Waves of Death, Waves of Resurrection

TSUNAMI: Seven hours that shook the world - An eye-witness account from Sri Lanka.
Author: Satinder Bindra
Vijitha Yapa Publishers, Colombo

Review: Carl Muller

NATURE’S FURY:I may be driving this issue into the ground. The tsunami of 2004 is long gone, but I want to pay my deepest respect to Satinder Bindra, a seasoned journalist of the world-wide CNN team. He was on holiday in Sri Lanka in December 2004 and became this island’s CNN man-on-the-spot who covered, as he called it -

‘One of the most awesome displays of Nature’s fury, and the biggest news story of 2004.’

His book, “Tsunami: Seven Hours that Shook the World - An Eye-Witness Account from Sri Lanka” tells of this incredible sea-storm that struck twelve countries across Asia and Africa, triggered by the second-most powerful earthquake in recorded history.

The tsunami left up to 220,000 dead, rendered millions homeless and shook the globe, leaving behind a picture of terror; destroyed families; shattered homes - a monstrous purging of life, both human and animal.

Satinder launched his personal story with a word from Chris Cramer, CNN’s managing director, who laid the groundwork for this book. As Cramer said:

‘There is a cruel equation in the news business, that Christmas and tragedies go hand in hand.’

Resilience

Even as Satinder was briefed by Parisa Khosravi, CNN’s senior director of international coverage, he reported what he had learnt;

‘....hundreds of giggling children running onto the beaches to snatch the teeming fish left stranded when the earthquake sucked the waves from the shore - only to be hurled to their deaths when the tsunami roared back again a short time later.

Thousands more children were simply too tiny to outrun the water which engulfed their villages and communities along the coasts of Sri Lanka, Thailand and Indonesia... (and he added even television could not begin to comprehend the suffering of the people of South Asia. The screen was simply not big enough.’

He also had another purpose in writing this book. He wished to tell of the ‘warm, generous and selfless people’ and ‘the resilience of the survivors’ and from the pages rises a truly gripping story. As he said:

‘This is a story of two waves. The first, a killer; the second, a wave of compassion which became the largest-ever relief operation launched in the world.’

At first, the sea came remorselessly in, rushing onto the land, surging across roads, dashing into beach hotel walls. Then, as Satinder records:

‘I was watching the world’s most powerful vacuum cleaner in action. Furniture from seaside restaurants, pieces of damaged homes and all kinds of debris were being pulled kilometres out to sea... (and he details the tragedy with a flurry of rapier strokes): a ship sunk in Colombo harbour..the jail that was torn apart in Matara..the three twenty-foot waves that smashed the town of Hambantota.

seaside home

‘There was Imtiaz Ahmed, a small-goods trader in Hambantota. The waves killed his sisters in their seaside home...’

Arthur Senanayake, CNN’s distributor in Galle, reported that “the sea just exploded, sending 30-foot waves hurtling at us. He told Satinder that the waves were so huge “that several buses had even landed on the top of multi-storeyed buildings,” The carnage in Colombo seemed to have zeroed in on the poor coastal dwellers. In one of his scripts, Satinder noted:

“....as it unleashed its fury, the sea targeted the poorest of the poor.”

Tragedy

He has also pointed an accusing finger at the people who used the tragedy to loot. and plunder. At the White House Beach Hotel, the owner, David Gittins, showed him two vans that had been smashed and looted by people in his own community:

‘The vans belonged to foreign surfers, three hundred of whom perished, My immediate neighbours, everybody from the local community, is walking into my property. They are stealing, taking property that does not belong to them. I find it a very despicable thing.’

The day after the tsunami saw more than 200,000 displaced. On the east coast, Satinder tells of maximum damage and of Father Dayalan Sanders who was at the orphanage he runs for children at Navalaji Beach. The priest told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour:

“Words defy description. It was a massive thirty-foot wall of sea, you know black in colour, stretching from one end of the beach to the other; and the very sight of this mass of water rushing towards us - it was like a thousand freight trains charging at you: that thunderous roar itself petrified you with fear.’

There was one thing Father Sanders could do. He piled the children into a boat and swept out to meet the wave - and the boat rode its crest and carried all its human cargo, dripping and wet but unharmed, into Batticaloa. The orphanage was completely destroyed and Father Sanders said:

‘It wasn’t just a wave. It was living, fighting, malevolent thing. It was out to kill!’

Destruction

To Satinder, Galle looked as though it had been hit by an atom bomb. The entire fishing industry had been destroyed. A huge 1,500-tonne ship lay on the jetty. The Sri Lanka Navy’s missile carrier had capsized, entombing several sailors.

The Galle stadium was wrecked. Buses had been dragged from the central stand and wedged into shops and buildings. Cars were piled up, one upon the other “in what appeared to be the sea’s grotesque might and malevolence.”

If this book tells of the full evil of the tsunami and all the stories that swarmed out of it, Satinder also paints the most horrifying picture of all. To tell you of it would be to suck out the pith of this extraordinary book and I would like you to read it all yourself - the moving story of the boy, Tharesh Liyanage, who saw his mother disappear and the loss of so many family members.

The most poignant part of this book tells of the findings of Phil Turner of london’s CNN force in the North. He sent the China correspondent, Stan Grant, to Mullaitivu, where the Tigers were collecting bodies everywhere - and he remarked:

The Tigers know how to dispose of bodies. They are fairly unsentimental about it.’

The story of Baby 81 also figures, and what is more, the book carries a selection of colour prints. The train and its gouged track is now a shrine to the people who still go to Peraliya to pray for the dead. .. and there is that important question: Why did we not have an Indian Ocean tsunami warning system? As he comes to the end of the book, Satinder says:

‘I watched the arrival of relief planes from countries as poor as Bangladesh. I fully understand the meaning of the term: “The world is a global village.” In their darkest hour, people all over the world had reached out to the Sri Lankans.’ Forgive me for making this small correction to that last badly - constructed sentence. Should not Satinder have said: “People all over the world had reached out to the Sri Lankans in their darkest hour’?

One thing must be said. This is book to be read if only to tell us that we are a part of this ‘village’. As such, will anyone please tell me why the blazes we cannot live together like the people of one village?