Life after the Tsunami

On the sunny morning of 26 December, 2004, children were playing on beaches, mothers were cooking and tourists were sun bathing when one of the strongest earthquakes in history ripped open the ocean floor and created a tsunami. Hundreds of thousands of people died and some

of them were children.

Many years have passed, people are still very upset about the friends and family they lost;

children and adults are still very scared that a tsunami might come again. Maria, a woman wh is living in a temporary shelter in Sri Lanka said, "Children under ten years old seem to be

recovering well after the tsunami because their memory of the tsunami is weaker. But those

who are ten and over are still very scared that it will happen again. Even if they know how to

0 swim, they are more scared of going to the beach."

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Since that day, Christian Aid and other charities such as the Red Cross and World Vision have

been helping those hit by the tsunami to pick up the pieces. Local organizations knew

immediately what to do, helped Christian Aid to set up feeding centres and help hundreds of

thousands of people in temporary shelters, providing food, medicine and burying the dead

Thanks to generous donations from people al around the world, fishermen are going out to sea with new boats and fishing nets; children are back at school and people are recovering from the loss of family and friends by talking to helpers about their problems. However, there is still a

long way to fully return to their previous life. Perhaps, they will never be able to