The Thai Army had been fighting with the Red Shirts since early in the morning. Wednesday morning around 10 am we took this picture from the top of the grocery store by our house.
We could see smoke from the fires near the protest site.
Around 1:30 some of the leaders of the Red Shirts turned themselves into police. We were at home (where we have been for the past 8 days) trying to follow everything on facebook and twitter. Around 3 pm our electricity went out and we started to hear something that sounded like gunfire. We went outside to talk to our neighbors and could see thick smoke near our house.
We live far enough away from the protest site that we never saw or heard anything, so we were very surprised to suddenly be hearing and seeing things so close to home.
Around 4 pm we were hot and decided to jump in the car and drive to the grocery store. We really had no idea what was going on around us. We made it to the end of our street and saw 4 police trucks, smoke coming from two different buildings and nobody on the street. We backed right back down our road, into our driveway and went right back in the house.
Our neighbor got on his bike and road to the main street and came back to tell us that a bank and a TV station were on fire. We were so surprised to see anything like that near where we live. Roger went out a little while later and saw a helicopter rescuing people from the top of the TV station (the station is in a tower, the fire was on the first floor).
A little while later the electricity came back on and we were able to get online and see what had happened. Evidently when the Red Shirts left the city they burned down a lot of buildings and destroyed a lot of property.
The rest of the night was quiet, everything was closed and there was a curfew for the whole city.
Today we went for a walk to see what the damage was to the buildings around us. None of our usual Thai friends were out, so we couldn't check to see how they were doing.
We did see some busted telephones booths and some of the fire damage at the bank.
Tonight everything is quiet again in the city. There is still a curfew and we are praying that this is all finished.
Obviously a lot more happened in the city. In fact, what happened near us was very minor compared to the damage and destruction near the protest site.
More pictures from the past few days in Bangkok, click here.
2 comments:
O My! Thinking of ya'll.
Did this blog die? In my laziness, I use this blog to get to Asher and Jack's blog... but now that it's 2011 and you have another kid, I was wondering if I should really just give up on it?? :D
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