| Although it would misrepresent the facts to say that | | | | long-term negative effects the disaster would have |
| today's Phuket - Thailand's largest island and one of | | | | on Thailand's important tourist industry, they have |
| the world's top tourist destinations - looks the same | | | | not come to pass. For the most part, tourists have |
| as it did before the 2004 tsunami that was the | | | | returned to the beaches and resorts on the Patong |
| greatest natural disaster in Earth's recorded history. | | | | Beach side of the island, on the Andaman Sea coast, |
| But reliable anecdotal evidence does confirm that | | | | and new or rebuild resorts are there to |
| visitors to Phuket would have little reason to think | | | | accommodate them - and to provide essential work |
| that the island and its famous beaches were ever | | | | opportunities for Thais in the tourist industry. No |
| struck by the deadly wave. | | | | appreciable drop in tourist numbers has been |
| Think what you will about ousted Thai Prime Minister | | | | reported in this critical region. |
| Thaksin Shinawatra, much of the credit for the | | | | Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for all of the |
| remarkable recovery, arguably the most thorough of | | | | parts of Thailand's Andaman coast struck by the |
| any of the places hit by the tsunami, belongs to him. | | | | tsunami. Reconstruction has been slower and more |
| In a move redolent of his effort to pay off Thailand's | | | | fraught with controversy in Khao Lak to the north, |
| debt to the IMF for its recovery from the 1997 | | | | Phi Phi Island farther north, and coastal Krabi across |
| financial crisis, Thaksin determined early on that | | | | from Phi Phi. Longtime visitors to many of those |
| Thailand would attend to its own recovery - and not | | | | locations have, in various ways, tried to prevent the |
| wait for international relief funds to arrive. | | | | original owners of tourist properties there from losing |
| Some of that recovery has been laced with | | | | their land and licenses. Not all of the efforts have |
| controversy. Chief among them are the charges that | | | | been successful, and lawsuits regarding lands are |
| many of the former prime minister's friends became | | | | choking Thailand's cumbersome court system. |
| the recipients of the country's largesse, extra-legally | | | | Even so, the dramatic recovery of Phuket has |
| taking over rights to lands that belonged to longtime | | | | become a beacon of hope for similar places on both |
| Phuket residents whose documents of ownership | | | | sides of the Andaman and Indian Oceans, for whom |
| were destroyed along with so much else during the | | | | recovery has been slower and fraught with even |
| catastrophe. | | | | greater troubles. |
| Still, contrary to dire predictions by many about the | | | | |