wowpow
August 26th, 2006, 13:33
Someone mentioned this article in the Best restaurant trail. I went to SPICE and found it in their archives. SPICE is a terrrific mag these days and I think a boon to those overseas desperate for news of their beloved country. This article is a smaple of the excellent stuff there and will touch your cockles. Have a hanky at the ready.
courtesy http://www.spicemag.net/?page=articles&(block)=14wavefromhell
Wave from Hell!
It is about 8am on Boxing Day (26 December) 2004. IтАЩm the general manager of an eco-resort called Golden Buddha Beach Resort on the island of Koh Pra Thong, near Kao Lak National Park, north of Phuket on the Andaman Coast.
The accommodation, such as bungalows, small houses and some very elaborate houses are constructed with natural materials, in order to blend in with the surroundings. They are privately owned by individuals from all over the world who wish to spend their holidays in paradise. Most of them are situated close to the beach and bay to take advantage of the views and cool sea breezes. The main service amenities are place centrally but still with commanding views. There are only two hills on the island. The rest of the island is savanna and the centre of it is almost desert-like, without much native vegetation.
ItтАЩs the busy season, Christmas is over and it had been great. IтАЩm now in the resort restaurant checking that all is ready for breakfast and greeting the guests. The staff asked me if I had heard a muffled bang earlier but I had not and did not think any more about it although a guest, who came in later for breakfast, said that his bed shook a bit at that time.
But the weather was brilliant with clear skies and the sea right besides us was like a lake.At 10.30 am we heard an enormous rumble from the beach about 20 metres away. It sounded like a 747 jumbo jet at full throttle taking off. The sound was so loud that everyone jumped up and ran for the beach expecting a plane crash. All we saw was the sea rushing away from the beach, sucking sand with it. There was no sea, just beach.
On the far horizon we saw a white line which appeared to be about a centimetre high. Even at that distance it was clear that it was a wave breaking. Instinctively we knew there was about to be trouble. Most of us started running along the beach to get the many guests, children and staff off the beach and up onto Monkey Hill, the little hill on the other side of the resort. It was about 40-50 metres high but without easy access so people had to struggle up through the brush.
Although we knew that this wave was going to be big we never thought of the word "tsunami". After all here was the perfect holiday resort, calm and peaceful. And who thinks "tsunami" anyway? Guests and staff were slow to move as with the sea on the horizon coming towards us at a fast rate and getting bigger and bigger who would want to miss the spectacle of a huge breaking wave? Our screaming and shouting made little impact but when it got closer they started to realised that it was going to be big and only then everyone started to run. All this took about 15 minutes.
A few of us were on the north side of our peninsular and ran for the hill on that side but by then I realised that I would never make it in time. I took shelter behind a massive casuarina tree and another guest was behind a smaller tree beside me. Next, an enormous wave rolled over the dunes and split on either side of me. The tree grunted as if it were going to snap and when I looked to the right of me the guest was gone. I did not have time to count my lucky stars because the sand was being washed away from under my feet and slowly I was being pulled down.
The next wave was a few seconds later and as I looked up it passed over me at least 10 metres above my head. I did not have to worry about the tree snapping as I was tossed aside like tissue paper in the wind. I had the presence of mind to take in as much air as my lungs would hold as I disappeared under water. I was pulled under, turned and rolled by the water and had no idea what was up or down but could feel that I was going at a massive speed.
My lungs were about to burst and I knew that time was running out for me. I opened my eyes briefly to see where the light and surface would be and without thinking I put my hands together and stretched my arms, using my hands like a rudder pointed up.
I shot up and briefly got my head out of the water for just enough time to suck in fresh air and down I went again. I have still no idea how many times I went up and down, but finally I stayed up. When I looked around me I was close to Ping Island, a little island which I knew was about 700 metres away from our island of Koh Pra Thong. The sea around me was smooth like a carpet but full of debris and I realised that being hit by any of it could injure me badly. I still grabbed whatever was floating by to at least give me time to get my breath back. Right beside me was a long-tail boat on its side and yet no matter how hard I tried the debris prevented me from even getting close to it. However a little foam seat cushion from a boat came close enough for me to grab and I pushed it under my chest to help me keep afloat.
