Oprah Winfrey's Tsunami Relief Efforts and Nate Berkus's Return to Sri Lanka

“On Oprah, I went on Oprah to talk about my experience in the tsunami weeks after, and the reason that I did that was because Oprah had said that she was going to raise money for the region that we were in, Fernando and me, and that she would waive all of the admin fees, et cetera, and whatever dollars were raised from her audience would go directly and be administered to the region of Podeville where we were.”

“And so we partnered with these different I was twenty eight. But they told us. These agencies helped us figure out, like feed the children, and these very established, you know, agencies, how to disburse the money. And one of the programs that was super important to me was that we were able to restore like the woman who had the fishing the cottage on the shore, who served the fisherman coffee every morning. We built a new hut and got her her new supplies, and we provided bicycles to the villagers and we actually built this two story building that was a vocational school.”

“A year to the date after the tsunami, I got a call from Oprah and she said, the PM of Sri Lanka has invited me to the opening of the vocational school that you helped to build. And I told them I'm not doing that, but he should go do it. So I'm asking if you want to fly back and I said, absolutely not. There's no I'm sorry. I'm sure that you're going to frame this as a full circle moment, and I'm sure you're right. I just don't have it in me to do it.”

“Ten minutes later I called her back and I said, I changed my mind. She said, I know you're booked on a flight out in two days, and this is the production crew that's going with you, And I said, how did you know who's coming with me?”

“A year to the date, December twenty sixth, I stood in the exact spot where we were. It was one of the most restorative, most incredible moments of my life.”