According to Andreas Rydzewski’s detailed account (in German), on the morning of Dec.26, he and Angela, his wife were playing golf at the "Tublamu Navy Golf Course", right at the west-coast, which was afterwards completely destroyed by the TSUNAMI.

During a pause at their golfing, suddenly they heard people, (who were closer to the shore) shouting desperately, while a horrible "unusual roar" came from the sea.

Their "caddies" screamed: "run, run run..." and ran to the inland direction (still carrying the golf cubs) followed by Angela and Andreas .

The birds made an extremely uncommon noise, according Angela's report.

Andreas’s bright sense of preservation, instantly realized "what to do" – they had to flee from a catastrophic wave (not "climbing palm trees" as some people and the caddies did. The palms were too thin). The couple instead, ran into the woods (eastward).

After rushing through a forest they had to climb over a 1.8 meter-wall which surrounded the Golf court, and kept running, followed by the huge wave.

Then they met a serious obstacle - a 2.5 meter-high wall, (which surrounds all the Military Base). On its top were "three barbed wires". 

Fortunately they saw next to it a heap of sand. Thus, Andreas lifted Angela over the wall, and climbed after her. As he reached the top, his stomach and arms were deeply injured by the rusty barbed wire. 

Subsequently he fell into the ditch at the other side of the wall.

There they saw the sea already invading the access road to the Military Base through the other side.

They ran desperately for their lives. (Thanks to an adequate physical condition they use to keep up).

On the road, they saw a Thay on a moped, presently unaware of what was going on – (apparently he was trying to guess "why was the water covering the highway ?") He could not anticipate, that in a few seconds both walls would be completely destroyed by the "second wave", and all vehicles on the road and neighborhood would be thrown over the trees into the woods - 100 yards away. 

The walls they had climbed were instantly destroyed and covered by the muddy mix of the wave and all what it was carrying within the brown water.

Andreas and Angela jumped on the back of the moped, shouting "run, run run...", indicating the highland direction.. So he did,

( Probably he assumed Andreas needed urgent help, due to his bleeding wounds). 

Thus, he saved his life, as well as theirs.

They drove to a higher level of the highway, where they found some stores (approximately 12 mts above the sea level).

They asked for a Hospital, but nobody understood English there. But after seeing Andreas' bleeding wounds, they drove them to a "first aid station", where his wounds were disinfected and provided with ‘iodine’ and bandages. Afterwards they checked for real Hospitals and a doctor, who was not found, due to the immense crowd, in serious need for medical assistance, all over the west-coast.

Somporn Sintop (a Thai driver as well as owner of a local Resort) offered to drive them to the Hospital. But even there, no proper medication was available.

Then he drove them to their hotel, for checking whether documents - passports etc, were eventually saved from the flood. Fortunately the wave did not reach o the upper floor, which remained undamaged, while the cottages all around had disappeared. 

In haste they grabbed documents, cell phone, air-tickets - and the strictly necessary clothes. From there Somporn brought them to his own place - Khao Lak Nature Resort, run by his family - wife and son. There they provided Andreas and Angela with a place to stay overnight, as well as food, candles, iodine, bandages etc. (a complete „black-out" was all over the west coast , including Cell phone transmission-towers).

A crowd of stranded tourists found a safe shelter at Somporn’s place.

On the following morning (Dec 27^th) they drove to the Phuket airport. There they found a chaotic situation - no possibility at all for departing, neither to Bangkok nor elsewhere to the East coast.

Finally they rented a car (the very last one available in town - a Jeep) in order to exit the affected area. They drove to their Hotel and packed their luggage and headed directly to the east coast - to "Kow Samui" island (where they had been already in the past). There they found an appropriate shelter to recover, as well as doctors, at an excellent local Hospital, thus being adequately medicated.

On Saturday Jan 8, they flew back to Frankfurt.

A new existence has been given them - a NEW LIFE !