Tsunami In Khao Lak
Before we left Krabi, Bob and Doug both had to “stamp out” of the country at Ranong (on border of Burma) so they could get another 30 days in Thailand. We rented an SUV and drove over to Patong Beach on the west side of the island of Phuket where so many people lost their lives in the tsunami. You would never know anything horrible happened here…businesses up and running and tourists lying on the beach although in minimal numbers compared to before the disaster…but a lot of bare areas where store-houses once stood facing the beach.
Driving up the coast north to Ranong we passed through Khao Lak…a 50 mile stretch of beach that took the worst beating in Thailand. For miles there was nothing but bare bulldozed land…bulldozed in order to remove bodies that were trapped among the roots of Mangrove trees and under rubble. Much of the land here is flat from the beaches to the foothills inland so in places the devestation extended across the road and into the countryside for more than two kilometers. Halfway up a hillside we saw a wrecked coast guard ship sitting at a crazy angle that we understand will be preserved as part of a memorial to all who died here.
We passed a volunteer center that is accepting volunteers for a month at a time and for as long as a year…many of them young people who scrambled down from the backpacker streets in Bangkok…others flying in from the U.S. and Europe…many of them professionals in their fields. At the web site at www.tsunamivolunteer.net you can read heart-rending and life-changing message boards…many in English.
Tags: Thailand, Tsunami
Zoe