WPCNR WHITE PLAINS AROUND THE WORLD. From Dr. David Elcott, his daughter Liore and wife,  Rabbi Shira Milgrom of Congregation Kol Ami, White Plains, The East Coast of India,   December 29, 2004:  The following message from India comes in an e-mail, forwarded to the CitizeNetReporter today from a White Plains couple who lived through the Tsunami disaster describes the Sunday horror that engulfed them. Earthquakes undersea created tsunami waves that inundated vast Asian coasts,  the death toll now being reported exceeds 70,000. Here is this sobering eyewitness account. The writers are thankful to be alive: 

(We do not know if you got this -- it seems not.  Today we have a bit of post-trauma, as we read how people walking on the beach were swept to sea.  In the hotel next to ours they recovered bodies in the room.  So it is strange.  Shira woke up realizing that a half hour earlier, Liore and I were running -- and there would have been no escape.   It would have ruined her trip entirely.)

We are safe.  We are alive.  We did not lose anything and, as we finally watched the news after evacuating the coast of India where we were hit by the tsunami, we realized that it was much larger than anything we could imagine from our vantage point.  

We ( transmission unclear)  the blessing for surviving a near-death experience, but the theology feels weak when you know that thousands of others – and hundreds right around you were killed. I was so excited to write and tell you about this unexpected dramatic experience, but as we saw and heard the news, the excitement has been replaced with horror. We thought we had been in the worst; we simply had no idea.

Liore and I ran this morning on the beach and noticed that we were at high tide, making running harder to do.  We passed by the neighboring fishing village with their strange boats made of tied logs, fragile looking crafts for the Indian Ocean.  We came back and met Shira for breakfast, about 200 meters from the beach, separated by sand and palm trees.  

The day was glorious and the gardens exquisite.  The breakfast luxurious.  We wanted to go back to the lovely shop that is part of the resort premise, and then visit the Shore Temple.  All of a sudden, the staff begins to yell, (transmission unclear0

With my back to the sea, I thought it was a bird or an animal, but Shira and Liore saw a wall of water coming at us.   Everyone began running away from the water, but already the paths were filling up.  Shira and Liore ran past the computer center, as water began to cover the floor.  I stayed an extra few seconds, stupidly transfixed by the sight of the sea covering everything before me, not awed as much as confused, since high tide obviously should not come this high.  Then I ran with everyone else.  

Our driver was yelling, signaling us to get in the car.  At that moment I was so grateful to Shira for having arranged what seemed a wasteful driver rather than hiring someone local.   As we drove out, old women workers were hobbling and screaming.  We started piling the weaker ones in with us (transmission garbled) at the time somewhat funny, the typical Indian transportation story.  But these older ones were sobbing and shrieking with such panic, perhaps from prior experience.  

From the high point, we saw the water covering the coast, into the gardens, a car no longer on a road but in an ocean. We heard something about an earthquake in the Bay of Bengal.  It still did not seem so serious and we went back to the hotel.

Shira later noted that, as a Californian, I should have known better.

I remember learning about tsunamis as a kid and was mesmerized by the idea of a wall of water traveling thousands of kilometers at fast speeds.  In Hawaii, I always checked where to go if we heard a tsunami warning.  But there are aftershocks. I never thought about aftershocks.   And the aftershocks of an 8.9 earthquake could be massive.

We returned to a world turned upside down.  The whole place was under water.  The gardens and flower pots, chairs and lounges were floating.  The lovely shop had water pouring out and the entire downstairs was destroyed. The amazing staff was carrying people out on their shoulders, the ones who were caught and fled to the second story. They even saved the birds in their large cages.