It was slightly after 9am on December 26 when Hiran Cooray, managing director of Jetwing Hotels, Sri Lanka, received a call from his general manager at the Lighthouse Hotel & Spa in Galle.

"What do I do? The sea is coming in," screamed a hysterical Sanjiva Gautamadasa.

"At first I thought he was joking. Sanjiva's always teasing me. But then when he told me that there were bodies in the sea, I knew it was serious," recalled Hiran.

For at least a minute, Hiran was stunned into silence. "I didn't know what to say or think."

Then his instincts kicked in. "Take care of the guests and staff," he said.

Built on a cliff, the Lighthouse Hotel was spared the full wrath of the sea. The spa though was washed away and is now being rebuilt.

Fortunately, all guests and staff present in the hotel were unharmed, having been moved up to a higher floor. One staff drowned on the way to work that morning.

Hiran meanwhile started alerting general managers in other coastal hotels. The Bluewater in Bentota moved all guests and staff back and the open design of the hotel spared it from extensive damage when the waves came an hour or so later.

Furniture was damaged, glass doors were shattered, window frames collapsed.

Today, the only sign of the damage is the chemical reaction of the floor tiles to the salt water. Everything has been rebuilt, a month after the tsunami, and some guests have started returning, especially local Sri Lankans from Colombo.

Not spared though was Jetwing's Yala Resort on the eastern coast which took the hardest hit. The hotel was completely destroyed. Out of 229 guests and staff there at the time, 55 died.

"When I went there and saw the devastation, I thanked God that so many survived, It was impossible to imagine how anyone could have survived the devastation," said Hiran, who lost several close friends, including the general manager Upali Weerasinghe.

Staff who survived have been absorbed into Jetwing's other 11 hotels. One staff, now working at Bluewater, told me how he was saved by an ankle that had been broken by an elephant just five days before the tsunami, an elephant had come into the Yala compound and he had tried to chase it away, only to have the elephant crush his foot.

Because he could not run with the other people, when the waves came, he hid in a storeroom and somehow managed to keep his head above water until he found a tree branch he could cling on to.

"I thank God I am alive and I thank Jetwing Hotels for keeping me employed," he told me.

Indeed, this was one of the most moving things I found on this two-day trip to Sri Lanka.

Most tourism companies such as Jetwing Hotels have not laid off any staff despite business having dried up. In the month of January, the company received only 30 passengers, when it would normally have been fully booked between January and March.

"How can you lay off people who already have nothing? At least we have our savings but there are people who came out of this with literally nothing. If we don't keep them employed, what will happen to them," said Hiran.

Indeed, on January 27, Jetwing took a pledge to emerge even stronger after this crisis. "We will do whatever is necessary to rebuild and come out stronger," said Hiran.

In the past two weeks, the company has brought in trainers, motivational speakers and counsellers. Hiran and his management too have undergone counseling training. "We are inexperienced at this, we have to learn to deal with our own grief and other people's grief."

Jetwing has also been working with local communities, particularly in Galle and Yala, to get them back on their feet. It has collected nearly Rs8 million under the Jetwing Relief Fund from guests and staff, and that will go into building homes for staff who lost their houses. A basic house costs about Rs350,000 (US$3,500) to build. It is also buying "starter packs" (US$100 each) for people whose homes were not destroyed but where essential items were washed away.

Sanjiva is monitoring the implementation of these projects to ensure the funds are put to best use.

They've also been working with local communities to help clear as much debris away as quickly as possible so that "everyone can get on with normal lives", said Hiran.

It is only now that Hiran is setting his sights on business recovery. He says he has been overwhelmed by the support of tour operator friends across the world who have all pledged to return as soon as possible.

"It was good to know that they haven't deserted us in our times of trouble."

The reality remains though that most tour operators in Europe have taken Sri Lanka off sale despite the fact that most of its tourism product remains intact. The Negombo beach area and the cultural triangle are unaffected but they've also seen business grind to a halt.

There is some good news on the horizon. LTU is re-starting its year-round charters on February 6, which will combine Colombo with Phuket.

Most are optimistic the European market will recover by the following winter.

They are realistic to know that this summer, whatever business returns will be at much reduced rates.

The Sri Lankan tourism industry is nothing, if not resilient. "We have been through crisis after crisis for the last 20 years. Each crisis has made us stronger and we face this one with the same courage and confidence," says Hiran.