Sri Lanka Travel Forum

Any information on what may have become of this hotel? I made friends there while on vacation last year, and would like to know if there is any hope for them...

Most of the hotels in the south and east have suffered a lot. The hotels which did not suffer much damage are having their beach devastated down here. This is the common situation to all the hotels.

I’ll try to give call and get you more information on the exact situation. The telecommunication facility is down and it is hard to get a call to some parts of south, east and north. I’ll do my best and get you information soon.

Thanks for all the concern about our country & the people; and your prayers & aid are really helpful to us at this moment…Thanks a lot….

Rupesh

Thank you so much! I realize it's very difficult now, with no communication lines to that part of the island. I'm hoping that it was spared, but considering where it sits (right on the beach), it would be lucky if it weren't completely destroyed. I also see that the Safari Game Lodge at Yala was devastated, a place I stayed just before going to Marissa at the end of my trip.

I will continue to check back on this site.for more news. I am so utterly sorry!

Laura

Hi
here is an article I found about Mirissa and the hotel you are asking about, I was there only a couple of weeks ago at Calm Rest just behind Paradise Beach, it was such a beautiful place. Unfortunately it's very sober reading.

My Boxing Day nightmare
in Sri Lanka
By Victoria Temple

"The sea is coming! The sea is coming!"

Irak, the young man who managed our guest house, was banging on doors and shouting.

A moment before I had been lying beneath a fan and a mosquito net, reading and thinking that I really should get up and have breakfast.

It was about 9.15am, it was the last day of our holiday and I kept thinking how I should make the most of our day and go down to the beautiful beach.

Our guest house was about 50 metres from the sea front of Mirissa, a tiny fishing village on the south coast of Sri Lanka with a beautiful sweep of golden sand lined with coconut palms, beach huts and tiny restaurants.

I grabbed my dress, money belt and glasses and ran out the guest house. Unfortunately, in my haste I didn't think to put shoes on - which was something I was to regret sorely later.

Initially we stood around in a daze, then ran towards the beach - and stopped. The hotel which had stood in front of ours had been completely demolished, crumbled walls, and rubble on the street.

Beside me were a dazed British family, who a moment before had been having breakfast. The boy, aged about 10, had a badly cut foot. His father's legs were covered in cuts. Local people were running with ropes down to the sea, I guess to try and help people who might be trapped in the rubble.

I didn't want to walk any closer, because of bare feet and the broken glass and debris everywhere, but my partner Andy walked further down the beach to see what was happening.

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At this stage I think nobody really understood or could grasp what had happened.

Then suddenly someone was shouting 'run, run' and everyone, tourists, Sri Lankan men, women and children, started running up a dirt track into the jungle.

A Sri Lankan boy was struggling to carry the child with the cut foot, so I went to help and grabbed his legs and ran bare foot with his foot bleeding onto my dress. His name was Pip and he was remarkably calm.

He had been sitting on a beach front terrace eating breakfast when suddenly the water surged forward and smashed through the hotel.

They had lost everything. But the people in the rooms beneath the terrace were even worse, completely collapsed. We ran up the track, women and babies crying. Everyone thought there would be more waves.

Then we stopped in the shady garden of a house near the top of the hill, I guess about 60 or 70 metres above sea level, surrounded by banana plants and jungle. There were perhaps 50 people in the garden and six tourists.

At this stage I started to panic. The last I had seen of Andy he had been walking the wrong way down the beach. My heart was beating so fast, and I kept asking everyone who had come up the hill if they had seen him. I was with a little girl, Amy, who didn't know where her father was and was also worried.

For 15 minutes or so we all waited. When a Sri Lankan man appeared in the garden with a first aid kit and told us there had been three more waves, I started to really fear the worst.

But a moment later Amy's father appeared - he was fine, although badly cut and only had the shirt he was wearing.

He told me that there was another group of people gathered at a Buddhist temple further up the hill, so I ran through the jungle and found many families, tourists, Buddhists monks, and Andy and our friend Leo.

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I don't think I have ever felt so grateful - but also faintly foolish for being so worried. We were the lucky ones. Andy was sitting next to a Dutch family with four little children, including a nine month old baby.

