It is strange how things change in just a couple of days: I mean there I was in Sydney celebrating New year with a few tens of thousands of other people with pretty much not a care in the world (apart from how I was going to leave the area with tens of thousands of other people after the midnight celebrations) and then less than a week later, whilst in Canberra, life suddenly throws a curve ball at me. I found out that on Christmas eve a friend, who I used to work with, was in Thailand and went out on a Christmas cruise and hadn't been seen since. No one even knew he was there; everyone thought he was home for Christmas having left Cairns for Thailand at the beginning for December. But it appears he liked Thailand so much he extended his stay and was caught up in the Tsunami. I honestly believed all those who I knew were unaffected; so I was totally shocked to find out that he was there, let alone was missing, and then came the news that his body had been found and his parents were flying over from Ireland to take him home. It all seems so surreal; only a month ago we were working together and now he's gone. I knew the Tsunami had affected a lot of people and had watched the news like everyone else, concerned for what I was seeing, but suddenly this was personal; I knew someone who had died. It just came out of the blue, reared its head and punched us all in the stomach. No-one saw it coming and now I guess we are a part of the disaster; not just bystanders, watching and sympathizing. I'm in Canberra now, a long way from those other people who knew Connor so well, but we have all been hit hard. No-one is quite sure how to react or what to say. What can be said when over 100,000 have died and many more are missing! For me this horrific natural disaster has suddenly taken on a personal tone that I never expected; to hear of someone caught in the disaster is bad, but for someone to die is just an indescribable shock. But whilst we remember Connor we all look forward to travelling and seeing the world as he wanted to.
Claire M More on the tsunami's impact on North Yorkshire » Hope fades for missing York man » Bishop Packer calls for Aid »Three minute silence for tsunami victims Could you be a student diarist?
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