After the Tsunami: Hua Laem, Thailand
17 images Created 22 Jan 2015
The road to Hua Laem, a small fishing village on the east side of Koh Lanta island in Southern Thailand, is a snake of red dust, pocked with potholes. Few tourists travel this way as most come to Koh Lanta to go diving in the Andaman Sea's exotic reefs or lounge on the exquisite beaches on the island's west side. Through a cloud of copper dust, motor scooters buzz past us, some with veiled drivers and families with as many as three children squeezed onto the seat.
My husband, David Karam, and I were about to head to Southeast Asia on a long-planned trip when the Tsunami struck Southern Asia on December 26th, 2004. As the images of horror and devastation quilted the newspapers and played out on news broadcasts, we began to rethink our plans. David, who has a Design-build business on Cape Cod, MA, has skills we thought might be of some use and, as a photojournalist, I thought I might be able to bring some attention to a community otherwise ignored. Bangkok's newspapers were full of stories about the Tsunami's effect on Thailand's tourist industry. Money was pouring into Phuket, Thailand's most popular resort island; volunteers were already reconstructing damaged hotels and beaches. Finally we read an article about fishermen in Southern Thailand whose longtail boats had been severely damaged or completely destroyed. These men and the communities that depended on them had lost their source of income and were receiving little aid because they were not as central to Thailand's economy as tourism. This is the thread we followed from Bangkok to Krabi where a Thai Baptist Minister happened to mention Koh Lanta island and we began our journey on the dusty red road down to Hua Laem.
The first day we visited Hua Laem and assessed the damage, the power of the Tsunami was made tangible to us. Most of the village's homes had been built on stilts right on the beach and what was left of many of them was a collection of wood, concrete, clothing and household items strewn about. Septic pipes and children's toys, school books, shoes, fishing nets, plastic tubs, longtail boats beached like dead whales. Villagers seemed dazed, walking around in the rubble of their homes, picking up occasional items and then dropping them as though not sure what to do with them. I watched two little boys play with their home-made carved wooden boats in a ditch of water. Picking up a board of wood, one cried out "Tsunami Tsunami" and began creating great big waves that soon overwhelmed the toy boats. An old man pointed to the trees above us. We could see the leaves below a certain height had turned brown from the salt water. This was how high the waves had come. Everywhere one looked--from the skeletal remains of boats and homes to the weary expressions on villagers' faces--one could see the destruction the Tsunami had wrought on Hua Laem.
My husband, David Karam, and I were about to head to Southeast Asia on a long-planned trip when the Tsunami struck Southern Asia on December 26th, 2004. As the images of horror and devastation quilted the newspapers and played out on news broadcasts, we began to rethink our plans. David, who has a Design-build business on Cape Cod, MA, has skills we thought might be of some use and, as a photojournalist, I thought I might be able to bring some attention to a community otherwise ignored. Bangkok's newspapers were full of stories about the Tsunami's effect on Thailand's tourist industry. Money was pouring into Phuket, Thailand's most popular resort island; volunteers were already reconstructing damaged hotels and beaches. Finally we read an article about fishermen in Southern Thailand whose longtail boats had been severely damaged or completely destroyed. These men and the communities that depended on them had lost their source of income and were receiving little aid because they were not as central to Thailand's economy as tourism. This is the thread we followed from Bangkok to Krabi where a Thai Baptist Minister happened to mention Koh Lanta island and we began our journey on the dusty red road down to Hua Laem.
The first day we visited Hua Laem and assessed the damage, the power of the Tsunami was made tangible to us. Most of the village's homes had been built on stilts right on the beach and what was left of many of them was a collection of wood, concrete, clothing and household items strewn about. Septic pipes and children's toys, school books, shoes, fishing nets, plastic tubs, longtail boats beached like dead whales. Villagers seemed dazed, walking around in the rubble of their homes, picking up occasional items and then dropping them as though not sure what to do with them. I watched two little boys play with their home-made carved wooden boats in a ditch of water. Picking up a board of wood, one cried out "Tsunami Tsunami" and began creating great big waves that soon overwhelmed the toy boats. An old man pointed to the trees above us. We could see the leaves below a certain height had turned brown from the salt water. This was how high the waves had come. Everywhere one looked--from the skeletal remains of boats and homes to the weary expressions on villagers' faces--one could see the destruction the Tsunami had wrought on Hua Laem.
