It was like any other afternoon after school, all of us tired and glad to go home after another intense mental workout (courtesy, Physics teacher). Even though my usual mode of transport is by car, that day I went home in an auto. By the time my sister and I reached home, I was almost fed up of the rocking, bumpy motions of the auto (which is why I usually avoid them). When I got down, I saw the man living in 2A in our apartment standing right in front of gate, arms on his hips, gazing at the ground intently. To me, he looked like someone who was trying to figure out whether an alien had just landed in front of the building, and I stared at him, trying to figure out what he was doing.
At home, my mom was watching the stock market keenly, barely looking up as we came in. A while later, I looked out the French window. Yep, the person from 2A was there, along with a few residents of 3A and 1B too. I was really puzzled by this, because I've rarely seen them standing in said place, especially not with those kind of postures. But when I casually said this to my mom, she immediately switched to the news channel (I have no idea how she connected the two), and then we knew about the earthquake and Tsunami warnings. The immediate parallel that my mind drew was, of course, the 2004 Tsunami, though none of us had a warning then.
I still remember that day very clearly. It was Dec 26th, 2004- my Dad's birthday, and my cousin's. I got up early that day just to wish him. Minutes after he had started reading the morning paper, we could hear loud screams of people, especially women. We could hear them shouting, " அலை பாயறது!! " (Rough Translation: The waves are leaping!), and it sounded really awful.
Immediately dad called the watchman and asked what it was about. "A huge wave washed away everything- the boats, the huts; it went till the end of the beach!" was his answer. None of us had any idea what it was.
The beach was a mess, and very, very wet. The wave had traveled the whole width of it, crossing the low wall that divided it from the road, all the way till the sidewalk.
As we walked through the beach, I could see dead sea creatures strewn everywhere- lots of crabs, prawn-like creatures, and even some fish. However, the worst part of it- at that time, at least- was the wreckage to our left.
The huts that were once standing upright had been reduced to a few pieces of wet thatch lying in the sand, and what boats were present were in pieces. And everywhere we could see, fisherfolk were extremely distressed- and why wouldn't they be? Their homes, boats- tools of their trade- were all lost.
Minutes after, the police came to the scene, and immediately began evacuating everyone from the beach. One of them came to us and ordered us to go away 'as far as possible' from the beach, while another one was calling back some of the fishermen who had gone into the sea to look for their boats.
Coming back home, my father called up a few relatives and asked them to switch on their TVs - we didn't have one at that time- and then left soon to my Grandfather's house, where the rest of the family had gathered. It was there, on TV, that for the first time in my life, I heard the word 'Tsunami'.
Knowing that Chennai was only one of the many places affected came as a complete shock to me. Looking at the video footage and post-Tsunami photos (of victims, especially), I knew whatever I saw in Elliot's beach was nothing compared to this. And when they started reporting the damage in Pondicherry, I think my heart skipped a beat, because the previous day, early in the morning, we were happily strolling about in the exact same beach that looked so very different on TV that day! My mom was nearly in tears when she heard the news, and I still shudder to think what would've happened if we had gone along with our previous plan to postpone the trip by a day...
There were a wide range of reactions to the (2012) Earthquake here. Many people I knew felt the tremors; some felt it lightly, some strongly, and some, like me, didn't feel it at all! And then there was that Tsunami prediction at 5 pm that day. At about 3, most of the residents in the apartment left home, only to return late at night. In news channels, information about what protection measures were being taken were displayed, and most companies and schools shut down early.
4 pm... 4:30... 5.... As time passed, there were no signs of a Tsunami approaching, and slowly tension eased. By the end of the day, everyone here was back to their normal routine; and the events of the day were pushed to the back of their minds.
Why am I even writing all this? I may remember what happened for now, maybe for a moth, or even a year- but I'm pretty sure that this event will soon be forgotten. On the other hand, it has been more than 6 years since the 2004 Tsunami, but the events are still extremely clear in my mind, and it is something that I surely will not forget for a long, long time.
In 2004, the disaster took everyone by surprise. No one would have ever imagined the kind of death and destruction wrought by the Tsunami or how much the victims would have been affected. What I've said here doesn't even begin to cover the events that took place all around the world that day. In a second, thousands died, lost their livelihood, their property, their family. Until then, there was no proper protection against such a disaster.
However, yesterday, Tsunami alerts were issued over 28 countries even though that type of earthquake couldn't produce one. Protection levels were high, people were evacuated, and scores stood near the beach, mobiles and cameras held up, all hoping for a glimpse of the Tsunami that never came...
Edit :- The reason why I used the word 'yesterday', even though I published the post 2 days after the earthquake was because this post was actually written on the 12th.
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