A Simple Act of Kindness Saved Our Lives

26th December 2004 will be remembered by most people around the world because that was the day the Tsunami hit a few countries claiming lives and making headlines throughout the world.

Me and my husband were in Phuket for holiday a few days prior to the incident and we stayed at the Central Karon Village Hotel which is situated on the cliff beside the sea. Every morning, my husband will take a walk on the beach and I will then meet him for breakfast at one of the stalls on the beach.

On 25th December 2004, Christmas evening, we decided to have our Christmas celebration over at the bar in the Novotel Hotel along Patong Beach. We got ourselves a table, sat down and enjoyed the evening waiting for the fireworks to come along. Then we saw a couple came in and they could not get a place to sit and no one wanted to share their table. My husband then said that this is no way for anyone to celebrate Christmas and he got up and invited the couple to join us at the table. We later got to know the lovely couple who hail from South Africa and is a surgeon.

We got along really well and stayed on till very late chatting and having a good time. We went home probably close to 3 am and we could not wake up early enough the next day for our breakfast and my husband's morning beach walk. When we woke up, we noticed that something was different and amiss. We saw huge ants marching in our room towards the direction away from the sea and the little guppies in the fish bowl in the room was hiding under a plant and not swimming around like they used to. We got a very good view of the sea from our chalet and saw that the sea was a different colour, red muddy like colour. But it just never occur to us that such a natural catastrophe could happen in Phuket and because of that we headed towards the beach like we used to. While walking towards the beach, we were warned by a few locals to stay away from the beach and took their warning but we were curious and decided to get a little closer and we were shocked to see the terror of nature. We wondered what had happened to the people who run the little stalls on the beach and the familiar faces we used to see. We never knew and hope to God that they were alright.

At that point, I thought to myself..what if we were on the beach like we used to..what would have happened.. I thought back and was so thankful that my husband's act of kindness might have just saved our lives.

We stayed in the resort during the day on the day of Tsunami because we were advised to and also, there were no taxis, tuk tuks or any public transport going from Karon to Patong Beach. But we were curious about what was happening and we wanted to go out to Patong town. At around 7pm we managed to get a tuk tuk out but he charged us 6 times more than the usual price to drive us out and back from Patong. We didn't mind paying because we knew that the locals were afraid to go back out to Patong so there were limited tuk tuks/ taxis on the road.

What we saw really broke our hearts. The coastal road in Patong was closed off so we were on the inner roads about 1km from Patong beach. We saw jet skis and fishing boats strewn all over the road. Tourist standing alongside the roads with their belongings stranded and confused. When we got back to the hotel, the staff were busying trying to accommodate stranded tourist as the hotel we stayed in was not affected by the tsunami. We felt so helpless and we knew of the staffs who were equally confused and worried about their loved ones because we offered to loan our mobile phones to few staffs earlier in the morning before the connections were interrupted.

We were the lucky ones who had our air tickets to depart Phuket on 27th when the airport was only opened hours before our flight took off. When we got to the airport, what i saw broke my heart even more. We saw people who were injured, bandaged and terrified..many still covered in mud. I saw a family with 2 young children with life jackets on and covered in mud and the mother was clearly still in shock when she sat on the floor rocking herself back and forth. It looked like they we just rescued because I saw uniformed officers beside them and trying to comfort the family.

And then there are also people who I can understand, feared for their lives and families, demanding for a flight out, shouting at airport staffs to get them out, there was so much emotions in the airport...fear, sadness, shock, anger, confusion.. and in such a chaotic environment, I have to hand it to the locals who handled the situation calmly and bearing in mind...they would have lost someone dear to them or someone they know and then having to deal with the stress of handling this catastrophe.

I have to say..hands down to the locals and all who help rebuild the beautiful island. I admire them for being able to bounce back from such devastation in such a short time.