This, then, was the start of an exodus and a quarter of a century of war. Already, the mobs had displaced over 300,000 Tamils. Although the government tried to close down the ferries, over half of them fled, mostly to India. It was the beginning of yet another race in exile, nowadays almost a million strong. Meanwhile, of those that stayed, some drifted back to their Colombo homes, and to an uncertain future. A few even changed their names to become less Tamil. Then there were others who headed north, to Jaffna, seeking safety in numbers. Some would join the separatists, looking for guns and a
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Scale of losses in the civil war in Sri Lanka.
