natives of the situation and they outlined the magnitude of the quake and the path of destruction that was being carved out as we spoke. At that stage some of the aftershocks were still sending 40ft waves out into sea. After a quick email home to explain that we were safe we went about finding out as much information as we could. First we were told that 1,000 had died. Later 2,000...So on and so on and now the count is approx. 20,000. Some of the stories that we heard were terrible as the situation unfolded. We met one guy who told us that he was talking to his girlfriend who was stuck in the island of Phuckat (one of the worst hit), she was on top of a mountain with some others who dashed to the summit and she didn't know what to do. They had received a 2 hour warning to reach high ground. Another told a story of how his friend was deep sea diving off the same island when the first wave hit. Both were saved. Others were less fortunate. Up to 20 tourist boats through out all the countries were missing. Many fishermen were lost and even the grandson of the kingdom of Thailand, a 21 year old boy, lost his life while out jet skiing. And its still not over for these areas. Talk has now swung to the disease that will spread due to poor sanitation and lack of clean water. Unfortunately, the death toll is going to be higher. More individual eye accounts can be found on http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4125945.stm
Life on the island is going on as if it hasn't happened. Literally, everyone is going about the business. Fortunately, Koa Phanyang is in the gulf and protected by the mainland. As such, we did not experience anything at all. Just huge volumes of emails, phone calls and TV images of the devastation.
I count myself lucky. Back in June I made a decision to stay in Brasil an extra month. If I had not done that I would presently, according to my original itinery be on the east coast of Sri Lanka and would have been in one of the regions that was hit the hardest. I now won't be going there and must contact Quantas to see what my options are of a different flight. Maybe it will be an extra couple of weeks in China or India. I'll have to check it out.
Anyway, thanks for the emails. They were much appreciated.
