Posted on 01/07/2005 12:11:19 PM PST by Sally II
PATONG BEACH, Thailand - Many believe the tsunami that devastated this tourist hotspot and killed thousands had one positive side: By washing away rampant development, it returned the beaches to nature.
Greg Ferrando glistened with sweat and sea water as he went for a barefoot jog up the immaculate white sand beach, where the tsunami has wiped away almost all signs of humanity.
"This whole area was littered with commercialism," said the 43-year-old from Maui, Hawaii. "There were hundreds of beach chairs out here. I prefer the sand."
The beauty of Thai beaches is the stuff of folklore: pristine, clean and untouched. That was 10 or 20 years ago. More recently, they have been swamped by development.
"Everyone is talking about it. It looks much better now," he said. "This looks a lot more like Hawaii now, where vendors aren't allowed on the beach."
Phanomphon Thammachartniyom, president of the Phuket Professional Guide Association, said when tourists return to Thailand for their second or third visits, he has to recommend new beaches.
"They will complain, 'Why has this place changed so much? I don't like it anymore. I want it to be like it once was,'" Phanomphon said.
Phanomphon fears politicians and organized crime will steer development in the wrong direction and hopes care will be taken when the area is rebuilt. "Nature has returned nature to us. I want it to be this way forever," he said.
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said the tsunami swept away unplanned and possible illegal building, creating an opportunity to regulate growth.
"I have sent a team to collect information on damaged buildings, including hotels, resources and guest houses," he said. "We need the quick restoration of the tourist facilities there, but we also have to establish restrictions for building."
Some on Phi Phi Island agree.
"They were just building and building and building. It was too much. You couldn't even walk around," said Moriel Avital, a 24-year-old Israeli who lived on the island for four months.
"It was all gone in one wave — it's telling people not to mess with nature," she said. "Paradise should be paradise and should not become this civilized."
Surin Kaewjan, a 44-year-old fruit vendor on Patong Beach, is suffering financially because of the tsunami. But before the huge waves came, the beach was littered and the sand was black and dirty, she said.
"Honestly, I love this nature," she said. "Twenty years ago, it was like this, and full of trees. I haven't seen the beach this white in ages."
"Well, on the bright side..."
Unbelievable.
So what if a few thousand people died to get the beach to the state you like?
What a self-absorbed jerk.
I guess hundreds of thousands of deaths is a small price to pay for pristine beaches. Let's hear it for the victory of nature over commercialism!
Unbelievable isn't it. All those people just messing up his natural beach. So why is he there?
PING!
"Tsunami Reverts Beaches to Natural State"
Hey, isn't that great? /sarcasm
Yeah, damn those Thai for trying to earn a living!
Yup: Old Greg is just a-jogging along happy as a pig in slops. Nice Pristine beach ,and the stench of rotting bodies
doesnt seem to bother him a bit. No matter that all that commercialism that was feeding so many is now gone. Never occurred to Greg to place some of that jogging energy into a search for missing people, I bet Greg even complains when his maid isnt on time to make his bed because she lost most of her family. Clueless?? Yeah i think maybe Greg is clueless.
I willing to bet Nature can plow down a Starbucks just as easily as it can plow down Greenpeace's headquarters.
It certainly had that effect on 43 year-old Greg from Maui.
Impossible (according to environmentalist doctrine)! Development destroys the Earth. There is no way a mere 30 foot high Tsunami caused by a massive 9.0 earthquake could do anything about the irreparable damage of that development.
These envirowhackos really are nuts. One day they tell you we are killing, say, a beach with development and the next they are saying the beach has been returned to its natural state by way of a giant wave.
Do they realize how crazy they sound? The next thing you know they will be telling us of a coming ice age brought on by mankind.
What an uncaring ass......
Hey, in a couple billion years the sun will cause the earth to revert to it's natural, molten state.
That basically sums up the envirowackies thinking and life.
They don't at all think of their own actions and part in the commercialism they so decry.
Pretty hysterical when an envirowacky berates me and my car for being a pollution spewing earth killing demon, and then she stiff-leggedly struts to her SUV with her nose in the air content in her convictions that she's 'put me in my place' as an illiterate philistine with her 'obvious' superiority.
The enviros aren't at all concerned that people died, they see that as depopulation which some of them preach as being needed.
Boy am I glad I left envirowackyism behind.
Rush closed his show with this today. Did he have a "heads up" on this story or...
did his machine create it? I mean...look at the time! Rush is off the air at 1500 and this pops up on FR at 15:11.
Cynical? Who...me?
When he moved there he was alone and it was good now he wants it back that way.
Oh, goody!
Happy day for this guy isn't it. Even the smell must be gone.
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