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By Root 472 0

the surf was up, but they always came back. The mixture of work and play kept them balanced. Many romances blossomed. Volunteers often had to use hand signals to communicate with one another because they didn’t speak the same language, but it didn’t stop them from making love. Bruce was our number one quiet achiever. Many volunteer girls had crushes on him. Oscar and I had already been a couple for some time, so at night we usually just ate dinner and went to sleep exhausted from the day. Donny remained loyal to his family back home in Australia. He was exhausted every night, getting up at five each morning to work in the melting sun. The only fluid he was getting enough of was beer, which relaxed him into a deep sleep every night.

We did manage to have some fun, too, in the midst of all our hard work. Oscar’s birthday was in late January, so we decided to have a celebration on the beach near our guesthouse with all the volunteers. We located long wooden tables and decorated them with local flowers and candles. Then we sat down to a delicious meal prepared by a local guesthouse. We ate fresh fish, fruit, rice, and dahl, and the local Lion beer flowed.

Later, the chief and a group of fishermen from Peraliya showed up. They joined in the celebration, and we realized that it was the first time we had hung out together socially. The Sri Lankans couldn’t hold their liquor so they got really drunk and the chief started dancing in a kind of disco-robot manner around the fire. I joined him, and we had a Pulp Fiction moment. The village men serenaded Oscar with drums, then asked him to sing for them. He howled “O Sole Mio” in an unknown key, and the dogs joined in.

Then the chief pulled out a large joint and the peace pipe was handed around to all who cared to partake. The sky was painted silver and I relaxed against a coconut tree into the enchanted night. Some of the German and Dutch guys got naked and went for a moonlit swim, while one of them took off on a motorbike with an Israeli girl to a secret island destination. It was a great night and friendships among locals and volunteers bloomed.

On January 26, we held a memorial service for the one-month anniversary of the tsunami. It also happened to be Poya, a Sri Lankan holiday celebrating the full moon, which was marked by a Buddhist ceremony in which the whole village stays up the entire night chanting prayers. Elegantly costumed male dancers led a drum procession to a staging area where people sat on the ground. Monks presided over the ceremony, sitting in a specially woven grass hut.

It was both a spiritual and a spooky night. Most of the Buddha statues had been beheaded during the tsunami. The villagers adorned the headless statues with flowers and surrounded them with candles, praying at their feet. Oscar, Bruce, Donny, and I walked around the village visiting families and lighting candles to honor the dead. The train tracks were sprinkled with oil lamps and candles were placed inside. I lit some candles in the rubble of Chamilla’s house and a few young children held back my hair when I came too close to the fire.

In Sri Lanka, the monks were revered. Whenever they came to visit, it was a rule that a villager had to place a white sheet on the chair before the monk could sit down. I hadn’t learned this rule, so during the ceremony I casually went over and sat on one of the comfortable white chairs, thinking they were for us. Some village men grumbled at me in disgust and pointed for me to sit on the dirt floor.

The Peraliya monks were honest, kind, and very young. Some of them were still kids. It was difficult for them to preside over tsunami funeral ceremonies where people had lost over eighteen family members. The young monks’ voices would weaken at times during the ceremony and they would burst into uncontrollable tears. I had spent time with many monks in Burma and Thailand, but this was the first time I had ever seen them cry in public.

The Poya chanting was soothing and rhythmic. I found it impressive for the first few hours, but then it began to put me to sleep.