This man, a grandfather, holds his young grandson on the road to the sea behind what used to be his home. The waves came ashore quickly and swept back to sea, again and again, scraping and stripping the earth of every living thing – growing more powerful with each wave until there was nothing left. We saw each other at the side of the road, and I stopped and asked to photograph him – quietly he shared his story of outrunning "waves as tall as the palm trees" that stand behind him. He was on a scooter when the first wave came ashore, but it soon rushed back out to sea with the birds, the air – drawn silent. He sensed danger, hearing a growing rumble out to sea, and then over his shoulder he could see a new wave building – instinctively he grabbed his boy and literally had to run for their lives. They were very lucky that day to have survived. Nearly a quarter of a million others – did not.
Two weeks after the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami drove mercilessly across open ocean to hit the coastlines of some 14 countries, I was initially on the ground in India for Food for the Hungry US, to cover the tragedy and the global response that was being rushed to the region. Straight from the airport to the beach, literally the funeral pyres were still smoldering while women wailed into the offshore winds at the searing pain of losing their babies and complete families – the waves taking dreams, hopes, laughter and life – without a kiss goodbye. It would be my first time in a relief zone – naively thinking India was as bad as it gets. I was wrong.
After 10 days up and down the eastern coastline, I asked to be sent to Indonesia, to Banda Aceh, to begin documenting the carnage at the centre of the greatest natural tragedy on earth. I would spend weeks in the region and return for years that followed. Each and every visit, I would find myself pulled under by the memory of stories I heard, the broken hearted sobbing and images of death from what felt truly like The Apocalypse had been unleashed.
To share just one moment is the best I can do tonight but – my time in Banda Aceh stole my ability to speak, it reduced me to constant tears having spent far too long without relief in the midst of tortured souls trying to come to grips with having lost their entire world.
A few flashes of those times tonight – still brings me to my knees.
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