=?iso-8859-1?Q?Fwd:_TSUNAMI_=96_SRI_LANKA_=96_FIRST-HAND_?= REPORT from Russell Bowden

[Haraszti Katalin]

Tisztelt Kollégák,
továbbítom a sri lankai lakos Russel Bowden levelét, aki az IFLA-nak igen 
aktív tagja volt és jelenleg is dolgozik a IFLA MAS-ban (a 
könyvtárosegyesületeket/-szövetségeket tömörítõ szekcióban).

Haraszti Katalin
MKE alelnök


>Dear Colleages,
>
>So many of you have e-mailed to enquire about my safety and that of 
>friends and to express concern that I though that the most convenient way 
>to respond was to attach a copy of a report that I've just written after 
>returning late last evening from a three day tour down to the south.
>
>I hope that you find it informative.
>
>My good wishes for 2005 and may it be better than 2004.
>Sincerely
>Russell.
>
># From: "Russell Bowden" <russell at slt.lk>
># To: <Ifla-l at infoserv.inist.fr>
># Subject: Tsunami - report from Sri Lanka
>**********************************************
>TSUNAMI ­ SRI LANKA ­ FIRST-HAND REPORT
>
>A General Note to all Concerned Friends
>
>I and all friends, thankfully, are safe ­ although one or two had narrow 
>escapes or suffered flooded houses, ruined TVs and radios etc. etc. My own 
>house is 6 kilometres from the sea and built on high ground so absolutely 
>OK. But what for all the other Lankans? Nothing ­ only indescribable damage.
>
>On Monday we visited the Mount Royal Hotel on the beach at Mount Lavinia 
>where many of you and other friends stay and we walked the length of the 
>beach. The wall between the Hotel’s garden and pool and the railway line 
>and the beach was flattened and the garden, pool and ground-floor rooms 
>filled with mud and debris. On the beach nearly everything was flattened 
>with only one restaurant left standing although damaged: otherwise nothing 
>is left except debris. But debris the likes of which I’ve never seen. Not 
>a whole roof or an entire brick and concrete wall but tiny unrecognisable 
>pieces as the swirling waters smashed everything into smithereens. All 
>this mixed with weeds, plastic and other rubbish. There remains nothing to 
>salvage: only to bulldoze, clear and throw into rubbish dumps. Nothing 
>left with which to rebuild.
>
>On Tuesday we ventured a little further afield to where the road south 
>begins and runs from Moratuwa to Panadura. Between it and the sea is the 
>main railway line south to Gall and Matura filled with low cost housing 
>and shacks of fisherman primarily. What was left? Nothing!! On both sides 
>of the road (which had been bulldozed clear by the Army) nothing but tiny 
>bits of splintered wood,  tiny sheets of asbestos and a few bricks 
>remaining concreted together, all draped in plastic vegetation etc. and 
>piled metres high against buildings or  posts that withstood the forces as 
>the waters three times rushed in.
>First at a few metres high then as it receded showing a bare sea bed never 
>seen before (and onto which an adventurous few went to collect fish left 
>dieing on the bared sea bed) only to return 15 to 20 metres (not feet!!) 
>high and then recede and return again. In 30 minutes it was all over! All 
>on a beautiful early morning with a clear blue sky cooled by the cooling 
>Christmas breezes that blow at this time of year.
>
>On the Wednesday I’d contacted some friends in Galle, 78 miles south who 
>were inland and safe but short of food etc. We decided to venture down 
>south, although the main Galle Road was uncleared, by driving on narrow 
>minor country roads that meander inland from village to village and 
>connect them and inland towns with those on the coast. Using a map and 
>with excellent emergency signing put up by a Soya Bean company we drove 
>through some beautiful scenery where we’d never visited before and arrived 
>to find the family safe. After distributing the food we’d brought we 
>ventured into Galle.