They had lost everything, had had to grab their children and run from the beach in the middle of breakfast.

Everyone had a story to tell.

One friend, an Irish girl Maraid, told me she was in the Paradise Beach hotel, a beautiful complex of little bungalows and a restaurant right on the beach, where we had eaten Christmas dinner the day before.

She was standing at the buffet with a bowl of cornflakes in her hand when suddenly her boyfriend shouted 'run, run'.

"I was running through the restaurant trying to get out onto the road. The glass and walls were smashing behind us as we kept running.

"Then I looked down and I was still holding my bowl of cornflakes. I think I thought that at some point it would all be over and I could sit down and have my breakfast," she said.

A Dutch girl who was in the same restaurant had to run through the sea and glass and told us how she saw the body of an old Sri Lankan man float past.

I don't know how many Sri Lankans died in the village, but someone said six tourists had been killed including two children who had been in that restaurant.

People spoke about having to cling to the ceiling fans of their room to avoid being swept away.

We sat on the hill and waited. Everybody was frightened to go back down and there were rumours that there would be another wave. Sri Lankan families were stunned. They had lost everything.

Yet just an hour later people were carrying water, drink, rice and curry up the hill to feed us all. The people were so kind, so helpful.

I keep thinking about the lovely people in Mirissa, where just the day before we had enjoyed the most beautiful Christmas Day.

These people live beside the beautiful, sparkling Indian Ocean, which is their livelihood. Yet on that terrible Boxing Day, it turned their lives upside down.

I couldn’t find the telephone no if you have it please send that to me; I’ll get you a feed back …

Rupesh

Hi lex,
I have been many times to beautiful Paradise Beach Club Mirissa, the first time in 1983. Now I am searching for my old friend Ananda Jayadewa, owner of this place. I tried to get a phonecall hundred times and sent many emails, successless. Everything seems to be damaged there. I feel so sad with the poor friendly people there. I thought about taking a flight and going there. Maybe I can help.
If you are still there and if you meet Ananda- if he is alive- tell him please to contact me.I`m Jörg from Osnabrück/Germany. Or do you have any idea how to contact him?
My phone: 0049 541 56135 or 0172 4058983
email: Riepe-O@t-online.de
So many thanks,lex. Wish you all the best and goodluck for the srilankan people

thank you lex 71for your account of events that morning in marissa. I am relieved and glad to know of your safe outcome and your reunion with your boyfriend. I am distraught with lack of information about events in marissa so your news was welcome.I am still very concerned for all souls in that place but paticularly for the swiss couple and the staff at the Calm Rest guest house. If you are able or if anyone else is able to tell me more of events and outcomesI would be greatful. many thanks. Also thanks to Rupresh for his great efforts to keep us informed on so many sad matters in that disrict God Bless You

Can anyone give me name and address details for a waiter callad Akram ( ? ) who escorted me from the Paradise Beach Hotel to Welligama Hospital on Boxing Day? He also returned to find my family and let them know where I was - and took my son Ben to Karapatiya Hospital to find me. Any info as to his full name and/or Address would be gratefully received. We just want to be able to thank him for all his help.

To answer your original question - when we left the sea had washed most of the Restaurant and adjoining buildings away, the beach was two feet lower than before and everything was under two feet of water.

Afraid that none of the buildings on the beach fared too well. You can see a picture of how Paradise Beach hotel looks just now -

http://www.wannasurf.com/forum/view.php?site=wannasurf&bn=wannasurf_tsunamicontactboard&key=1104760391&first=1104755520&last=1104344094

Fortunately the number of deaths was relatively low compared to many other places - I think 30 or so locals and 5-10 tourists.

Still a tragedy, particularly seeing things such as the school completely wiped out.

Hello, please can anyone help me. y girlfriend and I made friends with the Boys from the water Creatures surfcamp at the end of Mirissa beach, especially kaloom, please, does anyone know if these boys are OK .
I can be contacted on

CCouzens@statestreet.com

or 44 207 864 7184

44 7812 247 132