Petcharath Ongskul, or Pui for short, is a Thai exchange student at St. Mary of the Lake in Slave Lake. On Boxing Day, Pui got a call from a Thai friend, also an exchange student, in Calgary.
“My friend phoned me in the morning and he told me, did you know about earthquake yet? I just woke up. I didn’t know anything. And he said that it’s an earthquake in the south part of Thailand. All the islands gone and a lot of people dead from that. I have to go watch T.V., watch the news,” says Pui.
The city she is from from, Hatyai in the Songkhla Province, is on the Malay Peninsula where many of Thailand’s affected coastal villages are, but it is closer to the eastern than western coast. The tsunami wave never reached Hatyai, but the undersea earthquake off the coast of Indonesia that started the wave was powerful enough to be felt in Hatyai.
“The biggest building in Hatyai is almost broken. The aftershock, how do you say, cracked the building,” says Pui. “I phone my parents after I watched the news. I phone my parents and asked, are you okay now? My grandmother, in that day, in the hospital, and she was sick, and that hospital moved patients to the parking because it’s a big building. But it’s okay.”
Watsiree Rattanapakdee, or Som for short, is also an exchange student from Thailand at St. Mary of the Lake.
“My host family told me. Another day after that, my friend called me from Thailand. He told me, do you know how about the tsunami in Thailand? And then he told me, don’t worry about it because we live in the north. It’s okay. He told me how the beautiful beach and things is gone. It’s so sad. And so after that, my mom phoned me too,” says Som.
Som’s family lives in the Nan province in the northeast of Thailand, far from the affected Malay coast, but her grandmother lives in the south, in Hatyai. Som’s parents were able to tell her that her grandmother is fine.
Fortunately, both girls had good news from home. Neither has lost family in the disaster, and it looks as if all their friends are safe too.
There were some narrow escapes, though.
“My friend in that situation, but he climbed on a palm tree and he stay on the roof about two or three days,” says Pui. “He just go visit there and scuba diving. And when he went back he saw it all and whole village gone.”
Hatyai is not far south of Phuket, the hardest hit part of Thailand. She says that when she was younger, her mother used to take her there on vacation.
“So bad about that. All the beautiful beaches in there have all the tourists. That part make a lot of money for Thailand,” she says. She thinks it will be hard for people with the tourists gone.
Som never visited that area, and now regrets it.
“Everybody in Thailand send their stuff to there. Money, doctor, nurse. Not enough now,” she says.

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