Featured image courtesy Amalini de Sayrah

As a 16 year old, Nushelle de Silva was entirely unprepared for the experience of seeing Jaffna in its ‘raw state’ during the ceasefire in 2004.

Traveling there on a field trip with her Ladies’ College classmates, Nushelle felt deeply guilty when they visited the Jaffna library, then undergoing renovation, and saw the empty bookshelves.

Yet it was the visit to a graveyard for LTTE cadres that stuck with Nushelle the most. “You don’t realize just how many people have died until you see the immaculate rows of gravestones, and the endless space left behind for those to come. It was eerie and macabre,” Nushelle said.

View this immersive story, compiled using Atavist, here.