Remembering the Southeast Asian Tsunami, Part 1

I said I’d relaunch this blog today, so I am.  Despite the fact that it’s already quarter after nine in the evening as I begin to write this post.  And that I’ve unintentionally spent most of the day at the mall with the millions of other people who found some reason or another to buy things, or trade things for other things, on this holiday that’s not even supposed to exist in America.

But that’s beside the point.  I wanted to relaunch this blog today, Boxing Day 2009, because five years ago today I was witness to one of the most tragic events of the last decade: the Southeast Asian tsunami that killed nearly 230,000 people in 11 different countries.  Also, in exactly one month from today I’ll be making my own return pilgrimage to Asia, this time flying from LAX to Bangkok on a one-way ticket with China Air. From there, my intention is to spend about three months vagabonding around Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam.  I’ll be chronicling my adventures on this blog.

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When the tsunami hit, I was in a village in southern Kerala state, India.  I was in a tea shop with Jason, an old friend of mine.  We’d been staying at the Amritanandamayi Math ashram for about two weeks, and had celebrated Christmas there the previous day.  I was 20, and it had been my first Christmas away from home.  On this particular day, we had decided to take a break from the rigid schedule of the ashram.  We crossed over the backwaters to the neighboring village on a small ferry.

We were sitting at the tea shop, our Lonely Planet guides spread out on the table, cups of chai and half-eaten unidentifiable chaat arrayed in front of us.  We were focused intently on a map of southern India, planning our escape from the ashram and out into the wider world.  We imagined a journey that would take us through temples and holy places all around the south of India.  Flies buzzed lazily around the cool, shady room, and the locals chatted in Malayalam and mostly ignored us.

Just then we heard people shouting outside the shop.  “What’s going on?” I wondered out loud.  The shouting continued, so we stood up and poked our heads out the door to investigate.  Outside, we could see a couple dozen villagers running down the dirt road toward the water, waving their arms and shouting excitedly.  Of course, neither Jason nor I could understand a word of Malayalam, so we had no idea what they were shouting about.  “Maybe they’re trying to catch the bus,” I speculated.  I had noticed that the people here could get pretty excited about that kind of thing.

But then we noticed something: the water in the stream that ran through the village was going the wrong direction.  And then we noticed something else: it was rising rapidly.  “Oh, shit,” said Jason.

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I know, I know, that barely even qualifies as a teaser.  But after all the festivities of the past three days, I’m totally exhausted and need to call it an early night.  Stay tuned for the rest of the story, and for more musings about my upcoming travels and other subjects of potential interest. Cheers.