O n the morning of December 26, 2004, Tsunami waves struck a large number of coasts surrounding the Indian Ocean, affect- ing many countries, destroying both the built and the natural environments. Nearly a year has past, wounds have been healed, shelters have been rebuilt and communities have been reborn. Yet, the memories remain. The num- ber of places affected by this natural disaster is countless: rebuilding projects everywhere, no matter how different in the methods and the outcomes, have helped us understand our delicate relationship with the natural environ- ment as well as the way we see the world. Along the southern seaboard of Thailand, the provinces most affected are Phuket, Pang-Nga and Krabi, whose white-sanded coasts have a blend of beach resorts and local villages. The land around most beach resorts has been domesticated — resorts are located ‘without’ the natural environment. In the de- stroyed local villages where people depended upon oceanic natural resources, their shelters and communities were sited ‘within’ natural surroundings, united with the land and the sea in such a way that the villagers never saw themselves as capable of living elsewhere, nor do they desire to be anywhere else. Since the Tsunamis, this relationship with the natural environment has changed. Some, like the Morgans, the sea gypsies with no national- ity, cannot imagine themselves living inland. Others are not so sure that they want to go back to the same locations they once called home, nevertheless, most of the villagers were relocated. In rebuilding the land we belong Tonkao Panin
Finding a place Being relocated simply means that most villag- ers did not have a chance to choose loca- tions for their communities. Under Thai law, people can apply for legal title to a plot of land after 10 years of continuous use. In practice, very few succeed and millions of Thais live on what is technically public land. After those lands became inhabitable because of the Tsunamis, they were assigned to new places which mostly belong to the local Bud- dhist temples, schools, or were donated by both private and governmental sectors. In finding new homes for the villagers, two conflicting ideas emerged. On one hand, some authorities strongly urged that the locals needed to be returned to their previ- ous locations to make them feel at home, replicating what they once had, but now with additional Tsunami protection built around their communities. On the other hand, some authorities vehemently advocated completely new strategic locations, new types of commu- nities, new types of shelters and new kinds of environment: the planning of the community and the design of the houses would be done for the villagers. In other words, the solutions were to be either the immediate return to previous lives, or the invention of completely new ones. Perhaps neither the first nor the second will suffice. What is missing from the lives of the villagers is not only physical shelter, but also a sense of belonging.
Tsunami problems Most of the strategies were developed by local authorities with countless local and foreign organizations involved in the planning, designing and rebuilding. In some cases, the sense of urgency in the preparation of new lands to accommodate a whole village meant the bulldozing of woods and forests to create flat empty sites. In some other cases,exigency rebuilding of a whole community was trans- lated into a uniform layout where hundreds of houses are neatly lined along thoroughfares. This has destroyed the sense of cooperative community among the villagers. As for the design of the house itself, the urgent need for both temporary and permanent shelters as well as a very limited budget is sometimes transformed into a prototypical house with- out windows. So, despite the gracious aiding efforts and the great amount of resources, many of the rebuilding projects have become the constant reminder of what the locals have lost. Many projects succeeded in relocating and rebuilding communities within a very short period of time by dealing mainly with the provision of a large number of ‘individual’ houses. Authorities believed that as long as people have roofs over their heads, they will be satisfied. But the problems are far more sensitive than the provision of physical shel- ter. In similar houses all lined up in rows, the villagers’ already diminishing sense of identity was now lost. They are forced to ask: Where are we? Where are our families and neigh- bours? Who are next to us? How do we live? What will we do? And perhaps the most daunting question without any answers: Who are we?
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architecture and land
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