Today I got to learn that Philip Nicholas too was an unfortunate casualty of the tsunami title wave that hit Sri Lanka yesterday. At the time of his death, he was holidaying in Arugambay (located in Pottuville) spending Christmas at the Star Dust Beach Hotel. The wave that struck the area had completely destroyed the hotel.
Phil was the founder and lead developer for Hibyte Co., a UK based web development company. He came to Sri Lanka in 1999, to work on the Star Dust hotel's web site, and directly gone there at a time when going to Pottuville was unthinkable do to terrorist activities. Ever since then he had fallen in love with Sri Lanka and had worked and lived here since then.
I met Phil towards the end of 2002, when my former company ITABS formed a partnership with Hibyte LK. I worked with him a little over an year on a few projects. He was a perl and DHTML genius. I would say most of my current perl writing styles and even some PHP generic functions were greatly influenced by him. One thing I really admired in him was his appreciation for Sri Lanka and its people. He would often talk of how lucky we are in certain things compared to western countries and showed us things that we took for granted. He had many stories to tell.
You were a great inspiration and we shall miss you dearly. To all the thousands of people who their lives, let us pray that they find true happiness in what ever form it may be.
Lets all unite and help those in need so that they may have a better tomorrow and live to tell of this tragic incident.
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