I think the wall of water effect would have been seen in areas where the water would have a chance to break before hitting the coast, regions with high waves, ex: in hawaii and regions of australia, there are underwater shelfs which give rise to an abrupt gradient near the shore, which causes the water to break on these and rise up leading to the wall of water.
In any case, the waves here are huge, and moving at 500 miles an hour. The waves were huge enough to completely destroy parts of the andaman and nicobar islands (there are fears that the only paleolithic tribe on earth, numbering about 300, may have been wiped out) and completely submerge the maldives, an entire island nation. Can you imagine an entire country (however small, it is still something some people call home) being under water? Some of the videos are really disturbing, where people deperately clinging to balconies etc are swept away and you realize the water they are treading is 40 feet deep and moving at 100s of miles per hour and is 100 yards into the mainland. There are 80,000 dead in indonesia alone, some days ago that was the total dead. While the news keeps telling us that these are poor countries with high population densities (as though thats some consolation to find in the numbers), there are still 120,000 individuals dead and the waves didnt give a **** as to who they were coming after. Regardless of how poor, uncivilized or wretchedly underdeveloped some may label them, they are picking themselves up after a disaster, the scale of which we in our comfort zones find difficult to comprehend (and the best emotions we can come up with are awe, condescending pity and a sprinkling of sorrow in that order).
ps: before someone gets off on my rant, its directed at no one on this board, forum or topic, but at a much larger audience.
Over 10,000 lives lost in the Asian oceans~ Let's all take a moment of silence and pray for these lost souls. We can all blame wars for causing (sometimes if not all the time) unnecessary sufferings in humanity, but we cannot blame nature. Being a part of this world, we are ever so susceptible to its wrath. 
