Malaysian tsunami victim wants to turn house into museum

A tsunami victim in northwestern Malaysia recently has filed a petition to the local authorities, saying that he wanted to turn his house, which was struck by the tsunami last year, into a museum as a reminder of the catastrophe.

Awang Ismail, a 61-year-old government pensioner living at Kota Kuala Muda, a town in Kedah State which was hit by the tidal wave in December last year, said on Sunday that he hoped that his house, part of which had collapsed, could be turned into a museum to store news items, pictures and historical materials on the tsunami.

The victim who was living at a makeshift settlement accommodating 115 families from 10 villages around Kota Kuala Muda said that he hoped literature on the tsunami tragedy could be stored at the museum to remind the young generation of the natural disaster.

On Dec. 26, 2004, a disastrous tsunami, spawned by a strong earthquake beneath the ocean floor off Sumatra island, sent giant waves crashing into Indian Ocean coastlines from Malaysia to eastern Africa, killing at least 216,000 people in total.

The Indian Ocean tsunami also reached the northwestern coasts of Malaysia, leaving 68 dead and more than 23,000 affected there, including nine people killed in the Kota Kuala Muda region.

Malaysian officials said that so far, all of the 23,064 tsunami victims or their next of kin in Malaysia have been compensated in various forms.

Source: Xinhua