- A plague of ghost sightings has hit the Thai coast, with
the restless spirits of tsunami victims said to be wandering the area.
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- Thais are intensely superstitious and the reports first
began to emerge as rumours of fresh tsunamis began to die down.
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- Many of the apparitions on Phuket are said to be of foreigners,
with one taxi driver reported to have picked up three Caucasians to take
them to the airport.
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- He arrived only to be asked by the car park attendant
why he was there, as his van was empty, and fled in terror.
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- "My staff are getting really panicked," said
Chaiyun Trisuwan, general manager of the Phi Phi Island Village resort,
which was untouched but where corpses from a neighbouring bay were kept
for four days before they could be moved.
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- "There are rumours, some guy saw this, some guy
saw that. This is definitely the number one problem."
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- Now security guards accompany his workers when they return
to staff accommodation at night.
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- Mental health specialists say the phenomenon may be a
way of expressing mass trauma following the tsunami and its aftermath.
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- Wallop Piyamanotham, a Thai psychologist, said: "This
is a type of mass hallucination that is a clue to the trauma being suffered
by people who are missing so many dead people, and seeing so many dead
people, and only talking about dead people.
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- "Thai people believe that when people die a relative
has to cremate them or bless them. If this is not done, or the body is
not found, people believe the person will appear over and over again to
show where they are."
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- A bar manager in Patong, Napaporn Phroyrungthong, said:
"I believe in ghosts and I always will. It happened so quickly the
foreigners didn't know what happened and they all think they are still
on holiday."
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- © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2005.
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- http://www.telegraph.co.uk/
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