It was a trip that I had planned with my school at the time UW-Milwaukee. I was in architecture school and I wanted to help the victims of the tsunami that hit on December 25th of 2004. After almost a year of planning we had landed in the beautiful country. We toured around in a little bus which you can see in my pictures and learned the culture. We were greeted by many smiles and hand shakes. We couldn't have asked for a more enjoyable trip.

It was when we started to head south on the coast when we really started to realize the true value in the trip. As the bus traveled farther south the damage got worse. It was our first encounter with the aftermath of the tsunami that hit to that day one year ago. We were stunned. In fact none of us knew it but when we had gotten off the bus to encounter the shore of the Indian ocean for the first time it was exactly the same time the first tsunami hit. Right where we were standing millions of gallons of ocean was pouring over us…..the sight was surreal. As we stood there in silence a fishing boat was preparing for launch. It was no coincidence that we helped them push their boat back into the sea to essentially start the building process all over again. It was there that we knew we made it that we had a chance to help that we could contribute our knowledge to help others who lost almost everything a year ago.

More to come…...