>
>If you’ve been watching TV you will have seen the main Galle Central Bus 
>Stand and the International Cricket Stadium under water with three girls 
>being swept away as they failed to hold on to the bus stand. At first 
>driving into the town all looks OK until there tell-tale piles of rubbish 
>in drains and in gardens. Then it gets progressively worse as walls are 
>washed away, then vehicles are plastered against houses and trees, then 
>boats appear in gardens and houses and then there is nothing except this 
>incredible debris where it is possible to recognise what had been a chair 
>or a plastic bucket or a sink or a toilet until even these are so 
>destroyed that nothing in the piles of debris can be recognized. This 
>rubbish sometimes is metres high. It all stinks with that sweet smell of 
>death and decaying bodies - by this stage rarely a few human mainly but 
>dogs, cats, goats etc etc.
>
>Galle had been particularly severely hit with the three waves each forced 
>into two as the 16th century fort ramparts withstood the waves (inside it 
>is scarcely damaged) and the floods were funneled into a small space 
>opposite the railway station and directed down a canal into the centre of 
>the town and carrying everything before it including the corber of an old 
>Dutch building. The buildings facing the sea across the bus stand and the 
>cricket ground and the Fort ramparts were the sieve that allowed the 
>waters through but sifted out buses, cars, lorries, three wheelers, 
>bicycles and boats all piled up two stories high against the Stanley Hotel 
>and the newly-opened Cargill’s Food City. All of this infiltrated with 
>this unique tidal wave debris. The stench was unbearable. The waters 
>exited down the three narrow main streets to the beaches on the south 
>ripping open steel security shutters of shops and emptying the contents of 
>TV’s computers, hardware sacks of rice and dhal etc. !
>  etc. on the way. The Fish Market does not remain only the concrete 
> floor. Opposite on the beach 13 ocean-going trawlers smashed together in 
> a huddle!
>
>The next day (Thursday and the fourth day after that on which the Tsunami 
>arrived) we decided to visit Matura from where Mahesh’s family come). We 
>knew them all to be safe. To get there we again ventured deep into country 
>lanes but again all extremely helpfully sign-posted and this time with 
>Police, Army and Naval Security (protecting from looting) providing 
>helpful advice. It was a slow journey because of the amount of traffic 
>carrying food and aid collected by the TV stations and banks and voluntary 
>bodies in Colombo and the undamaged areas. We visited places that I’d 
>always wanted to see (but not in these circumstances) and eventually 
>reached Matura to find it not too badly (relatively speaking!!) damaged in 
>that the sea swept in across a newly and solidly-built bus stand to come 
>into the river which quickly and conveniently flushed the waters back into 
>the sea.
>
>We drove along the coast road then being bulldozed clear to Weligama a 
>beautiful small town at the cusp of a wide bay and open un-protectedly to 
>the full force of the ocean waves. The town, half a kilometer inland, had 
>been devastated with the now familiar sight of debris everywhere. The Rest 
>House, where I and friends have stayed for the last nearly forty year 
>stood, but all the doors ripped off the rooms and the bar and furniture 
>all swept away. The garden had obviously been a sea-water pond although 
>now it was all drained but the trees and plants (particularly jak and 
>breadfruit) clearly hated sea water and the leaves were already yellow 
>falling off onto the already terrible debris scattered everywhere. The 
>statue of the Buddha facing the tidal waves, on the corner of the grounds 
>protected by walls all now destroyed, sat serenely under the Bho Tree as 
>it has always done and unscarred by the waters. (As an aside what has been 
>truly amazing has been to see statues of ‘worth!
>  ies’, St George, Christ and the Virgin Mary and Buddhist dignatories and 
> particularly alters to the Buddha almost all (with few exceptions) 
> remaining entirely unscathed even though all around them and even next to 
> them buildings etc had been washed away ­ obviously a message for those 
> that wanted to search it out).