Ping Island was very close and I tried desperately to swim for it but I kept being dragged away by the pressure of the water currents and swirled in a big circle towards the land beside a peninsula on our main island. I was being pulled towards our beach and was happy to see the hill coming towards me at a fast rate but I realised that what goes up must go down and vice versa. Before I knew what was happening, I was taken like a speedboat back to the point where I had left Koh Pra Thong in the first place and shot over the 200 metre wide peninsula into the Andaman Sea. I desperately tried to grab palm leaves and tree branches but they ripped straight through my hands because of the speed at which the water was moving. I was surrounded by debris and frankly all our resort was floating around me.
I heard some cries for help in the distance and could see two of my staff members. As my cushion life saver was keeping me afloat I tried to swim to help them. The massive amount of debris and the power of the water prevented me from making any progress. I was steadily being dragged in the direction from which I had first seen the wave. I then realised that the sea was settling down again. The big problem now was to get myself back to shore through the layers of anything that could float. Considering that the whole resort had been built of wood, thatch and natural materials it seemed to take me forever to claw my way back through the debris to shore.
I dragged myself onto the beach and checked myself for injuries and was totally amazed that I only had a few scratches and a sore left leg. How I could have gone at high speed under water one way and on my return above water without being smashed into the many trees and debris will remain a mystery to me for ever. My watch was still happily ticking away and checking the time I could not believe that I had been struggling for my life for about 3 hours. When I got over the dunes there was little left. The resort was totally gone except, amazingly, for my toilet, but I really had no need for that anymore as I had peed from fright in the sea already! There was nothing but emptiness, some bent over palm trees and concrete slabs beside smashed up equipment. The beautiful resort now looked like a rubbish dump.
The only building left on the grounds was the two-storey reception building but in a big pile. Not a single person was to be seen. It was only then I panicked and feared the very worst. I walked straight across the resort area to the bay side to see if there was any one there but found no one. Walking along the beach was like being shipwrecked on a desert island. My mind raced thinking of what could be the next catastrophe; all guests and staff gone, including my lover?
But then to my immense relief I saw two guests coming from the Monkey Hill where I was supposed to be in the first place. They told me that most of our 150 guests and staff were on the hill behind the resort. Some had serious injuries but most were minor. Amazingly I was as calm and collected as could be but when I heard my boyfriend calling my name from the hill I broke down. I sat with him on a rock for a while reflecting on the event and then my nose started to run. I could not believe how much water could come from the nasal and forehead cavities. Most people were not willing to come down the hill for fear of an aftershock because by then we realized that indeed it had been a tsunami and aftershocks could bring more waves. Some, however, came and collected whatever food and liquid they could from that scattered around and buried in the sand as we felt that we would be there for while.
After making a quick survey of the damage and finding only one body jammed under the reception building rubble I went up the hill to prepare for maybe the longest night we could imagine. There I found "The Australian" newspaperтАЩs South-East Asian correspondent who was staying with us for Christmas. She had a mobile phone that worked. She was contacted by Barry Petersen (ex-Australian army officer) who takes care of my business in Bangkok who let us know that he had already been in touch with the Australian Embassy and his Thai army connections and told them of our whereabouts.
As it was now late afternoon rescue could come only early next morning. We spent the night on Monkey Hill. We tried to sleep and care for the injured but most of the time we just talk about what had happened during the day. It was then that the journalist told me that Pon (my partner) was her hero because he had saved her girlfriendтАЩs life. He had not told me anything of this.
Pon, like so many, did not initially realise the danger and so did not run up the hill as the first wave appeared small, but as it started to pour over the dunes he could see the big one behind it and thus took off and ran to our home. He went in but the water followed. He ran outside again and raced for Monkey Hill, but the water was faster than him and he only just had time to climb a smallish tree. No sooner was he up the tree when a wooden structure knocked the tree over and he got swept towards the bay. He was lucky and got to a massive tree that was holding and climbed up as high as he could. A staff member came sailing by and he grabbed her and got her to climb above him. Then the girlfriend of the Australian journalist came floating past. She had given up all hope of living and made no attempt to get to a tree. Pon apparently yelled something to her that may not be printable. She reached out and he, having hands that could snap a leg off an elephant, dragged her in to the tree and as she later said, he saved her life as she had given up fighting. But we now knew that thirteen people were missing.
The water from the tsunami had covered 85% of the island and it has since been worked out that the second (main) wave had been 11.5 metres (35 feet) high.
