'Sri Lankans were so happy to see tourists replace aid workers'
The 20-year anniversary of the Boxing Day tsunami is not only a time to remember lives lost but also to celebrate the incredible spirit of Sri Lankans and the international community who united in rebuilding the island
It’s been two decades since Christmas Day celebrations switched to horror on Boxing Day as the world watched the catastrophic events of the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami play out.
Sri Lanka was one of the worst-affected countries with 35,000 killed and millions displaced.
In the dark days following the tragedy, stories of hope began to emerge, and Sri Lanka began the slow painful journey towards recovery.
There were setbacks – a civil war raged from 2006 until 2009, then there was the pandemic. Sri Lanka’s tourism industry is only now starting to fulfil its potential.
On the front line
Sam Clark and Tom Armstrong, founders of Experience Travel Group (ETG), had been living in Sri Lanka for four years when the tsunami struck. Having fallen in love with the island, they were in the midst of setting up a fledgling tour operation, Experience Sri Lanka, from a small shack on the south coast.
Sam explained they were staying in a house in Wennappuwa, north of Colombo, celebrating Christmas with friends, when they heard the waves had hit: “I was woken by a friend shouting ‘lots of water has come’. We were pretty tired and confused. We switched on the news… I didn’t really understand what a tsunami was but my girlfriend Tracy was from New Zealand and she did.” [Tracy Edginton is now Sam’s wife and chief of staff for Visit Britain].
Tom jumped on a motorbike straight away. It was still early days for Experience Sri Lanka and they had arranged for some trial clients to stay in Unawatuna much further south.
“Thankfully they and their chauffeur were ok,” says Sam. “But the vehicle was completely unusable, so they were stranded. The coastal road was closed, but Tom took the inland roads, and later that night we got them on a flight home.”
Confronted with Tom’s early reports of the complete chaos, Sam put out an appeal to friends and family for donations, and went to Pettah Market in Colombo to fill a van with emergency supplies.
Sam and Tom went back and forth many times with lorry loads, and Tracy, who was working with Save the Children at the time, was also deployed to the south coast.
She coordinated efforts among NGOs, ensuring resources were deployed efficiently, vital work for which she was recognised with a New Zealand Special Service Medal.
“We all tried to do things that weren’t happening,” explains Sam. After a couple of weeks NGO aid arrived in the south, so Sam and Tom switched focus to the east coast – they coordinated volunteer doctors from the UK, distributed clothes in refugee camps and helped clean schools that had acted as temporary camps, so that pupils could return to their lessons as normal.
“We had been preparing to launch Experience Sri Lanka that January,” says Sam. “But obviously there was no prospect of tourists.”
Hope returns
Sam and Tom spent six months helping aid efforts and fundraising full time, raising more than £250,000 through global donations, which was spent on aid, schools and, importantly, swimming pools so children could learn life-saving skills. Once they had recruited Claire de Boursac as manager to run Aid Sri Lanka, the charity they had started, they focused on developing their travel business once more. It was a tough couple of years – all their capital was spent on simply surviving.
But Sam says their resolve was even stronger to make the tour operation work after the tsunami.
“Years later, we saw how Sri Lankans felt so positive to have the tourists come. They were so much happier to see tourists than aid workers. It was a sign of normal life. It definitely gave us the impetus that tourism was the best way to develop the country long term.”
The scars will always be there for Sri Lanka, he says. “It’s pretty rare to meet a Sri Lankan who did not lose a relative – they have tight family groups. But those family bonds and kinship also helped people support one another in the aftermath. We have found Sri Lankans to be amazingly resilient.”
The 20-year anniversary is important, he says. “It’s giving people an opportunity to go back to the tsunami and have the space to remember. It’ll be a sombre, reflective time in Sri Lanka. But they will move forward, with positivity, again.”
And there is much to be positive about. Sri Lanka’s tourism industry is growing and visitor numbers are on the increase. For Experience Travel Group, this December to March is looking like the best peak season since 2019.
Sam explains: “At ETG we very much believe in quality vs quantity – we encourage off-the-beaten track adventures, gorgeous boutique stays and wildlife lodges that you wouldn’t otherwise find. These kinds of trips spread income around the country and involve multiple experience providers – from hoteliers, to walking guides, chauffeurs and wildlife trackers.”
A good example of this is ETG’s new tour: A Sri Lankan Adventure Powered by Pioneering Women. The handpicked accommodation for this 14-day journey includes boutique hotel Why House, luxury camping with Kulu Safaris and the newly opened Amba Yaalu, Sri Lanka’s first female-led hotel. There’s a private chauffeur-guide throughout, and immersive tours include walking the Pekoe Trail with the trail’s first-ever female guide, Thushni De Silva – a true trailblazer in Sri Lankan tourism – and exploring the Pilikuttuwa Cave Temple with local archaeologist, Prathini Samaradiwakara.
It is products like this that help illustrate how far the destination has come, but also how natural a fit Sri Lanka is for responsible tourism.
“We launched this new tour championing female-led travel experiences to celebrate initiatives that make the tourism industry in Sri Lanka more inclusive and female-friendly," says Sam. "We wanted to highlight experiences like this, which can be weaved into any tailor-made tour with ETG."
“After all, Sri Lanka was the first country to have a female Prime Minister when Sirimavo Bandaranaike was elected in 1960.”
A Sri Lankan's perspective
The tragedy of the Boxing Day tsunami inspired extraordinary acts of courage and determination, particularly from women who went above and beyond. They led critical relief efforts, rebuilt their communities, and continued to drive progress across the island.
One such woman was Kumari Kulathanga, a former head of the Matara Women’s Chamber of Commerce.
On 26 December she and her family were returning from their tea plantation in Morawaka, about two hours away, when they heard a tidal wave had struck Sri Lanka and their town, Matara. They lived near the beach, but on top of a hill, so fortunately their home escaped destruction.
Kumari recalls: “When we got there, we couldn’t believe what had happened as there were bodies of people everywhere. We took 20 bodies (mostly elderly persons and the young children) to the hospital for death certificates. It was shocking and unreal.”
On the day the tsunami happened she didn’t get home until after midnight, having spent the whole day helping people who had lost everything, and were in complete shock at how their lives had been so quickly destroyed.
Her efforts to rebuild began almost immediately, assisting with medical camps, financial help and house building.
She had initiated sponsorships for more than 200 orphaned children by 10 January, helped rebuild the local school to restore stability, and created the Healing Hands Organisation, a sewing circle that empowered fishermen’s wives. She signed up for trauma support training, and brought trauma counsellors and medical professionals from Belgium to support affected families.
“It was amazing how so many people came to help from all over the world,” she says.
The children she helped endured a great deal, she says, losing a parent or parents and siblings, and all their belongings along with their houses. “They had to start life from scratch, and lived in a shelter/tented camp for months.”
She says the country has come a long way in the last 20 years. “It’s doing really well, it’s back to normal. On and off I meet the children I have helped. They went through so much and it fills my heart with joy to know that they remember me. I helped them to continue their studies and live a more normal life.”
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