It's 12:30 and I've been reading the book all day. The book has only problems and no explanations, so I've been looking at Oxford, Cornell, and UW student pages for help and clear examples.

I'm going to study for another 30 minutes then sleep at 1.00. Wake up at 6.30 and be out of the room by 7.30. Breakfast and cramming before the 9 o'clock midterm. Wish me luck.

Statistics just pisses me off. Everyone else in the class feels the same. Why would the last class before the midterm be spent giving us a 10% grade test over 2 hours, vs. reviewing what we have studied? Why? Because the entire test consists of material we have never been taught and is not in the book! How do we review!? This is the same as last year. A couple students called her on it and asked how she wanted us to learn the material. Her response was calling the entire class idiots for not having learned this in highschool. Hmm. That was it, she didn't try to help the idiots, just gave us a 10% closed-book test. I was only able to answer 40% of the questions, some of which had very ambigous grammar. I took some pictures of the question, but my phone is broken.

Friday night I went clear across town to Potato's band practice to setup my effects with P'Win. I was dropped by the taxi driver in the heavy rain across from the wrong naval building. So, I called them, then started walking to the studio which we must have passed. Once I got there I walked in on some band I've never seen in my life. Awkward. Caught a taxi back the other direction. Walked around in search of the other studio. Closed. At this point P'win is calling me, I pick up, but there is no sound. He can hear me, but I can't hear anything. I get in another taxi and find the studio wedged in between two buildings. Practice was over by then, but Win and I squeezed out a couple effect settings. Then I went to dinner with P'Bom and his fiance P'Pae (super cool), and P'Win. Around midnight P'Win and I drove back to our area of town and talked about guitar schools. Win highly recomended Peavey school, a shack, hidden in the far back of Siam Square. P'Ekk2 was the teacher and taught Win everything he knows since grade 8.

Saturday, after my suprise (major) test, I went to Siam and searched for Peavey School of Music. I found Cresendo School of Music, a huge place that looked very busy, but no Peavey. With no luck finding the school I crossed the road and took my phone to MBK. Should I go to I-Mobile again? Maybe I'll look around at the cheaper and quicker phone-fixers. Long story short: 1 hour fix time became one week, they aren't sure if it will work again.

Yesterday, P'Ekk invited me to go to Siam Square for the hell of it. That little tiny Peavey sign P'Win had told me about really is at the far back corner of Siam Square. We passed it on the way coming in. P'Ekk and I went to the 3rd floor of the building (Peavey office), and asked for P'Ekk2. There were only three people in the office: a secretary, a student, and some guy who answered "and who are you?" while smiling a big grin. "P'Win told me to come and talk to P'Ekk ครับ". P'Ekk2 seems like a really calm and friendly guy. The office is tiny didn't have a large number of students like Cresendo. These seemed like good qualities to me: 1. Not in a rush to get me taugh and out the door. 2. Experienced (walls are filled with signed albums of his students, some of which I know). 3. Friendly enough to spend time talking to me about styles, my interests, where I studied... seems patient enough to put up with me learning from him. So, I signed up. P'Ekk might too, for bass lessons. I went for two nights a week with P'Ekk2, at their new building in Sam Yan which is right across the street from Paradox's store/studio. 1,200 baht I think, I don't remember. Thats $30 a month for private instructions twice a week. I'm excited.

But not too excited. Today I study for my ONE HOUR!! Intro to Statisics midterm tomorrow. I have to google the subjects I need to know. Our text book upon close inspection is made up of double-spaced, large font questions, but lacks the answers. Can you imagine taking a class where the teacher only asked questions, then called you stupid because you didn't have anywhere to learn the material. To say this is frustrating would be an understatement. This is the second time.

