Freddie Rousseau sinks his feet into the golden sand as another Indian Ocean wave crashes on the shore. Behind him, in bamboo-thatched bungalows perched on a rocky hillside, stressed-out aid workers from Aceh's tsunami zone crack open another beer and admire the view.
Two months after opening, Mr Rousseau's 10-room 'eco-tourism' resort is booked solid on weekends, and other foreign entrepreneurs are scoping out beachfront properties on Aceh's Sabang island.
His success offers a window into an unlikely beneficiary of Aceh's post-tsunami reconstruction: tourism. As the battered Indonesian province begins to look ahead to its economic future after the aid money runs out, politicians are weighing up tourism as a potential earner.
Taking a holiday in Aceh, a name synonymous with death and devastation, may be a step too far for many, but Sabang's sleepy beaches and vibrant coral reefs already draw thousands of foreign backpackers and aid workers who are quickly spreading the word.
Mr Rousseau, a South African who runs livelihood schemes for the United Nations Development Programme, arrived in Aceh not long after the December 26, 2004, earthquake and subsequent tsunami that killed over 160,000 people.
His initial task was co-ordinating corpse disposal in Banda Aceh, where everyone was searching for missing relatives.
To clear his head on days off, he began exploring the beaches on Sabang, which got off lightly from the tsunami, and discovered a hidden paradise. 'It was an escape from all the pain and hurt and suffering of Aceh. To come here and relax, I really needed it,' he said.
