It was in December 2004 that we decided to go to Andaman and Nicobar Islands; my grandparents, my parents, my sister and I. We boarded a flight for Port Blair from Chennai, and the journey was actually longer than what it takes to reach from Bangalore to say Pakistan, or even Bangladesh.
The islands are very picturesque and totally worth visiting; especially for their magnificent corals. I swear, out of all the beaches and islands I have visited, no other place has better corals than the Andamans. The water is pure and pristine with its shades of blue, and as you dip your hand into it, a rainbow of colours hit your eyes through the snorkelling mask. You can find red, purple and even green corals; the experience was mind blowing and anyone who wants to see the ocean and it's corals left untouched by pollution and development, then Andaman and Nicobar Islands is the place to go.
We spent the first six days of our week long stay relaxing, snorkelling, and visiting the Cellular Jail. This jail was used by the Japanese during World War II to hold POWs, and later by the British to keep Indian freedom fighters. The jail proved very effective, for it was isolated from the subcontinent by the vast Bay of Bengal, which was not humanly possible to swim across; though it is said that a freedom fighter by the name of Veer Savarkar did actually swim to the mainland.
We also visited the place from which we could see the view that is printed on 20 rupee notes in India. Go ahead and compare the picture to a twenty-rupee note, and the similarities will be astounding.
We were scheduled to leave the islands on 27th December, and on the day before, we were supposed to go on a boating trip to a nearby island.
It was the morning of 26 December, 2004....All of us ( except my sister ) woke up at around six in the morning so that we could be ready in time for the boating trip. We were out in the one of the gardens of the hotel, when we felt a tremor underneath, it lasted for almost half a minute and felt quite strong. We hurried back to our rooms, to check if there was any damage and to wake my sister up and keep her safe. My sister was all right, but the walls of the room had long and very noticeable cracks running from the ceiling to the floor.
My father suggested that we go and see the ocean because after an earthquake, the waves tend to rise a little and flood the shore, so my father, my grandmother and I went to check on the waves. We climbed up one of the viewing posts, and could see the waves rising and flooding the beaches, the sand on the beach had just disappeared. Nothing seemed very alarming as of now and we never suspected anything as massive as the tsunami.
Our hotel was on top of a rocky hill, and over the next few hours as the rising waves ebbed and flooded the islands, water levels reached up to our knees, and that is when we realised that the waves had been quite large.
My father immediately shot off two calls, one to his brother and another to his office, informing both that we were safe. The timing was almost perfect, because a few minutes after he had placed those calls, all the phone lines had been jammed or disrupted and there was no way to contact anyone else.
After the waves had settled down to a level that was around my knees, we decided to venture out and see what had happened outside; dead fish lay strewn everywhere; on the beach, in the hotel grounds, on the roads; some motorbikes and cars floated around lifelessly in the water, as rescue workers tried to find any dead bodies or fishermen and motorists.
We were supposed to fly out the next day, and ignorant of the situation at the airport, we decided to reach there as early as possible to get a grasp of the situation. We arrived at the airport around four or five hours before the flight was scheduled to depart. The airport was in utter chaos as the only runway was broken at one ended and was flooded. It took a few hours for water to recede after which only small planes could land and take-off as the usable portion of the runway was too small for a big plane.
There was no place to sit or stand at the airport, and you inevitably ended up being hustled from one end to the other by the massive crowd. News crews were in full action and they even managed to interview my mother. In the meantime my father tried to contact the authorities to inquire as to when the next flight would leave, thankfully because of children and senior citizens, we were given tickets to one of the first flights out of the islands.
In the meantime, back in India, there were reports that no one was left alive in Andaman and Nicobar islands, and that all the planes were ferrying back dead bodies; this made all our friends and relatives really anxious and almost fearful of the fact that we were dead and being ferried back.
