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The Rebirth of Phuket 
The Rebirth of Phuket
I wasn’t far out from the beach — just
beyond the lightly rolling breakers. My feet had left the sandy bottom,
and amniotic water burbled around my shoulders. A sea eagle sailed
between me and the hot afternoon sun. The starburst tops of a coconut
grove delineated the beach. An arc of sugar, it stretched away to a
cluster of rounded rocks and, beyond, a rise of greenery leading into
the tufted mountains of a national park.
I was floating in the
Andaman Sea at Khao Lak, in Thailand’s southwest. A paradise of
mangroves, tropical islands and emerald coves set in electric-blue
waters, the Andaman Coast is one of the world’s best-known beach
destinations. It includes the island province of Phuket, the spectacular
small island Ko Phi Phi, hopping Rai Le Beach and more sedate Khao Lak.
Its vacation options range from some of the most luxe accommodations on
the planet, through unassuming hotels priced for the modest budgets of
middle-class European and Asian families, to pristine natural areas
accessible only to those willing to rough it. The area is legendary for
its lush coral reefs and caves and the green-shrouded sugar-loaf rocks
rising from the sea in Phang Nga Bay.
But the softly humid
breezes of the Andaman Coast also carry an echo of menace. At the end of
2004, this beach at Khao Lak was littered with bodies and debris.
Horrific, indelible scenes that spread around the world almost as fast
as what had caused them, the great tsunami. All told, the disaster
killed a quarter-million people worldwide and more than 8,000 in
Thailand — fishermen, villagers and more than 2,000 foreigners from 16
countries. The United Nations estimated that around 150,000 people in
Thailand lost their livelihoods in fishing and tourism that December
morning.
I visited this part of Thailand in October, just before
the start of the tourist season, with an eye toward assessing the
coast’s recovery. What I found was a placid seaside with few signs of
the disaster. Instead, it had the expectant atmosphere that any popular
tourist area has just before the high season. The beach at Khao Lak was
empty, and few tourists were around, but the palm-shaded resorts were
spotless and occupied with preseason preparations. Everywhere I went on
the Andaman Coast I heard the rhythm of industrious hammers and smelled
fresh paint.
Statistics from the Tourism Authority of Thailand
support the impression of a full physical recovery for the tourist
business — and until political uncertainty and the current global
economic crisis sent visitor numbers plunging, an economic recovery as
well. Other than Khao Lak and Ko Phi Phi, which, respectively, lost 75
and 60 percent of their hotels, most of the Andaman Coast was spared
complete devastation. Hotels were refurbished and repaired, and after
visitors returned in large numbers in 2006, a vigorous building boom
began. In 2007 alone, Phuket’s stock of hotel rooms climbed a tenth,
contributing to an 11 percent increase in visitors to the island, to
more than five million — more than in any year before the tsunami. In
2008, more new hotels went up. For travelers willing and able to spend
the money to get there, this coast is once again an inviting place to
stay.
The Khao Lak area, which suffered much of the Andaman
Coast’s worst devastation, now features a low-key set of immaculate
resorts attracting families from around the world, especially Northern
Europe. Instead of boisterous night life like that in Patong, on Phuket
to the south, or stunning cliff faces like Rai Le’s, to the east, Khao
Lak’s charm is in its long serene beach at the foot of a range of
thickly forested mountains.
Though it retains its mellow vibe,
the new hotels are changing things: Khao Lak now features more upscale
luxury than it had before, with newer resorts joining rebuilt ones like
Le Méridien Khao Lak, which seems to have overcome rumors that it was
haunted after the disaster. I found few signs of the tsunami — a vacant
lot here and there and a few trees’ exposed roots and stumps of twisted
branches alarmingly high up their trunks. The town, a strip of shops,
restaurants and tour operators’ offices in utilitarian concrete boxes,
was bustling if uninspiring.
As the sun dipped magnificently into
the fiery Andaman Sea, I took a place at a split bamboo table by the
surf. I dug my toes into the warm sand like a ghost crab and washed down
an assertively seasoned green curry with a big bottle of hoppy Chang
Beer. Just as the sky turned inky, someone nearby launched a
candle-powered paper hot-air balloon. It rose steadily, eventually
taking its place as an orange star among the constellations.
THE
next day, behind the town, I found unmistakable evidence of the tsunami.
A small grassy park surrounds an incongruous police boat that was
washed there, a mile from the sea, by the wave. The boat had been
guarding a Thai prince who was killed in the disaster, and it became a
place of mourning and remembrance.
Certainly, everyone who
survived has vivid memories. My driver in Phuket, Marn, told me that 10
members of his family had died in the tsunami. But the forlorn boat, and
an abstract memorial sculpture nearby, seemed forgotten. A few
foreigners walked around the gray hulk in a warm drizzle, shaking their
heads.
If there is any grand physical monument to the disaster,
it is the rebuilt coast itself.
“It’s back, stronger than it ever
was pre-tsunami,â said Bill Heineke, an owner of the Anantara hotel
group, which got its start in northern Thailand and now has nine resorts
around Asia. Anantara’s hotel in Khao Lak was destroyed by the tsunami,
but in October the group opened a new one on Phuket.
But the
area’s economy is at the mercy of more than the awesome forces of
nature. Even as I strolled the beach, fresh troubles were brewing. The
global economic collapse has been a blow to every region that depends on
the disposable incomes of rich countries. Meanwhile, domestic tensions
have flared as Thailand’s complex politics works through a particularly
intransigent period. Political demonstrations in November closed both of
Bangkok’s airports for days, stranding more than a third of a million
travelers.
Source: http://travel.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/travel/11phuket.html
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