On Saturday, September 23, several teammates and I had to be up and out the door by 7:15 a.m. For a group that struggles to meet an 8:15 a.m. departure time during the week, this was, in a word, challenging. With eyes still partly crusted over from sleep, the coffee yet to have its full impact, we, amazingly, managed to trudge out the door at 7:22 a.m. Impressive, I know. The logical question: What could make us do this on a Saturday morning, after a long week of field and administrative work? Photographs. The Boxing Day Tsunami razed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Sri Lankans. All along the coast, homes were ripped apart and washed away; the landscape was littered with the tattered remains of people’s livelihoods, homes, and memories. A year and a half later, much has been recovered, rebuilt, or constructed anew. But memories and their precious tokens are especially elusive in that way. For thousands, the loss of life was accompanied by a loss of history. The pictures that framed and memorialized lives, events, and achievements were lost to the ravenous void of the tsunami. To some, the loss of pictures may seem insignificant. But, when placed in the broader context of emotional recovery, these pictures, as irreplaceable as what they represent, would have been the last remaining remnant of a child, sister, mother, husband. Upon entering the home of many Sri Lankans, one is immediately inundated by images; a young child posing austerely in his first school uniform, a daughter on her wedding day, barely able to contain her joy. These pictures, clinging to the walls, mingling contentedly on tables, evoke the emotion and history of the family. As your host moves you from one picture to the next, sharing the background and meaning, the images gain a voice and a presence in the here and now, sharing their story. For many tsunami victims this is no longer possible. The pictures are gone. The voices are silent. The stories are seemingly finished. The memories are fading. Though little can be done to restore what has been lost, our project was an effort to help people pick up the thread of the story once again, the narrative does not need to end. Hope can give us the strength to turn the page and put pen to paper once again. “There is always hope – hope enough to balance our despair. [If there were not] we would be lost,” (Rohinton Mistry). May these pictures provide some small glimmer of hope. And (who knows?) maybe it will be that intangible, mysterious "something" that allows some of these courageous community residents to escape the unfathomable darkness that has been the past two years, helping to balance their despair with newly found hope.