Last night was fun. I met P'Ekk at his workplace (a photography studio) and then took his motorbike to meet a band he is producing Pud Pik Gang Gai. We took a base guitar and went flying around the Din Dang to switch with another base guitar in the shared apartment/recording studio of Casanova, who Ekk also produces. I was introduced as "The new guitarist" for his project band. Gulp. If I have any freetime in Ohio and Washington I had better be practicing scales and guitar theory like mad. I have a lot of catchup to do. Casanova is great. The guys are one younger than me and we enjoy the same kinds of music really. The guitarist and I listened to some of there new songs on the computer they record with. Both were very good and I think would do very well.

Hopefully Ekk and I's band will too. No songs yet.

Flying around on the back of P'ekk's bike last night gave me an idea of how many soldiers there really are in BKK now. Busloads of troops coming in, and many in from of Channel 5, Taksin's buisness Skinwatra Corp., and all the government buildings. All had M16's with ammunition clips. Driving by Praram 4 again this morning I saw "my" soldiers. Now there are 4 at Praram 4 and a few more down the street by the bank. Few across the street now too.

Now for my political rant...

Today it hit me. I'm getting used to this. The guns, the uniforms, the new rules don't bother me or anyone I know really. 83% of the nation has said they welcome the coup. This is a horrible sign. This means democracy really doesn't matter to most of us, only getting what we want.

On the way to school I didn't care. In class, A.Daniel started with a passionate speech about the history of Thai coups. The bloodless coup now, but it may not end that way. In history they were all bloodless, they were all started to help the people out of a situation. The professor made something very clear to us: no matter what happens now, Thailand is the loser. Foreign investment is gone, Thai baht is plumeting. EVEN IF the coup gives up after two weeks, the new political party is likely to be a puppet. If the army doesn't surrender to democracy (doesn't that sound like a Ashcroft phrase?), the US has already said that all aid money that flows to Thailand will be cut. Farmers recieve no more subsitities.

Do the ends justify the means? Yes, people in BKK are happy about Taksin being gone, country folk are happy about the political snare being "solved", but all of this comes at what expense? Taksin's large majority is not in BKK. BKK is happy with the army for what it has done. But what has it done? The army just overthrew the entire country's democratic system. This is where Thailand is special now. People in BKK aren't going to stand up to the billionare-become-politician, it takes an army. Reports were scared shitless by Taksin's legal threats. "You repeat something I said in a negative way and I'll shut you down for 3 days." This happened so many times! Taksin has 2500 people SHOT without trials, just 4 years ago. Did Bangkok protest? No. Taksin sells a billion dollars worth of shares in one blow... tax-free. The PM does not pay taxes. Does BKK protest? Of course not. We all go with the flow. That's what I caught myself doing this morning on the bus, just giving up and refusing to question the situation.

What happened last time? Students (not adults BTW...) got pissed off and took back the country. Many where shot. Would that happen this time? Not me or my friends. Without kidding, my friends talked far more about the mall and movies today than the 8 guys with machine guns gaurding the entrance to our school.

"How is Thailand different from Myanmar now?"

Do the ends justify the means? Yes, we (in BKK) wanted Taksin out. Should we get the military to overthrow the government we dislike, or should we teach the rural villagers that 30 baht healthcare and care packages were total lies and Taksin doesn't deserve more votes or tax-free "chance cards". The first one is easier because we don't think about things in the long run. Just like daily life: throw your bottle in the river, burning cigarrete goes in the leaves, raw sewage heads to the fisheries... we'll worry about our problems whem they get closer to us.

On the way home I got off the bus early and went to talk to the soldiers at Praram 4. They've been there since the morning, releaved yesterday's guys. The guy I talked to was 3 years older than I was, finished highschool then had to join the army. I wanted to take a picture together but my phone battery was dead. I'll go back tomorrow. My friend sent me an SMS asking "I haven't seen you on MSN in a while. Did the troops grab you? (โดนทหารจับป่าว)" Tomorrow I'm gonna get one of the guys to "grab" me (on the shoulder) take a piture together, then send it to my friend. เราโดนทหารจับแล้วโว้ย I've been caught!