The first Thai Navy helicopter circled over us at about 6.20am on 27 December and shortly after three more arrived and landed on a clear bit of the beach. All the injured and families were taken off. We found one more body and by early afternoon all of us were evacuated by boat leaving behind the devastation that had once been a paradise.
Most of the guests and staff who did not have missing loved ones or friends went to their homes or onward destinations. Pon and I went to the main temple in the nearby village of Kuraburi which was set up as the main rescue and command centre. Whole communities had to spend their time there as there was nowhere for them to go as their villages had been wiped out like our resort.
Thais are an amazing people; within one day clothes and other household articles came in from all over the local area from people who could least afford it. I spent the next five days from early morning to late evening viewing every corpse that came in to help identify and process the deceased guests and staff from our resort. It seemed to be a never-ending process and it became more difficult as days went on because of the decomposition of the bodies. I will not describe the state and smell of the corpses after five days in the water. Sometimes identification could only be made by jewellery or other identifiable items found on the corpses. We found twelve of our people but one baby was still missing. Its body has never been found.
After a week Pon and I went back to Bangkok having lost absolutely everything except our lives and my bank account and a pair of my shoes that we found later upon our return to the island which I proudly still wear today! The owner of the resort was at a loss of what to do next and asked me and Pon to return to the island after a weekтАЩs rest to assess the situation and advise him on the next steps to be taken. We spent three weeks there living like hermits on a deserted beach, no water, no electricity only debris and a million mosquitoes. We had to dig for everything we needed to survive and make life livable. After assessing the damage it was obvious that rebuilding would require massive clearing and reshaping of the grounds as the tidal waters had created massive channels and lakes where the resort had once been. We had to tell the owner that it would require a huge investment and an almost impossible logistical task to rebuild. After advising the owner of this we gave up. Pon was dead scared being there amongst the spirits of the dead and I had had enough of living from bottled water. There was no hope of any future development for a long time.
Now we are back in Bangkok. Pon and I are starting life all over again at O..HoтАжRestaurant; but still remember with horror the tsunami and thanking our respective Gods for the good fortune of life. And those who did not make it may they rest in peace away from the fears of this world.
Spice! Design
Thailand Travel Agent -Reliable and Responsible Travel Company in South East Asia
Heartt 2000 - Help Ensure Aids Rescue in Thailand Together
SPICE! magazine published in Thailand. Formely known as Sticky Rice
courtesy http://www.spicemag.net/?page=articles&(block)=14wavefromhell
Wave from Hell!
It is about 8am on Boxing Day (26 December) 2004. IтАЩm the general manager of an eco-resort called Golden Buddha Beach Resort on the island of Koh Pra Thong, near Kao Lak National Park, north of Phuket on the Andaman Coast.
The accommodation, such as bungalows, small houses and some very elaborate houses are constructed with natural materials, in order to blend in with the surroundings. They are privately owned by individuals from all over the world who wish to spend their holidays in paradise. Most of them are situated close to the beach and bay to take advantage of the views and cool sea breezes. The main service amenities are place centrally but still with commanding views. There are only two hills on the island. The rest of the island is savanna and the centre of it is almost desert-like, without much native vegetation.
ItтАЩs the busy season, Christmas is over and it had been great. IтАЩm now in the resort restaurant checking that all is ready for breakfast and greeting the guests. The staff asked me if I had heard a muffled bang earlier but I had not and did not think any more about it although a guest, who came in later for breakfast, said that his bed shook a bit at that time.
But the weather was brilliant with clear skies and the sea right besides us was like a lake.At 10.30 am we heard an enormous rumble from the beach about 20 metres away. It sounded like a 747 jumbo jet at full throttle taking off. The sound was so loud that everyone jumped up and ran for the beach expecting a plane crash. All we saw was the sea rushing away from the beach, sucking sand with it. There was no sea, just beach.
On the far horizon we saw a white line which appeared to be about a centimetre high. Even at that distance it was clear that it was a wave breaking. Instinctively we knew there was about to be trouble. Most of us started running along the beach to get the many guests, children and staff off the beach and up onto Monkey Hill, the little hill on the other side of the resort. It was about 40-50 metres high but without easy access so people had to struggle up through the brush.
