Well, what can you say.
We were luckily in Cambodia when the Tsunami hit, on the coast at Sihanoukville. Originally we were meant to be in Thailand but time didn`t allow it. Our friends Dave and Delph were on Ko Mak, in the Gulf of Thailand.
Tomo and Kyoko however, were on Ko Surin and were hit by it on Boxing day morning. After calls to find out if they were Okay (survived and being evacuated to Phuket then on to Bangkok) we headed over there to meet them before New Year. Other mails from friends we'd met travelling confirmed that they were all well, mostly as they'd left Thailand just before the main holidays started...
Tomo was snorkelling when the first wave hit and spent an hour swimming against being pushed past the island and out to sea. He finally managed to haul himself onto a rock out at sea and was rescued an hour later. Kyoko had been sleeping in a tent on the beach when it hit, luckily the flap was open and after being dragged upthe beach was able to escape with help from others fleeing. We read in a paper recently that the islands big reefs and palms may well have taken a lot of the force out of the waves impact and saved many lives...
As for us, we're at the moment getting our Laos visas and will be heading there soon.

Shin-nen Akemashite Omedeto ! Bonne Annee !