Tourists are gradually returning to tsunami-hit beaches around the Indian Ocean as hotels and bars rebuild, although for many holiday havens a full recovery is still months, if not years, away. ?Before tsunami, Phuket number one. Now, number nothing,? said Nong, a 23-year-old transvestite cabaret dancer in Patong beach on the Thai island of Phuket, where some 250 people died in the disaster. Despite the tsunami, Thailand, one of Asia's most popular destinations for European and Asian tourists, still clocked up around 12 million arrivals in 2005, although it fell well short of A 13 million-plus target.

In Khao Lak, the worst-hit area, where the majority of Thailand's 5,395 victims died, many luxury hotels remain deserted ruins, although some have managed to spring back in time for the start of the November-March holiday high season. ?In November, I was forecasting 18 % occupancy and at the end of the month, we were looking at 30 %,? said Achim Brueckner, general manager of the five star, 243-room Meridien Hotel on Khao Lak, which opened in mid-October. ?The impression is that most of Khao Lak is still devastated. I was having problems getting agents in Europe to put us in brochures. But it really doesn't look like a disaster area any more,? he said.

Besides the shocking images of death and destruction which have left many potential visitors thinking of going elsewhere, Thailand has had to compete with fallout from a resurgence of bird flu and separatist bloodshed in its Muslim-majority south. ?I don't think people in Europe are so worried about another tsunami,? said Marianne Doris, a Dutch retiree who now lives just south of Paris, sitting having breakfast on a virtually deserted beach in north Phuket. ?Everybody is more scared of bird flu. I feel so sorry for these people ? first it was September 11, then SARS, then the tsunami and now bird flu.? The UN World Tourism Organisation says beach resorts in Thailand, Sri Lanka and the Maldives are reporting forward bookings of 80-90 % for December and January. But hotel capacity is down, the agency said, noting that only 500 of Khao Lak's 6,000 rooms have reopened. Airline flights to the region have not yet returned to pre-disaster levels.

?A full recovery will not be possible until capacity is fully restored sometime in 2006,? UNWTO said in a report last week. Sweden?s Fritidsresor, the biggest tour operator for Swedes holidaying in Thailand, said sales for this winter have been surprisingly strong. But it dropped Khao Lak and Phi Phi Island in favour of resorts in Krabi and the Gulf of Thailand. ?Scandinavians always seem to have liked the region ? the food, the culture, the sunshine. Now on top of that, there is a very strong bond between the people. That seems another reason for going,? said communications director Lottie Knutson.?Sales for this winter have come back very much quicker than we thought,? she said, adding they expected to sell holidays to close to 60,000 Scandinavians this year, about the same as 2004. However, it dropped Sri Lanka from its winter offerings, citing slow sales and security concerns even before the tsunami.

Sri Lanka ? second hardest hit by the tsunami after Indonesia ? says the number of foreign tourist arrivals fell to 525,000 in 2005 from 560,000 last year. Tourist board Director General Kali Selvam said Europeans ? the highest spenders who make up 50 percent of all tourists ? were staying away more than visitors from nearby Asian nations. In Unawatuna, a southern beach resort, many villagers still live in rough wooden shacks in a mosquito-infested abandoned quarry off a side-road out of sight of passing backpackers. They say they have not been told when they will get new housing, and want the tourists back. ?I lost my child, my house, my shop and everything,? says 36-year-old Nandika Dewandarage, who used to sell bangles and sarongs to beachgoers and now lives with her surviving daughter in an abandoned office at the quarry. ?Without the tourists, we will never put ourselves back on our feet.?