Todays class was embarassing. University is fun here, I learn a lot from some teachers, less from others, and the learning enviroment is VERY different from the US. Everyone of Prof. Daniel's students failed this speech until today. Why? Every single person before our class (of 250 students) either copied or didn't use a bibliography. 250 students, in 2nd/3rd year, used "www.xxxxxx.com" "A book i got in da library." "Interview w/ taxi driver." "Discovery channel" as sources. Really. Those are all real examples. No page numbers, no titles, they just used the material. Others googled their topic, copied, pasted in Word. 7 pages of words they've never seen before, about a topic they've never really researched. Sigh.

Our class had about 12 people who passed. Yes, I was one of 250 who passed? Why? Thank you Ms. Neilson grade 11 for teaching me MLA citing. I gave my speech, no problem. Finished 30 seconds early, got 2 extra points in the class. The 220? who failed? Re-write, nobody looses points. The prof. had no option really. How do you fail 95% of the class because they only know how to copy? That's how most Thai schools and universities really work. Really. Most teachers look the other way.

Today was a regular day. Traffic is getting closer to normal, and my street had a lot of people walking around and buying food from vendors.

Last night P'ekk came over to listen to the new songs (not complete, or even close to complete). We greated eachother with a sulute, then went to get something to eat and talk about melodies.

What am I doing today? Starting to write my speech. I'll do the powerpoint slides tomorrow.

Sorry theres no big news. I haven't been shot, nobody has been shot, HM the king endorces the coup, and its being called the friendly coup and boodless coup now by the media.

Coups can be fun too!

I thought this was a great summary of the current situation, off of 2bangkok.com's fourm.

Coup-land, the theme park!
Just got back from the area around Gov't House/Parliament etc. Large swaths of area are blocked off to car traffic, mostly using portable metal gates. There are soliders at many interesections and at all entrances to the blocked areas. Many of the soliders don't have ammunition clips in their rifles.

The mood is completely calm, somewhat comedic actually. Pedestrians are free to cross the traffic barriers and wander about on the closed roads. A fair number of people are hanging out, taking pictures and videos, posing with the tanks and the soldiers. The soldiers are very friendly, happily smiling for the cameras. People are putting their kids on the tanks to take their pictures. It's hardly what you'd expect from a military coup.

We saw no hint of any political interest from the people there - no clear cut coup supporters or protestors. People just seemed curious and somewhat bemused. The scene has become a tourist attraction. There's even a tuktuk based iced-coffee seller at one barrier.

I suppose we're in for a barrage of "democracy in peril" stories, as if Thaksin was some kind of paragon of democratic ideals. I hope somewhere the story comes out how this is really a battle between two personality cults, one using the rhetoric of electoral politics and free markets, the other using the rhetoric of religion and tradition while both pander to nationalism. But neither really cares much about the substance behind the rhetoric, using promises of salvation, whether material or spiritual, to command a following in order to increase their own stature. There are no good guys here - but IMHO, the current coup is a more honest reflection of Thailand's political rot, and therefore is preferable to the Thaksin administration which was more able to hide its authoritarianism under a veneer of electoral victory and liberal rhetoric.

In truth, neither side is really democratic in that neither is really interested in the people governing themselves. With the military/palace alliance at least this is obvious. Thaksin, for his part, ignores the civil liberty and checks-and-balances aspects of self-rule, creating instead a majoritarian dictatorship.

I'd say the biggest immediate issue is placating Thaksin's supporters upcountry. I hope this means an accounting of what he and his cronies have really been doing these past few years (similarly, an accounting of the Bush crew's actions would be nice to see). Of course this will be politically motivated, but perhaps ti might also be accurate.

I'll be very interested to hear the Thaksin apolgists take on the evidence as it emerges.

For the longer term, I don't think this coup makes much difference to Thailand's political, social or economic development. All of these are a disaster and has been so for a long time, though covered up by different layers of hype, supported by Thailand's immense natural wealth. The military is just as likely to institute real democratic change as was the TRT, IMO.

This is a step sideways into the light - not forward or backward.

