Survivor aids tsunami rebuilding

A survivor of the Asian tsunami has helped to raise more than £350,000 in aid for a charity she co-founded to rebuild stricken Sri Lanka.

Tsunami waves stopped just short of the hotel where Clare Allen, a yoga teacher from Salisbury, and her family were staying last December.

Her 12-year-old daughter Daisy who had been on the beach was found safe.

Her charity Rebuilding Sri Lanka has since funded a child therapy unit and temporary housing for 350 people.

Mrs Allen has spent the last year travelling between Wiltshire and Sri Lanka, raising money and ensuring funds are spent properly.

"It is good for our healing as well as it has been quite traumatic for us Clare Allen

Last Christmas, she had been staying at the Bentota Club Villa on the south west coast of the island, where she married her husband William, 35, earlier in the year.

On 26 December, the tsunami came within just a few feet of their hotel.

"I left the hotel with two girlfriends and just couldn't believe what we saw - that really was the beginning of it," said the 39-year-old.

"This has been the most valuable year of my life, next to having a child."

"It is good for our healing as well as it has been quite traumatic for us. There is such a family out there, I have made really, really good friends."