'Hotel tossed like a ship on stormy ocean'

KOLKATA: It was meant to be a dream holiday, long planned, travel agents badgered, guide books pored over. But all that is a surreal blur. Today, there is only numbed gratitude. They feel lucky just being alive.
Relief veils their tired faces as they stumble out of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose airport, those who had chattered off to a vacation in the Andamans, and landed in a nightmare hitherto unknown to our shores.
"The water had climbed knee-deep in our hotel room - on the second floor. We thought we''d drown. It was nothing short of divine intervention that saved us," said Tapan Haldar of Naihati, who was rescued by a special flight from Port Blair.
"The hotel was tossed like a ship in a stormy sea. For a few terrifying moments we felt that it was the end of the world," added Debashish De Sarkar, a SAIL employee. The Biswases of Behala rushed out of their hotel when they felt the earth shake. "Hundreds of people had swarmed into the streets."
None of them had ever thought they would experience anything like this; it was the stuff of disaster films. Ashis and Kabita found reel turn horrifyingly to reality: they''d seen the Hollywood blockbuster, The Day After Tomorrow, just a couple of days before going on holiday to the Andamans. "We had scoffed at the special effects and computer-generated images. After seeing the Nature''s fury, those scenes have become horribly authentic," said the shell-shocked couple.
Equally dazed were Putul and Indranil Banerjee. They had planned the trip meticulously, going into every detail, savouring all the things they would do in the Emeral Isles. "Not even in our worst nightmare did we think we would nearly lose our lives so frighteningly on our dream holiday. No, no, never. There is no question of ever going back," said Putul.
The Boses of Barasat were at a loss for words to describe the devastation. "To watch jetties collapse, waves engulfing fishermen.... It was like ...like something out of a disaster film," said Debashis Bose.
For Nandini Chakravarty of Ballygunge, too, it would be a long time before she gets over the images. Three Maruti vans bobbing up and down in the sea, waves ten, eleven, twelve feet tall - or taller, who knows - rushing forward....
This is what the Sharmas of Delhi missed narrowly. C Sharma, an AAI official, had planned a trip to the Andamans but somehow felt uneasy about making the trip. In the end he called it off.