I just came back from school. I went at 14.00 hours (yes, I'm using military time) to get my research materials from the library. In two hours I managed to collect enough information from about 10 different books, journals, and government studies on air and water pollution. Made copies and got out before today's 16.30 closing. There was nobody at school today. I saw maybe 20-30 people on campus. the university is open, but no classes. After checking out books I went downstairs and ate lunch in the near-empty caffeteria. On my way off campus I ran into my dean. "อ้าวววว น้องDan. You haven't gone home yet?" "I just got finished in the library, I'm headed home now ครับ" "Well hurry." Then he took off in the other direction. I came home.

Bangkok isn't very different really. Lot less cars. Lot less people walking around. I passed one soldier on the way to school and two on the way back. They are stationed at Praram 4 and Sukumvit roads with M16 rifles. They were mostly just standing, watching traffic and laughing with the traffic policemen on duty. On the lookout for some crazy counter-coup force on the way from out of town. The soldiers aren't particularly frightening. Crazy TRT supporters and left-wing lunatics are much scarier. These are the groups which cause the tention which leads to chaos and shooting.

I agree with the article above on the current political situation. In many ways today is no differnt than last month. Thai Rak Thai (Taksin's party) effectively covered up the last election's true results and has since held power despite cries of coruption from all other parties and even a few TRT cabinet members. The real key thing is how the release of power works. Thai generals don't have a great record of taking power then releasing it again.

Half of me wants to go take pictures. Not to sell or inform but just for the hell of it. Look! I was here when the military took over! type shots. Maybe take a group of friends. The other half, the sensible one, says my family would disaprove. Actually, my grandfather might be jealous that I get to be in the revolution while he has to work.

Last night at 2:30 the general on all channels was relpaced with a more pleasent looking woman who announced the military's intentions:

First coup announcement:

In reference to the council's announcement of its power seizure earlier, for the sake of peace and order to prevail in the country, the council has imposed nationwide martial law. The council has repealed the state of emergency declared on Sept 19 at 9.05pm. This announcement is made by Gen Sonthi Boonyaratkalin, head of the Democratic Reform Council.

Second coup announcement:

The council has ordered that all mobilisation and movement of military logistics and manpower be prohibited. Military personnel are absolutely not to leave their units without permission from the council.

Third coup announcement:

1. The current constitution, drafted in 1997, is now repealed.
2. The House of Representatives, the Senate, the Cabinet and the Constitution Court are now dissolved along with the abrogation of the constitution.
3. The privy councillors will remain in their duty.
4. The courts of justice, except the Constitution Court, will retain their full power to adjudicate cases according to the law and the announcements of the council.

P'Mo called to tell me school is canceled.

For the latest news, http://2bangkok.com/highemer.shtml is best. Most Thai and foriegn media has been blocked to provent Taksin from making any orders or gaining support again.

The biggest danger is Taksin supporters who are daring enough to lauch a counter coup against the military. This is the reason for guns and tanks.

The only news channel just lost audio. :(

Lucky they haven't shut down Thailand's internet... it all runs through one of two wires. The other is for the military.

Coup!

A state of emergency has been declared by PM Taksin, who is in New York now.

The military has come into Bangkok in full numbers, with tanks. They have taken the government buildings, Taksin's house, and who knows what else. This means HM the King, in this 60th year of power, has also been overthrown. This is serious...

The army has taken over all the television stations, with a recorded message telling us that the army has taken control to end the several month struggle with election results from last April's suprise election called by Taksin.

I plan to not get shot. It has happened in the past. Nobody has any idea what will happen tomorrow.

I'll keep posting as long as I have internet.

I have a lot of work to do.

I have midterms next week that I need to study for. Luckly these are spaced over two weeks time, so i'll have a lot of time between subjects.

I have a speech to write and do (documented) research on. Due Friday. Yesterday's presentation in Modern Presentation Techniques went ok. Quick. Easy. Professor Pennapar said anything goes, so I tried to make it simple.

