Back from Bangkok

Made it back safely from Bangkok yesterday morning. Back to the office today! Never thought I'd be so glad to be back to work. :)

As you probably know, Bangkok's NYE celebrations were cancelled due to a series of 9 bombings throughout the city. Luckily, it sounds a lot worse than it was, the casualties were low (2 or 3 depending on the report) and 30 or so were injured -- considering the circumstances it could have been a lot worse -- thankfully not the case. It was a scary way to end a fantastic trip to Thailand. I don't really know what to say about the bombings -- first time I've ever been so close to something like that happening. Luckily the time most of the bombs went off we were safe in our hotel room, preparing to go out and celebrate the New Year...I turned on the TV and caught the news just before we were heading out. We were planning on going to the main celebration in the city center, where there was going to be a countdown, music concert, and celebration...but all of this was cancelled. Good thing too as reports are saying several more bombs went off later in the evening at that exact spot -- if the events had gone on as scheduled, there would likely be many more injuries.

Scary to think that we were in Chinatown, where one bomb went off, probably only about 2 hours or so prior to it happening. It really is a sad thought that people do this to other people. No-one has claimed responsibility for the bombs yet, but they suspect it is people who supported the previous political party, which lost power in the coup 3 months ago. Not the best way to gain support for your cause, if you ask me, but I guess it doesn't work that way.

After catching the news (glad I turned on the TV), we decided to stay in the hotel and celebrate from there. We had a room with a fantastic view of the river, so we were able to order room service and sit back and watch the fireworks from the comfort (and safety) of our hotel. (There are several fancy hotels along the river, which must have put together a fireworks show, with firecrackers launched from several different boats on the river -- pretty cool).

Alright, that is enough out of me about that -- I don't know much and don't know what to say. I do a better job blogging about pointless stuff like trying to do an ollie on a skateboard (see next post), so I'll stick to that.

If you want to read more about the bombings, check out Google news for the latest.