I heard from my sister. They were so unaffected by this that they didn’t even know that anything had happened, other than feeling some tremors during the night. Their first clue that anything happened was receiving an SMS from me asking if they were okay.
However, the airport in the Maldives is completely flooded and closed indefinitely. All flights are cancelled. My brother in law is an aircraft mechanic for puddle jumpers – sea planes. He has no idea if he still has a job. The planes may all be destroyed, for all they know. Or they may be perfectly fine. He’ll go in to work tomorrow and find out. But really, job or no, they’re fine.
They were supposed to fly here January 2nd, but that’s not going to happen given that they, unlike the many tourists there, have a place to stay and don’t absolutely have to leave the country.
Sri Lanka has already put out a request for international assistance. India is sending warships – to help or to invade? I’m kidding at the last comment . . .
Now I’m starting to wonder what we – as in, those of us here – can do to help. This is an excellent opportunity to get the locals involved in helping other people, and man alive, they need to learn how to help others. But that’s a whole other aside that I won’t get into here. Or, at least, not now.