I have 2 FULL songs to write before tomorrow. These are going to be sent to Fat Radio (104.5) and be played on the air. This means P'Ekk and will likely be playing at the Fat Festival in November. This is a huge concert which means band practice every day after I return from the US.

I never did get to P'win's house that night. I sat at the end of his street for a hour and a half because his cell phone battery went dead. I ended going home to sleep. Where gonna setup the pedal together at the next band practice for Potato. I talked to P'yod's guitar tech, Bank, who said this pedal is better than many $500+ boards but needed a lot of tweaking at first.

Want to know just how busy my next month will be? Here is a visual representation:

Study, research, write speech, write song 1, present, write song 2, study, midterm, midterm, midterm, practice song 1, practice song 2, study, midterm, midterm, recording song 1, study, midterm, recording song 2, to SEA, to CMH, to Massillion, to CMH, to SEA, to Port Townsend, 6 days, to SEA, to BKK.

After I get back I have to deal with Visa crap. I always feel uneasy about these things. It's easy enough to do, but getting suprised with "Ohhhhh! Yeah, you were supposed to get a special stamp 3 months ago sweety. Now you need to leave the country, pay 2000 baht and your first born child".

I'm so busy. If it wasn't fun being this busy, my head would have burst by now.

I never did iron those clothes. Instead I washed more clothes and made the iron pile larger.

I was stood up by the fashion student. Never showed up at Starbucks. I waited nearly 2 hours. Wish she had called to say she wasn't going to come.

Bought an effects pedal. It's built like a US tank: some parts have armor, others need it. Clean sounds are mind-blowing. The ECC83 tube gives it great tone. Distortion is so-so. I'm not used to using effects pedals so I'm gonna take the whole thing to P'Win's house in a few minutes and have him help me. He's put out 3 best-selling albums using the thing, so he should at least be able to how me where the power switch is.

Gave a statistics presentation today. Last term I failed this one. My team did very, very, little work this time. We wrote the report an hour before class. Why? Because this is the secret to good grades in this teacher's class. Last term I spent a week with my English partner doing a 100 person survey on transportation, wrote a good report, and got 40% out of 100%. Why? We only had 5 pages of graphs. Most Thai students faked surveys (my friends), double-copied pages of raw data, threw in ten pages of tables, and printed out their entire powerpoint slides full-page. 50 pages. A.
So what did I do this time? A 30 person survey, quick and simple report, long presentation, and 40 pages of graphs that all show the same thing in 6 different ways. Matches every other report in the class. A.

Yesterday I got a call from Fam, a friend from Grammy. A bunch of friends I hadn't seen for months had a job at my university. They were setting up a HotWave radio event at the university. I went early and took everybody (including the sound techs I didn't know) to my favorite resturaunt for noodles. After class I came back and talked with old friends Kala and Paradox, who I hadn't seen since last year. P'Bank, Bodyslam's main techie was there too so we talked about the Zoom effects for a while.

Today I bought new shoes. Yes, I am broke, but being broke and having toes showing through your old pair of Asics is even worse.

Monday morning math went by quickly today. After years of high school algebra practice, I seem to be grasping the concept of factoring trinomials. I swear I spent 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th grade doing the the same problems but using different textbooks. Now I have a chance to do all the once again, Monday mornings, eight-forty am.

Statistics has actually gotten to be educational (somewhat). Last week was actually the first time in my life that I really grasped standard deviation. Yay!

Despite my excelling math skills, I may not be able to balance my checkbook this month. All this invoice sending, guitar buying, amp selling, and wire transfers has me confused. All three papers I sold pictures to at the end of last month have said payment is being processed. No idea what that really means. My interpretation is that "payment is being processed" means the editor sits on my check until I send him enough emails.

