24 July 2008 - Political Violence Comes to Town

24 July 2008 Political Violence Comes to Town

It is Friday morning, 25 July, and I am writing about yesterday. We lost power last night for about 5 hours - don't know exactly when it came on because we had gone to sleep.

Yesterday was an eventful day here in Udonthani. We did not realize it at the time but this morning the significance of what we witnessed has come into focus.

Duang's son and daughter-in-law came over to take us grocery shopping in the afternoon after he had finished school. We went to Lotus Tesco and bought some drinks, and food for the upcoming week.

On the way back to the hotel we drove by the big park in town that is fairly close to the hotel. The park has a large pond in the center of it with a nice walking/jogging path around the perimeter. As we drove along the north end of the park, I noticed that there were no people walking along the path. Typically there are several people walking or jogging around the pond - many of them "falang" (foreigners). Duang mentioned that many people had drowned in the pond.

It was at that point that we noticed all the people at the south end of the pond. There were hundreds of people standing around at the edges of the pond and I noticed two orange boats in the water. It appeared that someone had drowned, police were dragging for the body, and everyone was watching the drama unfold. Duang asked if I wanted to watch. I had no desire to see a body removed from the pond and felt that it was rather morbid entertainment so I declined. As we drove along, we could see a heavy Police presence that was keeping people from going into the park area. Then we heard a siren coming up on our right side and we were soon passed by an "ambulance".

In general, Thai "ambulances" are normal pickup trucks with a light/siren bar across the top of the driver's compartment with perhaps 1 to 4 radio aerials. There is a metal camper shell over the back of the truck for transporting victims. This ambulance blows by us with at least 10 people in the back - at least ten because two people were almost falling out the back! I was thinking that the poor drowning victim will suffocate back there.

This morning I checked the local expat website and found out what happened. There was a political rally at the local party. An opposition political group came and attacked them with boards, sticks, and machetes. One person and now they say 2 people were killed and 25 injured. The overloaded ambulance was taking injured to the hospital.

One group is the PAD and the other is the PPP. One wears red headbands and the other yellow headbands. One group supports the deposed PM Thaksin and the other opposes him. Protests have been ongoing in Bangkok for awhile and now the troublemakers are spreading out to other areas. There are rumors that there may be another military coup.

In September of last year, Duang's son got a broken arm during a confrontation between the groups. I don't know which group he supports nor do I care to know. I have advised him to stay out of politics all together.

It is sad how politicians everywhere manipulate and take advantage of the masses for their personal gain.