I lost my family in the Boxing Day tsunami, now I run the orphanage that saved me

Watana “Game” Sittirachot and children who live at Baan Than Namchai Foundation Orphanage, Khao Lak, chat at lunchtime in the orphanage canteen. Boxing Day 2024 marks the 20th anniversary of the 2004 Tsunami, the worst natural disaster in the history of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. Baan Than Namchai was set up by Rotjana Phraesrithong to provide shelter to kids orphaned and homeless after the tsunami. With Rotjana’s passing a few years ago, Game is now the director of the very orphanage that took him in. Hand drawn pictures of Rotjana by the kids still hang in the playroom.

Every year, Game takes the kids to the tsunami memorial cemetery to clean up the unmarked graves of those whose bodies could not be identified. For others, memories of the tsunami remain painful. Punticha Nuanyai gazes out at the sunset on Khao Lak Beach which was badly hit. The receptionist says that she used to work at a hotel directly on the beachfront, but now rarely ventures close to the ocean. Shot for The Telegraph.