TROUBLE IN BANGKOK

If you've been reading international news headlines lately, you may be wondering what the heck is going on in Bangkok right now. There are several thousand protestors who've locked themselves into the government house downtown. Their action is an attempt to get the current Prime Minister, Mr. Samak Sundaravej to resign on the accusation that he has connections to Thailand's former Prime Minister Mr. Thaksin who was ousted in a military coup in 2006.

I'm writing this blog to let all of our family and friends know that we are OK and staying far away from the protests. Both of us are reminded of WTO in Seattle a few years back, when the riots were restricted to downtown Seattle and everyone who wasn't walking around downtown on the streets was safe. We live and work 45 minutes outside of the city, quite a ways from the protests. We wouldn't have known about the protests, accept for the fact that it's been all over the news. The largest affect it has on the two of us is that we can't go into Bangkok until it all calms down.

Rest assured we are safe. Now that you've relaxed a little, here's the scoop with all the juicy details of what's really happening in Bangkok right now. 30,000 protestors have taken over TV stations, government buildings, and some bridges that lead into the city. The railway and public transportation employees have all gone on strike, causing delays with the country's buses and trains. Three airports were shut down in Hat Yai, Phuket and Krabi: all beach towns that typically attract many tourists. As Thailand gears up for its peak tourist season, possibilities of economic downturn could result from all the political hype scaring the tourists away.

So far there is very little violence or vandalism caused by the demonstrators. If this were happening in the states, we believe that people would have been violently aggressive and much more destructive to public property. We have been absolutely amazed at how peaceful the Thai protestors have remained despite being tear gassed and arrested by riot police.

Yesterday a Thai colleague at work commented on the future outlook for Bangkok saying, "We know that violence will not create any changes for a good government. Violence will only make everything worse". Wow. Is anybody listening out there? I think a few of our American political leaders could stand to learn from this.