Mourners gather as ceremonies are held across Asia to remember the thousands who died two decades ago when a tsunami hit coastlines around the Indian Ocean, in one of the world's worst natural disasters.
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00:00Music
00:28At that time, I didn't know it was a tsunami.
00:30After my father came, he cried and said,
00:35Your mother is no longer here.
00:37Everything is gone.
00:39We were hit by a tsunami.
00:41It was all mud on my father's body.
00:44There were three mass graves.
00:46One in Ujung Bate, one in Luele, and one here.
00:50I've been to all three places.
00:52And my heart was beating here.
00:54When I came, I visited, I prayed.
00:58At night, my parents came.
01:02And this is the location.
01:04Music
01:14It's been 24 years since the tsunami hit.
01:22On December 26, 2004,
01:30There was a large-scale earthquake in Kulu Lanka.
01:39Music
02:03I'm still afraid.
02:05I'm still afraid.
02:07I'm glad they came.
02:10They haven't forgotten us.
02:12I'm glad.
02:14Music
02:16It was my first time working in a disaster like this.
02:21I've never seen anything like it.
02:23But as the months went by, out of the sadness,
02:27I got to see and learn the power of community,
02:31the power of humanity,
02:34the power of strangers becoming brothers and sisters to help one another.