Post tsunami's

things are getting back to "normal". it will take years for the reconstruction and i wonder how the rural islands will be able to pick up from where they left. let me tell you how the response was..the tsunamis hit the capital around 9:30, due to dhiraagu's (our telcom) lack of of providing real telecommunication system to the whole country, no one was able to report the comming wave or their condition even on the islands where the telecomm system was running. dhiraagu promised by 2000 that they will introduce telecommunication to the whole country and guess what they did. they just installed one telephone in the atoll house (where the admin work of atoll takes place) and if you are lucky one telephone booth in the islands. this is disgusting for a company like cable and wireless .. anyways it hit male' the capital around 9:00. the fist thing that happened was, all the cell phone to cell phone calls got jammed. the network went too busy (this usually happen even on normal days so just imagine). and people started running towards the beach to watch.the wave did not come with great force but it looks like the sea level rose and the water poured in over the sea wall (lucky we had that)..
communication with most of the islands were lost and people panicked not knowing if their friends and relatives were OK. The government turned the only tv channel, casting images of the tsunami and started live interviews and stuff. I wish they had created a seperate channel for this.
it took at least three days for communication to be established with the rural islands. i must say that it was a shame that the government did not use its plans, boats, launhes to travel to these islands to asses the damage immediately. a fund was opened and there was very very generous help given by the people of male' (the capital island) which i must say i was surprised at how much compassion that they showed.
as usual the opposition blamed evertyhing on the government including the tsunami itself.
the general election was postponed which is great because this country wont be ready to vote for a long time. but under the present constitution the last day to announce the vote can be 25 january unless the president declears a state of emergency. but this would get the oppositions go crazy...