Jaime's Story

By Jaime Aldridge

8 Feb 2005

written by Jaime Aldridge

Me & my family were staying at a beach hut in Unawatuna, Sri Lanka for Christmas. On Boxing Day at 9:00am we planned to go on a snorkelling trip out at sea. We woke up at 8 and got on the boat at 9:10 which was incredibly lucky due to the experience ahead of us. We hadn’t a clue that a tsunami was going to strike. So we sailed out to sea in a fishing boat. We kept circling the island while the fisherman explained that the sea was too rough snorkel and was very dangerous. At this time we were getting a bit aggravated that we wouldn’t be able to snorkel! At the bottom of the fishing boat was a small square of glass down into the sea. We kept looking in it, and every time it looked dark and sandy so we couldn’t see through it. My aunt Becky was very sea sick at this time and wanted to get off the boat. The fishermen went to take us back to shore and the sea had become so rough it was swirling around like mini tornados. So the fishermen sailed us around the corner to another city called Galle, when we got closer, 3 fishing boats shot out of the mist shouting "GO GO OUT TO SEA NOW, WAVE 100FT WAVE! GO!"

we hadn’t a clue what was happening, but we took their advice anyway. We sat in a boat out at sea, with my aunt being sick, my mom worried, my dad laughing about the whole affair and my grandma was reassuring my aunt. We waited 2 hours for what we thought was just a rough sea. In that time the fishermen were cutting off the safety rings off the side of the boat for if anything happened. We glanced at our hut and the hotels on the beach and realized that it was all destroyed. Still at this point we did not realize the extent of the damage. We sailed towards the beach where TV’s, tables and domestics were in the sea. I caught a glimpse of something floating in the sea, and when we got closer we apprehended that it was a floating corpse of a baby and next to it an old man. We got incredibly worried and yearned to get back to our cosy beach hut as soon as possible. The fishermen drove us through the waves carefully towards the beach. The boat washed up on the sand and 5 men out of nowhere began pulling at the boat and shouting for us to get off. I was puzzled why they were hurrying us. However I was the first off the boat and I ran to where the men were pointing for us to go. A man pulled me up onto a ledge and then we ran though a broken down restaurant to a plot of land where all the waiters were. We got to know the waiters very well during our stay, so they were concerned about us and were all glad to see us alive, as they had all suffered dramatic experiences on land. My family ran over to me, and we were all told to run up the street. I had no shoes because I left them in the room, so I was running bare foot until a kind middle-aged man, looked at my feet and gave me his own shoes. My mom and dad began to run and so did I. we still didn’t know what had happened.

We ran up the street where some locals stopped us and took us inside to eat and drink. We were sitting down in their yard, when tourists and locals began to run in horror. Another wave was coming. The people that were looking after us took us along an alley; to some trees with ropes which led up into a mountain; which we remained until the streets were safe. In the mountain were a few families and we were lucky to be up there. An Italian family was resting there and were very helpful. My shoes were gigantic so I couldn’t walk let alone run in them. So an Italian woman ripped her clothes to wrap round my feet to stop me from getting injured. My dad and uncle went down to our complex to see what they could find and left us in the mountain.

They came back with shoes and food. We were told by passing tourists to go to the temple to get food. We up to the temple and stayed there since it was on high grounds. After 3 hrs of watching homeless, upset, missing, children and adults walk past, my dad and uncle went to find a safe hotel to stop the night in, As we didn’t want to sleep in the temple. While they were gone, the temple rang a bell which meant an after shock wave was coming. We were worried about the men. After 20 minutes they came back safe and had found a hotel to stay in. We dragged our few items left, up to the hotel and met our neighbours who happened to be 6 Lankan lads who were from Colombo. They were very nice men as they offered to help us get a minibus back to Colombo as my aunt and uncle live their too. Through that night the temple rang the bell a couple of times because of swells. Dogs barked all night and people screamed. In the morning we went to the only shop open, to get tooth brushes as we had lost them too, after that we went to visit our broken down Beach hut to try to find our things. I found some clothes of mine in the wreckage.

My mom found her favourite picture and some of her clothes. Most things were destroyed, missing or 300 yards up the road. Everything was now getting a bit emotional and my mom began to cry as she looked at the damage that nature can do to our civilisation. I stood looking at the sea which by now looked quite calm. My grandma didn’t find anything except her statue elephant which she cherished a great deal. We began to make our way back to the hotel, then the bells rang and in panic, we had to run again. This by now was the 4th time the bells had rung. My grandma however couldn’t run as she has arthritis in her hips and knees. At that moment of crisis, we bumped into one of the waiters at our beach hut and he put my grandma onto his bike and pushed her along. I ran as fast as I could up the street and lost my family. People stopped running and was asking me whether I had lost anyone because I was alone. A young girl came up crying and emotional asking if I was alright. I ran to the hotel and waited with my neighbours, until my family reached the hotel. My uncle got a phone call saying that we are being collected. We were reported as missing on BBC. BBC said that a British teacher and his family were on a boat when went missing. This was us. My uncle is a British Council Teacher, so we had people looking for us. A car finally came for us and the Lankan man drove through the jungle to Colombo because the coast roads were in ruins. We are extremely lucky to get away from the disaster than has killed thousands. We were offered counselling since I seen at least 10 dead bodies and watched our beach hut be demolished. We were told that when we were in the boat we were lucky because the tidal wave travelled under us and picked up the sand on the way which made the cloudy liquid what we could see through the glass square on the base of the boat. We finally got home from our episode of jeopardy, and watched on the news the devastation that we thought was just a big wave, happened to be a tsunami and it was a miracle we were still alive to see the damage.