Tomorrow I have a meeting at Starbucks with Inah, the Filapina-Spanish fashion student who contacted me about taking the pictures for her soon-to-be-launched advertising campaign for her new hip-hop clothing line. This job sounds like it should be interesting at least. The guy I sold my amp to within one night, P'Yu, called me up today to say he has a factory that wants me to come and take photos for promotional material. That sounds less interesting than the clothing line launch but I'll need to pay for this new guitar somehow.

Oops. Yeah.. My 1.5 year loan of a friends guitar is about up. I'll return it to her in the US next month and pickup my new guitar in Columbus. It was fairly cheap, got great reviews, was recommended to me by a few producers at Grammy, and is twice as expensive here as it is in the US -_-. $350 for the guitar and the hard case, it works and it's very cheap.

The next step is something to play/record through. This part isn't so cheap. If things go bad I can always sell here, break even and pay for the hassle of bringing it over. Zoom's new effects pedal is the most economical and won't break within a year. I can record with it, I can send it through amps, and I can play with headphones in my room. Sold. More money here ($290 vs. $250 in the US), but a month's worth of practice before leaving seems worth the difference. I'll think I'll head over to Bangkapi and listen to it again tomorrow, after the meeting at 2pm.

P'Ekk and I will be practicing/writing guitar parts after school/work three times a week until I get close to finals at the end of the month. At that point I need to rest and review notes.

I'm serious about resting and reviewing. Last year I didn't take that part so seriously and found myself crawling out of the last final.

I'll post again tomorrow night.

Monday I skipped class and went to the Disney Land of Thailand, Dream World. After months of doing freshman planning stuff, a trip with the other staff members was a great change.

The other day I got an email from a fashion student in Bangkok who would like me to shoot photos for the launch of her new clothing line. I'm excited about the project as it should be a good chance to get creative shots for her advertising campain and my portfolio. We'll be meeting at Starbucks next week to discuss details. I love organization which is why I couldn't stop smiling after I was told the models, location, themes, and prep-work were going to be done for me. All I need to do is take the damn photos. So simple.

Today I cleaned my room after I got home from school. Then I ate dinner and birthday cake with the family next to Momo's uncle's house. Then I had a glass of beer with my uncle and talked about the recent theft problem at my apartment.

This has been somewhat of a problem. The other day everyone on the fourth floor had their locks hammered in. Some rooms were broken into, some didn't open. My room didn't get hit, but the college kids across from me did. The whole doorknob came off.

Security here is normally not a problem. We have an electronic lock door, the apartment is located in a quiet area, everything is well-lit, and people are coming and going all day and night. I'm not too worried, but I would be pretty depressed if my computer, guitar, amp, or camera equipment was stolen. What would I do at night!?

I don't have to worry about my clothes being stolen. I have a collection of un-ironed clothes sitting in a blue basket beneath my ironing board. They are clean, but look like something both my mother and grandmothers would agree to frown upon. I'll tackle that tonight, or at least claim that I will.

30 seconds ago somebody called me about playing guitar tonight. Somebody I met on my street a couple months ago. Hmm...

*I'm back.*
P'Ekk was the person who called me. Ekk is a photographer I ran into a while ago while he was shopping with his mother. He asked me if I was a singer and I said "No. I just play guitar." He's been in a few bands and knows a lot of the same bands I do. We turn out to have quite a few mutual friends. Last year his band won Best New Band for Thailand, but broke up after people started getting jobs and families. Now he's planning on doing producing work at Sony with Moderndog's lead singer.

How do I fit into this? The band needs a guitar player (second). I listened to the stuff they recorded and we talked about music ideas, it all sounds pretty good to me. I have to play catch up and learn their old songs, while writing new ones with P'Ekk and the other guitarist. Next month is the same competition GBOB (Global Battle of the Bands), which they won last year and got sent to England for the final round. Sounds fun to me! This will mean having to play a couple hours a night and a weekly band practice before November.

Nope. No sailing. Turns out you have to be a CEO of a major foreign company, be transfered to Thailand, then pay $2000 a year to be a member. That doesn't include renting your boat and regatta fees. Sailing will be a graduate school and/or retirement sport.