A Year After the Tsunami

Armed with a map and an English-speaking taxi driver, I began to tour the coastal areas which had been hit the hardest. Phuket is the lifeline of Thailand’s tourist industry, it accounts for over sixty percent of the total revenue generated by tourism alone. And for many years it has been the number one tourist hot spot in the world.

"Both myself and others guests had felt the tremor and the building shake hours before the wave hit. When we asked the staff in reception what was going on, we were told that it was probably from a heavy goods vehicle passing by.”

First, we decided to visit Patong beach; Phuket’s most popular tourist enclave and one of the island’s worst affected coastal areas. The seashore at Patong is very long and the tsunami was able to roll in with full force catching the thousand or so morning strollers unaware. The beach is perfect here; the white sand just rolls on and on, but having been there many times before, I had the feeling that the whole energy of the place had been altered in some way.

The most noticeable thing is the dwindling number of vendors plying their wares up and down the beach. Whereas before you could be a total hedonist—coconut drink in hand whilst having a foot massage—the place looks and feels like it’s been given back to nature. This has been taken into consideration by the city’s planners and government officials, plans are already underway to build an area where the normal bars, huts and vendors will be able to continue operating without cluttering up the beach.

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