Fateful decision saves Calabasas pair from tsunami

By Michael Picarella
pic@theacorn.com

HAPPIER TIMES-Calabasas resident Michelle Miller and her boyfriend Mattias Folkesson prepare for a dive in Khao Lak, Thailand. The pair left in May, but were supposed to return to the country as scuba instructors in October. A decision to instead visit Sweden helped the couple avoid the worst natural disaster in recent history.

Calabasas resident Michelle Miller, 24, didn’t travel much as a child. But once she turned 18, she decided to travel the world.

For the last two years Miller has been living in Khao Lak, Thailand, where the recent 9.0 magnitude earthquake and subsequent tidal waves devastated the area.

Miller and her boyfriend, Mattias Folkesson, just missed what is now being called one of the world’s worst natural disasters.

The pair left Khao Lak in May, but were due back to work at a diving center in October. They didn’t go.

"We decided we should spend Christmas and some of the winter in Sweden," Miller said. "Mattias, (who’s from Sweden), had not been home for Christmas for four years, so we thought it would be a nice change and a surprise for his family."

"This past year we worked for a company called Khao Lak Scuba Adventures," Miller added. "Mattias was working as the general manager of operations, instructor and tour leader. I was working in the company’s beach office doing all sales and bookings, and also working as a dive master."

Miller had gone to Khao Lak to visit and she took up diving. It was there that she met Mattias, who had been working for a company called Phuket Divers as a scuba diving instructor and tour leader. The two soon began dating.

"The diving season ended in May—rainy season started and so there are no tourists—and we traveled back to Sweden and the U.S.," Miller said. Miller’s mom lives in Calabasas and Miller works for a Calabasas real estate company called Best Local Agent.

"I do a lot of online administrative stuff, and (do a lot of) home searches, etc.," Miller said. "I’m basically like an assistant . . . It’s the perfect job because I do everything via the Internet. I’m able to work wherever we are in the world. I could work all day in the scuba office (in Khao Lak) and do my real estate work for Calabasas at the same time."

Luckily, Miller and Folkesson missed the natural disasters in Khao Lak. But the two are still sad.

"The devastation in Khao Lak is enormous and the death toll is raising by the hour," Miller said. "(Mattias and I) are still missing many of our friends, and the town that we used to call home is pretty much gone."

According to a regional disaster official, rescuers have recovered more than xxx bodies, including both foreigners and Thais, along the Khao Lak beach north of Thailand’s Phuket resort island.

Sources said that the beach in Phang Nga province appears to have been the area worst hit by tidal waves in southern Thailand, besides Krabi, Phuket, Ranong, Satun and Trang.

Thailand officials said the disasters have taken more than xxxx lives, with more than xxxx people missing, many of them Thais working in the tourist industry.

Some of Miller’s friends have sent cell phone text messages to let her know that they’re OK. They wrote of searching through rubble and corpses trying to find loved ones. The scene they described was grim.

"We’ve managed to talk to some of our friends who have survived and are currently there," Miller said in an e-mail to her friends and family. "It seems like a nightmare that is impossible to even imagine. We are thankful for any good news we get. We are deeply saddened by the pain our friends are going through, the lives of friends that have been lost, and the destruction of our beautiful little beach town. We have been frantically trying to reach missing friends and co-workers but the communication lines continue to be very poor."

In an attempt to help her friends and co-workers who were in Khao Lak at the time of the disasters, Miller is asking those she knows to donate to the Thai Red Cross. "I am desperately trying to get any help with disaster relief for this region," she said.

Miller is especially worried about a Thai family that rented her a home in Khao Lak.

"Our friend Brian thinks that Meaw, the wife, is dead, but doesn’t know for sure," Miller said. "Key, the husband, and Sai, their 6-year-old daughter, are still in question."

Khao Lak is a small town; so small it’s like one big family, according to Miller.

"There are so many other people we worry about, not just our close friends, but all the people in town," Miller said. "We ask each other, ‘What about the waiter who made my lunch everyday? What about the guy from the market that I buy water and candy from each afternoon? What about the little old woman who did our laundry once a week? What about all of our friends who work in hotels down by the beach?’ Could you imagine if half of Calabasas was wiped out? There are so many people to worry about."

  To donate to the Thailand Red Cross via e-mail, go to www.redcross.or.th/english/donation/moneydonate.php4. Donations can also be made through the American Red Cross at www.redcross.org/donate/donation-form.asp.