UNDP’s Tsunami Project came across many people who became champions of tsunami awareness in their schools and communities. One such champion is 9-year-old Kenit, who is promoting tsunami preparedness in India after participating in a drill organized under the Tsunami Project. While conducting drills in a tsunami-prone school in the Solomon Islands, UNDP met Durie Hickie, a school teacher who survived a tsunami.

In Thailand, the fisherman Surachat shared his experience from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and in Palu, Indonesia, Milanda shared her narrow escape from the 2018 Sulawesi earthquake and tsunami. More recently, the volcano and tsunami in Tonga also saw champions like Li’oa, a driver with the National Emergency Management Office, risking his own life to warn others.

These stories are so impactful that UNDP decided to create a series of ‘Tsunami Story Books’, aimed at young readers to raise awareness against tsunami by sharing real-life experiences gathered across Asia and the Pacific, including from Japan.