>
>On to Unawattuna Bay where so many of us have swam and bathed. Milton’s 
>and Sea and Sand hotels on the corner of the Bay and beside the main road 
>left as simple shells as the waves had entered at the front removing door 
>and window frames and then swept out at the back onto the main road 
>destroying the property walls on the way and depositing all that it had 
>picked up on the way either on the road or through other buildings on the 
>land side that it had also destroyed. From the ruins one could survey the 
>entire length of the beach which, on the previous Christmas night had been 
>the venue for beach parties and now with not a building remaining with a 
>frontage undamaged. We visited the Unawattuna Beach Hotel where only three 
>weeks earlier we had been trying unsuccessfully to book rooms for Liz and 
>Moya, Brenda and M. and I. The restaurant on the beach lurching at 45 
>degrees but in the restaurant dirty glasses and bottles still remaining on 
>the bar! The garden, ground floor rooms!
>   and pool were entire wrecks. [Incidentally not getting reservations at 
> this hotel we’d gone further south to Attanagalle and found a beautiful 
> small hotel wide open to the sea with a nice garden and pool and rooms 
> with no steps at sea level. Now all the second floor rooms have unmade 
> beds etc but at ground level nothing remains except the swimming pool 
> filled with deep sea debris and dead crabs all stinking quietly in the 
> sun. The Owner vowed to have it open in three months. I told him of our 
> booking and the deposit we’d paid which he offered to pay back. I refused 
> to take it!!] Incidentally the school at the entrance road to the Beach 
> Hotel destroyed: not a building, not a piece of the four walls enclosing 
> the large sports field left.
>We drove silently and somberly back to Ratna and Jaya’s to bathe off the 
>smells of death and have a couple of very strong arracks.
>
>Yesterday [Friday and the fourth day after the disaster and (for the 
>remainder of the world) New Year’s Eve !!!!] we set off back to Colombo 
>along the coast road the military said was clear. Everywhere, where the 
>waters had hit, one saw this total devastation and strange debris created 
>by these churning swirling waters.  Hikkaduwa had to be approached from 
>inland as the Police had closed the road because there had been reports of 
>devastated people trying to stop and rob long-distance bus passengers. The 
>waters had destroyed the station and railway lines lay twisted and bent 
>and the level-crossing gates bent and twisted and a collection point for 
>all types of rubbish. The first hotel had no back to it and the waters had 
>washed out the window and door frames on the road side. In the garden 
>battered against the crumbling back of the hotel were two ocean-going 
>trawlers. The main canal emptying the paddy fields inland had served as 
>the conduit for waves entering and destroying en!
>  tirely the buildings beside it including the police station.
>
>All hotels were the same. What is remarkable is the few numbers of 
>foreigners that were drowned. Throughout the town buildings, even on the 
>land side, were also damaged or destroyed. One man with only the windows 
>washed out had opened and was displaying postcards to sell and (dry out in 
>the sun) to the few foreign tourist wandering disconcertedly though the 
>wreckage and rubble. Otherwise all was strangely silent and the 
>all-pervasive smell of death. The entrance to the town no longer existed 
>with the waters penetrating more than half a mile across the road and into 
>the land utterly flattening walls and houses and then breaking the 
>concrete and bricks into tiny pieces.
>
>So it was for the remainder of the 60 mile journey back to Colombo. In 
>places the waters had swept container lorries loaded with goods yards off 
>the road where they now lay twisted and mangled and almost unrecognizable 
>as vehicles. Cars, buses and lorries hung at odd angles from trees 
>reminding one of those strange draped watches of Salvadore Dali. The 
>railway lines swept hundreds of yards into fields or just haning in 
>mid-air where the embankment had been removed under it. (Incidentally the 
>train that got swept of its tracks and the people drowned as they sat in 
>their seats still has more than 100 bodies in it that have not yet been 
>evacuated and buried).
>
>If before the road beside the sea had been a tourists paradise and with 
>views always to be remembered but occasionally blocked by hotels and 
>bungalows and high walls or by trees and vegetation not so today. All have 
>gone. The view is now uncluttered by houses and trees. If shops, 
>restaurants and cafes and the cars parked in front of them sometimes 
>blocked the road to cause traffic jams and road rage that is not so today. 
