Children are the biggest victims of the disaster. They make up a third -- 50,000 -- of the dead. But tens of thousands more, from Europeans holidaying on Thai beaches, to the sons and daughters of poor Indian fishermen, have been orphaned.
Thousands more have only one surviving parent who cannot look after them alone. Schools, the only hope many Asian children have for a better life, have been wiped out and books and other materials lost.
UNICEF estimates 1.5 million children have been hit by the disaster.
In Sikkal, local authorities, overwhelmed by the scale of the tragedy, have commandeered an ordinary house and turned it into an emergency orphanage.
They have crammed 30 children into the unfurnished home and more are arriving every day -- nine on Wednesday alone. There are no toys and nothing to do, the best the social workers can offer is a dry floor, simple bandages and three meals a day.
MENTAL WOUNDS
"Apart from Ramesh, they are all physically fit -- it's the emotional trauma they need help with," says volunteer Sureshna Saha, who flew and drove in from distant New Delhi.
"It's horrible. It's always worse when it's children."
Fifteen-year-old Sitha hovers protectively around her sister, Sitha Lakshmi, 10, and eight-year-old brother, Amitha.
"I'm the head of the family now," she says firmly, holding back tears. "I have to look after them. Mummy wanted them to get educated and I have to make that happen now."
Their father, a fisherman, and mother, who sold the fish, were killed in the tsunami. Sitha Lakshmi and Amitha climbed onto a neighbour's house. Sitha was about to be swept away by the fierce waters when someone plucked her to safety.
The district's head social worker, S. Suryakala, says the children here will eventually be shifted to the government orphanage. There, they will be "prepared" for adoption.
"They won't get a new family anytime soon," she says. "We have to get them used to the idea of adoption first. They have not thought about it, they don't want to leave their native place."
Ramesh, with a serious burn to his hand, and some of the other children with minor cuts and scrapes are being treated with medicines salvaged from the local hospital at Nagapattinam.
The hospital was flooded by the tsunami, killing every child in the pediatric ward and leaving a layer of mud a metre deep.
More than one week after the tragedy, clean-up workers along the southern coast are still pulling putrid bodies out of the sand and debris, the skin often peeling away in their hands.
It will be months before life here gets back to normal, if it ever can.
"I miss my daddy," says 10-year-old orphan Santhani. "Without dad, how am I going to live? What future do I have now?"
Sikkal, January 5: Ten-year-old Ramesh Kumar can't tell anyone what happened to him or how his mum and dad died.
