Dear elephant friends,
the elephant orphanage was not affected by the Tsunami disaster. But the whole coast arround Sri Lanka was devastated. After a short telephone call with the Sri Lanka government they were talking of a minimum of 40000 dead and 1 million homeless. The whole infrastructure and of course the tourism business, the main business of Sri Lanka, will be disrupted for a very long time. Now that all the financial means of the Sri Lanka government has either already been used for the rescue operation or will be invested in rebuilding, it is alone my responsibility to ensure that elephant orphanage carries on running smoothly. The government are taking all the medical supplies, including the milkpowder, out of Pinnawela. We must build up these stock piles again. Here we are playing a double role helping people, as well as ensuring that the elephant babies will not suffer. Because of this situation we have postponed all planned project for 2005 and are concentrating on getting the basic necessities to the elephant orphanage. At the moment everything is very difficult to organise and unfortunately very expensive. That is why we need, especially on a long term basis, - support and donations -. I would also like to give my deepest sympathy to all the families who have lost or are still missing relatives or friends after the Tsunami disaster. I think every day of the immense loss this catastrophe has caused and wish all of God´s strength to cope with the sorrow.