Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations

Tsunami devastation: Fifteen years after

Navodhi and her twin brothers now in Naula

29 December, 2019

Navodhi Karunarathna vividly remembers dragging her two 10-year-old brothers back to where their home once stood. They were looking for their parents. The house, where her father also ran a thriving wood carving business, was unrecognisable. The walls had collapsed, and stuck through what remained of the roof were pieces of bodies. People, bleeding, called out for help.

Just fifteen years old back then, Navodhi could not stop crying. “Mallila dennawa beraganna (save your two brothers)” her father had said before he went looking for their mother who was caught in the giant wave.

Fifteen years ago this week (December 26, 2004 to be exact) a massive Tsunami claimed nearly 230,000 lives in fourteen countries. Indonesia and Sri Lanka bore the wrath of fatal waves that were triggered by a magnitude 9.1 earthquake in the Indian Ocean.

Sri Lanka remembered the loss of 35,322 people in a series of events this week. The main event declared the National Safety Day and organised every year since December 26, 2004 took place in front of the Peraliya Tsunami Monument in Telwatte, Galle on Thursday (26). Personnel attached to the tri-forces and police along with members of the public took part in the commemoration. The country also observed two-minutes silence in remembrance.

“Since our parents are gone, let’s all die”

When Navodhi woke up at her home in Dadella, Galle, on that fateful day nothing was amiss. Her father rode his bicycle to a shop nearby to buy king a coconut, their mother was in the backyard and Navodhi and the twins got ready for tuition classes. Clad in a white t-shirt and denim-shorts she waited for their tutor.

Instead the trio heard their father screaming alarmingly “Puthe! Puthe! (Child! Child!)”.
“As we ran out of the house the wave crashed into the back wall,” Navodhi recalled.
The time was 9.31 a. m. and the first wave, black with muck, had hit.

After giving directions to Navodhi and asking her to take care of her brothers, her father went in search of their mother who was caught in the wave. They saw him disappearing against the dark water.

People caught in the current were washed away

Nineteen-year-old Lahiru Sameera, helped his sister and father climb to the second storey of their house in Polhena, Matara. He didn’t understand what the black water was. A few minutes ago his neighbour had screamed “Rellak enawa (a wave is coming)” and they all ran for safety.

Dozens of others took refuge in Lahiru’s second storey. From the safety there, he looked at the devastating sight. As the wave pushed back it took with it people, and debris. He saw heads and arms through the black water as people caught in the current were being swept away.

When the environment seemed to have calmed down, Lahiru’s father went to the sea area to see what had happened. He came rushing back and broke the news, “Muhuda hidila (the sea has drained)”. That is when the second, and more fatal, wave crashed in.

Hundred and two people from his his village died that day.
Waiting for little Hiruni to come back home

Hiruni Tharushika, who was seven-years-old at the time, and eight others from her family were bound on the Samudra Devi from Colombo to Hikkaduwa. She was on an expedition.

“There is a lesson about train journeys in one of her Grade two books. Her class teacher asked the students to go and experience a train ride. So, we took a train to Hikkaduwa,” Hiruni’s mother Chandralatha Gamage, (59), said.

Their plan was to spend some time at the Hikkaduwa beach and return to Colombo.
But nothing went as planned when the second wave crashed into the Samudra Devi killing over 1000 of its passengers. Hiruni’s cousin died too. Her body was found.

Hiruni is missing since that day. Her mother is hopeful she would return home.

On December 26. the family, religiously shares two photographs of Hiruni. One of a seven year old Hiruni alongside a digitally altered photograph of what she would look like now.

Never again

In his message, remembering the fatal disaster, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa vowed to take all measures to curtail the impact of such events.

Leaving his thoughts and prayers with those who lost their lives, the survivors and their families, the President said “With the adaptation of new technologies, we will take all measures to minimise the impact from such natural disasters”.

Meanwhile, this year, the Disaster Management Centre has taken steps to prioritise district level awareness programs in a bid to educate the general public on disaster management.

When Navodhi saw her parents she was overwhelmed with happiness. They had a harrowing story to relate, but the children and parents were finally together. They hugged each other and cried. Novodhi remembers other bystanders crying too. Along with other survivors they went to the village temple.

By 10.00am the waves had hit and left a grieving country behind. Navodhi had lost all but the white t-shirt (now black with muck) and the pair of denim shorts. Their house and her father’s wood carvings (their bread and butter) were gone, but what she misses the most are her books she collected over the years, about a thousand of them, to build a personal library.
Moving on

Today, Lahiru who is in his early 30s is a food and beverage manager at a popular hotel. He is happily married. The tsunami taught him that material things do not bring happiness.

Navodhi and her family have picked up the pieces too. They are living in a rented house in Dambulla Road, Naula where they get by. Nabvodhi is a visiting lecturer now and she is also manages Karu Arts the family wood carving business. She is passionate about helping her father revive it to its former glory.