Although we knew that this wave was going to be big we never thought of the word "tsunami". After all here was the perfect holiday resort, calm and peaceful. And who thinks "tsunami" anyway? Guests and staff were slow to move as with the sea on the horizon coming towards us at a fast rate and getting bigger and bigger who would want to miss the spectacle of a huge breaking wave? Our screaming and shouting made little impact but when it got closer they started to realised that it was going to be big and only then everyone started to run. All this took about 15 minutes.
A few of us were on the north side of our peninsular and ran for the hill on that side but by then I realised that I would never make it in time. I took shelter behind a massive casuarina tree and another guest was behind a smaller tree beside me. Next, an enormous wave rolled over the dunes and split on either side of me. The tree grunted as if it were going to snap and when I looked to the right of me the guest was gone. I did not have time to count my lucky stars because the sand was being washed away from under my feet and slowly I was being pulled down.
The next wave was a few seconds later and as I looked up it passed over me at least 10 metres above my head. I did not have to worry about the tree snapping as I was tossed aside like tissue paper in the wind. I had the presence of mind to take in as much air as my lungs would hold as I disappeared under water. I was pulled under, turned and rolled by the water and had no idea what was up or down but could feel that I was going at a massive speed.
My lungs were about to burst and I knew that time was running out for me. I opened my eyes briefly to see where the light and surface would be and without thinking I put my hands together and stretched my arms, using my hands like a rudder pointed up.
I shot up and briefly got my head out of the water for just enough time to suck in fresh air and down I went again. I have still no idea how many times I went up and down, but finally I stayed up. When I looked around me I was close to Ping Island, a little island which I knew was about 700 metres away from our island of Koh Pra Thong. The sea around me was smooth like a carpet but full of debris and I realised that being hit by any of it could injure me badly. I still grabbed whatever was floating by to at least give me time to get my breath back. Right beside me was a long-tail boat on its side and yet no matter how hard I tried the debris prevented me from even getting close to it. However a little foam seat cushion from a boat came close enough for me to grab and I pushed it under my chest to help me keep afloat.
Ping Island was very close and I tried desperately to swim for it but I kept being dragged away by the pressure of the water currents and swirled in a big circle towards the land beside a peninsula on our main island. I was being pulled towards our beach and was happy to see the hill coming towards me at a fast rate but I realised that what goes up must go down and vice versa. Before I knew what was happening, I was taken like a speedboat back to the point where I had left Koh Pra Thong in the first place and shot over the 200 metre wide peninsula into the Andaman Sea. I desperately tried to grab palm leaves and tree branches but they ripped straight through my hands because of the speed at which the water was moving. I was surrounded by debris and frankly all our resort was floating around me.
I heard some cries for help in the distance and could see two of my staff members. As my cushion life saver was keeping me afloat I tried to swim to help them. The massive amount of debris and the power of the water prevented me from making any progress. I was steadily being dragged in the direction from which I had first seen the wave. I then realised that the sea was settling down again. The big problem now was to get myself back to shore through the layers of anything that could float. Considering that the whole resort had been built of wood, thatch and natural materials it seemed to take me forever to claw my way back through the debris to shore.
I dragged myself onto the beach and checked myself for injuries and was totally amazed that I only had a few scratches and a sore left leg. How I could have gone at high speed under water one way and on my return above water without being smashed into the many trees and debris will remain a mystery to me for ever. My watch was still happily ticking away and checking the time I could not believe that I had been struggling for my life for about 3 hours. When I got over the dunes there was little left. The resort was totally gone except, amazingly, for my toilet, but I really had no need for that anymore as I had peed from fright in the sea already! There was nothing but emptiness, some bent over palm trees and concrete slabs beside smashed up equipment. The beautiful resort now looked like a rubbish dump.
The only building left on the grounds was the two-storey reception building but in a big pile. Not a single person was to be seen. It was only then I panicked and feared the very worst. I walked straight across the resort area to the bay side to see if there was any one there but found no one. Walking along the beach was like being shipwrecked on a desert island. My mind raced thinking of what could be the next catastrophe; all guests and staff gone, including my lover?
But then to my immense relief I saw two guests coming from the Monkey Hill where I was supposed to be in the first place. They told me that most of our 150 guests and staff were on the hill behind the resort. Some had serious injuries but most were minor. Amazingly I was as calm and collected as could be but when I heard my boyfriend calling my name from the hill I broke down. I sat with him on a rock for a while reflecting on the event and then my nose started to run. I could not believe how much water could come from the nasal and forehead cavities. Most people were not willing to come down the hill for fear of an aftershock because by then we realized that indeed it had been a tsunami and aftershocks could bring more waves. Some, however, came and collected whatever food and liquid they could from that scattered around and buried in the sand as we felt that we would be there for while.