Finally the plane took off from the islands, and we heaved a sigh of relief. At the airport back in Bangalore, a sea of people were present at the airport to check if their loved ones were alive, or dead; and if dead then to identify their bodies. It took a few days for everyone to settle down and be informed of our safe return.
When we reached back and grabbed one of the papers, we realised what we had just been through. It was unbelievable how we came out of that tsunami alive and unharmed.
The islands are very picturesque and totally worth visiting; especially for their magnificent corals. I swear, out of all the beaches and islands I have visited, no other place has better corals than the Andamans. The water is pure and pristine with its shades of blue, and as you dip your hand into it, a rainbow of colours hit your eyes through the snorkelling mask. You can find red, purple and even green corals; the experience was mind blowing and anyone who wants to see the ocean and it's corals left untouched by pollution and development, then Andaman and Nicobar Islands is the place to go.
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| Cellular Jail |
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| A Lighthouse on one of the islands |
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| View on a 20 rupee note |
We were scheduled to leave the islands on 27th December, and on the day before, we were supposed to go on a boating trip to a nearby island.
It was the morning of 26 December, 2004....All of us ( except my sister ) woke up at around six in the morning so that we could be ready in time for the boating trip. We were out in the one of the gardens of the hotel, when we felt a tremor underneath, it lasted for almost half a minute and felt quite strong. We hurried back to our rooms, to check if there was any damage and to wake my sister up and keep her safe. My sister was all right, but the walls of the room had long and very noticeable cracks running from the ceiling to the floor.
My father suggested that we go and see the ocean because after an earthquake, the waves tend to rise a little and flood the shore, so my father, my grandmother and I went to check on the waves. We climbed up one of the viewing posts, and could see the waves rising and flooding the beaches, the sand on the beach had just disappeared. Nothing seemed very alarming as of now and we never suspected anything as massive as the tsunami.
Our hotel was on top of a rocky hill, and over the next few hours as the rising waves ebbed and flooded the islands, water levels reached up to our knees, and that is when we realised that the waves had been quite large.
My father immediately shot off two calls, one to his brother and another to his office, informing both that we were safe. The timing was almost perfect, because a few minutes after he had placed those calls, all the phone lines had been jammed or disrupted and there was no way to contact anyone else.
After the waves had settled down to a level that was around my knees, we decided to venture out and see what had happened outside; dead fish lay strewn everywhere; on the beach, in the hotel grounds, on the roads; some motorbikes and cars floated around lifelessly in the water, as rescue workers tried to find any dead bodies or fishermen and motorists.
We were supposed to fly out the next day, and ignorant of the situation at the airport, we decided to reach there as early as possible to get a grasp of the situation. We arrived at the airport around four or five hours before the flight was scheduled to depart. The airport was in utter chaos as the only runway was broken at one ended and was flooded. It took a few hours for water to recede after which only small planes could land and take-off as the usable portion of the runway was too small for a big plane.
There was no place to sit or stand at the airport, and you inevitably ended up being hustled from one end to the other by the massive crowd. News crews were in full action and they even managed to interview my mother. In the meantime my father tried to contact the authorities to inquire as to when the next flight would leave, thankfully because of children and senior citizens, we were given tickets to one of the first flights out of the islands.
In the meantime, back in India, there were reports that no one was left alive in Andaman and Nicobar islands, and that all the planes were ferrying back dead bodies; this made all our friends and relatives really anxious and almost fearful of the fact that we were dead and being ferried back.
Finally the plane took off from the islands, and we heaved a sigh of relief. At the airport back in Bangalore, a sea of people were present at the airport to check if their loved ones were alive, or dead; and if dead then to identify their bodies. It took a few days for everyone to settle down and be informed of our safe return.
When we reached back and grabbed one of the papers, we realised what we had just been through. It was unbelievable how we came out of that tsunami alive and unharmed.
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1 comments:
You told me about your brush with fate at JT but reading it again I still get shivers. So incredible. So fortunate. Keep up the traveling stories - I love them!
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