Prayers for living and dead alike

PHUKET - A week after the tsunami swept along Thailand's tropical coastline, people prayed for the victims and spoke of putting the tragedy behind them.

But even as they looked forward, rescuers continued to pull bodies from the beaches.

Sombre parishioners lined up for communion in a small Catholic church still hung with Christmas decorations while an international service was planned at a Phuket hospital where injured from many countries are being cared for.

The national disaster centre said nearly 5000 bodies had been recovered from the ruins of hotels and resorts on the Andaman Sea coast and on islands packed with foreign tourists at the height of the season.

Half of them were foreigners, many who had left the cold, dark European winter for sun, sand and diving around coral reefs. More than 6000 people are still missing, just over 2000 of them foreigners.

Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said, however, that the actual number of missing might be fewer.

"The problem with the missing list is that some on the list have subsequently been found but not taken off it," he said. "For example, on Phuket, our review of the missing showed that it went down to about one-third."

On the worst struck beach, at Khao Lak, on the mainland just north of Phuket, police said 3800 bodies had been recovered, 2200 of them foreign tourists, with about 90 per cent of the area of crumpled resorts searched. After a week of searching for missing victims, some friends and relatives said they were nearing a decision to give up the hunt and planned a final visit to the beaches where their loved ones died.

"We're going to Phi Phi island, not to try to find the body, but just to try to bring a bit of closure to this," said South African Rob Ferguson, who is helping a friend look for his 23-year-old daughter.

"He just wants to see it and maybe connect in some way," Mr Ferguson said.

Search teams drained a flooded area on Phi Phi, the island made famous by the film The Beach and pulled 10 bodies from the watery muck.

They said they expected to find a further 100 victims there as elephants helped the search in areas that machines could not reach. At Assumption Catholic Church in Phuket, the Rev Joseph Winai said parishioners who had known victims of the tsunami should come forward during Mass on Sunday morning.

Thais had prayed for the victims in a national day of prayer on Thursday, but he said they should do so again in remembrance "for all the departed". Frenchman Pascal Taillard said he rarely went to church but attended yesterday to pray for a friend and his family lost in the waves.

Mr Taillard, who has lived in Phuket for nine years and is married to a Thai, said Thais, though deeply affected by the tragedy, were determined now to put it behind them and get on with life. "What they say is 'We have to clean up, we have to keep going and try to forget the things we can'."

- REUTERS