Songkran and UDD

Well I certainly cannot say there isn’t much going on. If you’ve been watching any international news you are probably aware that the UDD (red shirts) in Thailand have essentially shut down the city. The road blockades started late last week but really escalated after the ASEAN Summit and specifically on Sunday night. Although some parts of Bangkok have no blockades, because my apartment is so close to Government House and Democracy Monument Sunday night there were city buses being used as blockades at every intersection and sometimes even at small ones like the one at the end of my road. Due to this, taxi’s cannot get into my area of the city and on my way to RCA (the club district) to celebrate Songkran, I had to walk about a kilometre to finally get a taxi. Once in the taxi getting to RCA was difficult as the UDD had closed off major streets all throughout the city. Nevertheless, I met up with friends at RCA and we celebrated Songkran with thousands of others by splashing and squirting water at each other for several hours. It is a great way to celebrate the new year.

Yesterday, Monday, the police were cracking down on the protestors and we were instructed by UN Security to stay in our homes. I did this to the extent possible except for when I had to get something to eat. Around my area there were tires on fire in the middle of the road about 100 meters from my place and the buses which had been used as blockades the night before were set ablaze. I saw the billowing smoke from my window when I woke up and later when I went for dinner say what remained of two buses placed in the middle of the street with about a hundred soldiers sitting around the area. There were lots of pedestrians looking at the mess and I guess talking about what was happening all throughout Bangkok as the scenes around my place were not too uncommon.

Today everyone has been instructed to work from home. My general sense of the situation is that it is in the last stages of being resolved. I would like to add to all of this that while I’m perfectly safe it is only because of the UN Security and I have not yet heard a word from the Canadian Embassy. This is similar to when the PAD had taken over the Airport. Why did I register with them? Someone is asleep at the wheel.

Andrew

Spoke too soon

I may have spoken too soon about staying for an additional 3 months. This is not for certain apparently as it needs to get passed by HR. Although staying for an extra month did not need much approval so I've got my fingers crossed that 3 more doesn't either.

We'll see how it goes though.

Andrew

Ayuttaya Finally!

Since the last time I posted a message a lot has happened. At work the Mongolia SNAP workspace has been completed and the invitations sent away. Now we’ll see if it is actually used. The project proposal for the online MDG campaign which I’ve been developing with Julien has been submitted. Again, it will be interesting to see their reaction. A major project at the moment which I am contributing to is a CD Lessons Learned Workshop being held at the end of April. Lot’s of time is being devoted to this and Heidi deserves a tremendous amount of credit for putting all of this together in addition to her already heavy workload. I don’t know how she does it.

Outside of work Britton arrived from Toronto and stayed with me for a little while. We went to Koh Samet but although Koh Samet is nice I really would like to see some other parts of Thailand, especially Koh Samui. I will certainly try and find time to do this in the near future. Now Britton has been in the South of Thailand, I believe with a friend of his from Queen’s. Not sure when he will be returning to pick up some of the stuff he left behind.

I finally went to Ayuttaya! The old capital was a nice day trip out of the busy city. Because the area we had to cover was large we rented scooters for the day. That was kind of exciting as I had never driven a scooter before and never driven period outside of Canada.

Lots of interesting temples to see.

Coming up:

Songkran festival is coming up which is a really big holiday for Thai’s. For a few days everyone throws water at each other. I’m not sure to what extent this really happens but I’ve been told that you cannot expect to walk anywhere without getting wet so I shouldn’t carry anything important.

Also I’ve decided to stay on volunteering for an additional 3 months. The experience here I feel is immeasurable and I’m not really ready to go back to Canada yet. Not having found a job after this also contributes to this decision. What remains to be seen though is what I will be doing for those three extra months. I’m moving from my current apartment to a much cheaper one and have reworked my budget accordingly to maximize the amount of time I can stay here with as little money as possible. One lessons learned from the past 6 months (something the UN is always keen on knowing): Always budget assuming the worst scenario, even if you are led to believe the best scenario.

From Bangkok,

Andrew

P.S. If you want to get a sense of what Bangkok is like at night the video below is a good taste.