>They too have been washed into the jungles, swamps or paddy fields behind 
>them. The scars will take months and years to heal. Paddy fields have 
>turned rust brown in colour as the salt water destroys the young paddy 
>that had another couple of months before being ripe enough to harvest.
>
>What I can never, never forget (and the images keep coming into the front 
>of my attention like the clips of a movie before ones eyes) are the 
>people. They sit or stand in groups beside the road on both sides looking 
>for relief or food, or water or blankets or clothing or some form of help. 
>I have read of traumatized people but I have never seen them like this. 
>They sit and look into space. They know not where to start. (And if I were 
>them neither should I). Everything is gone. Often family members dead and 
>the bodies missing or buried (because of disease and the stench in mass 
>graves ­ Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus Christians altogether death not 
>recognising any particular burial requirements of individuals who have 
>neither been recognized or have been made un recognizable. They have no 
>boats (and many were poor fisher people), no houses, no shelter, no water 
>(all the wells were inundated by sea water and are now contaminated with 
>sewage), no ID cards and no money. They are com!
>  pletely destitute even of hope and ideas for any future.
>
>However a most painful feature of all this is the stark and immediate 
>contrast between these scenes of devastation and human misery and the 
>remainder of the country. Drive through Kalutara and down the Galle road 
>south and the houses on the sea side are prosperous and well kept and the 
>towns towards Colombo have their super markets and Cargills’ all open with 
>Christmas lights on and decorations nicely displayed. BUT 
. One hundred 
>yards behind is utter destruction and destitution. Where the waters didn’t 
>reach life goes on as before; where it did reach there is death, 
>destruction, disease and no hope. Both exist in two entirely different 
>worlds and only yards from each other.
>
>Assistance there is but my observation is that it is primarily for those 
>with enough energy to push and struggle for what is being given. What is 
>being given is mainly contributed by individuals in the remainder of the 
>country and distributed by well-meaning people (like us) who have driven 
>down with goods or dry rations or even with cooked meals but the 
>assistance is un-planned, uncoordinated and entirely inadequate given the 
>sheer scale of the numbers suffering. Those on the road get: those off the 
>road or in areas still too difficult to reach and far from Colombo (whose 
>needs are likely to be even greater because of their un-approachability) ­ 
>don’t. The Army and Forces have no doubt done excellent work in clearing 
>aid routes, the Police too in halting looting but the Ministers ‘ponce’ 
>around in front of TV cameras and hold unending meetings in Colombo 
>producing reports for the Media but NOTHING seems to be happening. I have 
>seen no clear instructions, for instance, to de!
>  liver your aid to local authority officials or offices or to police 
> stations. There appears to have been no orderly gathering of peoples into 
> refugee centres in Temples, Mosques or Churches and no guidance to people 
> on what to do. I have seen a report by a Lankan reporter suggesting that 
> aid channeled through the governments agencies has already gone missing 
> and been diverted to officals’ family needs. Where the aid is from the 
> UK, the US, Russia, China, Croatia, the French, the Belgians and many 
> other countries one doesn’t know. One sees planes being emptied in the 
> Katunayake Airport but I saw no signs anywhere on the hundred miles 
> between Matara and Colombo of any of it being moved let alone being 
> distributed to the needy. An opinion strongly shared by a Lankan 
> colleague who made at least two visits south with a seasoned cameraman 
> and reporter. In short: the ordinary man in the street, over the entire 
> island, has responded and assisted magnificently but the Government (wi!
>  th the exception of the police and the armed forces and the te!
>  lecom en
>gineers, water board engineers and electricity supply people) seems still 
>to be talking about what to do rather than DOING!!
>
>Enough, I hope, to provide a sense of what is happening here from my 
>experiences for all those of you who have been so kind as to communicate 
>expressing your concerns for I and my friends.
>
>Thank you most sincerely.
>
>Russell Bowden
>January 2005.