After making a quick survey of the damage and finding only one body jammed under the reception building rubble I went up the hill to prepare for maybe the longest night we could imagine. There I found "The Australian" newspaperтАЩs South-East Asian correspondent who was staying with us for Christmas. She had a mobile phone that worked. She was contacted by Barry Petersen (ex-Australian army officer) who takes care of my business in Bangkok who let us know that he had already been in touch with the Australian Embassy and his Thai army connections and told them of our whereabouts.
As it was now late afternoon rescue could come only early next morning. We spent the night on Monkey Hill. We tried to sleep and care for the injured but most of the time we just talk about what had happened during the day. It was then that the journalist told me that Pon (my partner) was her hero because he had saved her girlfriendтАЩs life. He had not told me anything of this.
Pon, like so many, did not initially realise the danger and so did not run up the hill as the first wave appeared small, but as it started to pour over the dunes he could see the big one behind it and thus took off and ran to our home. He went in but the water followed. He ran outside again and raced for Monkey Hill, but the water was faster than him and he only just had time to climb a smallish tree. No sooner was he up the tree when a wooden structure knocked the tree over and he got swept towards the bay. He was lucky and got to a massive tree that was holding and climbed up as high as he could. A staff member came sailing by and he grabbed her and got her to climb above him. Then the girlfriend of the Australian journalist came floating past. She had given up all hope of living and made no attempt to get to a tree. Pon apparently yelled something to her that may not be printable. She reached out and he, having hands that could snap a leg off an elephant, dragged her in to the tree and as she later said, he saved her life as she had given up fighting. But we now knew that thirteen people were missing.
The water from the tsunami had covered 85% of the island and it has since been worked out that the second (main) wave had been 11.5 metres (35 feet) high.
The first Thai Navy helicopter circled over us at about 6.20am on 27 December and shortly after three more arrived and landed on a clear bit of the beach. All the injured and families were taken off. We found one more body and by early afternoon all of us were evacuated by boat leaving behind the devastation that had once been a paradise.
Most of the guests and staff who did not have missing loved ones or friends went to their homes or onward destinations. Pon and I went to the main temple in the nearby village of Kuraburi which was set up as the main rescue and command centre. Whole communities had to spend their time there as there was nowhere for them to go as their villages had been wiped out like our resort.
Thais are an amazing people; within one day clothes and other household articles came in from all over the local area from people who could least afford it. I spent the next five days from early morning to late evening viewing every corpse that came in to help identify and process the deceased guests and staff from our resort. It seemed to be a never-ending process and it became more difficult as days went on because of the decomposition of the bodies. I will not describe the state and smell of the corpses after five days in the water. Sometimes identification could only be made by jewellery or other identifiable items found on the corpses. We found twelve of our people but one baby was still missing. Its body has never been found.
After a week Pon and I went back to Bangkok having lost absolutely everything except our lives and my bank account and a pair of my shoes that we found later upon our return to the island which I proudly still wear today! The owner of the resort was at a loss of what to do next and asked me and Pon to return to the island after a weekтАЩs rest to assess the situation and advise him on the next steps to be taken. We spent three weeks there living like hermits on a deserted beach, no water, no electricity only debris and a million mosquitoes. We had to dig for everything we needed to survive and make life livable. After assessing the damage it was obvious that rebuilding would require massive clearing and reshaping of the grounds as the tidal waters had created massive channels and lakes where the resort had once been. We had to tell the owner that it would require a huge investment and an almost impossible logistical task to rebuild. After advising the owner of this we gave up. Pon was dead scared being there amongst the spirits of the dead and I had had enough of living from bottled water. There was no hope of any future development for a long time.
Now we are back in Bangkok. Pon and I are starting life all over again at O..HoтАжRestaurant; but still remember with horror the tsunami and thanking our respective Gods for the good fortune of life. And those who did not make it may they rest in peace away from the fears of this world.
Spice! Design
Thailand Travel Agent -Reliable and Responsible Travel Company in South East Asia
Heartt 2000 - Help Ensure Aids Rescue in Thailand Together
SPICE! magazine published in Thailand. Formely known as Sticky Rice