2008!



New Years Eve Pong, Jik, Ben, and met up at May's house on Rama 2 Rd. After getting beat 12-1 in a Playstation soccer match, we a barbecue on the front porch, then caught a cab to Siam. We walked down the Skybridge to Central World where all the beer companies have beer gardens with concerts everyday until New Years.

I've been in some pretty tight crowds before. Packed buses, the Skytrain after 5pm, airport terminals. Nothing compares to New Years Eve at Central World. The only path between stages and exits was one strip between the flagship Central department store's impressive glass wall and fences of the beer gardens. This was only 3-4 meters wide and almost 300 meters long. When we came, we were able to float with the river of people moving through this gap, pushing a bit to get to a door to the stage for Bodyslam. No big problems. Security were friendly and pointed us to "our" table in the back.

Our friend Sai had come early and reserved a table at the Singha area. Once we got to the table we received a less than pleasant greeting from the other people sitting at the packed table. The six of us certainly weren't going to fit. May stayed, Jik, Ben Pong, and I jumped the fence and headed back to Siam Paragon where Potato had a table we could hang out at.



Bad idea. The river of people had stopped flowing by this time and was becoming near violent. At first people could move a bit by pushing through the crowd. We did a pretty good job of sticking with each other by diving through gaps of people when we could find them. Then it got scary. A surge of people coming in met people leaving. Both sides packed with people who couldn't go anywhere. The pressure of people in front and behind made it had to breath. Pong and I have to lock arms to keep our dwarf-like friend Jik's head in the air. Sometime before midnight people started to get restless and began pushing in unison -- from both directions. This was more frightening than I can describe. The feeling reminded me of the team building exercise where everyone packs in tight and sits on the knees of the person behind them. Only this was a wall of hundreds of people being pushed backwards. Once you fell back, you were thrown back the other way.

We didn't get trampled. The only people I saw hurt had all fainted in the crowd but couldn't be carried out. We ended up counting down together from inside the mass of people: wedged between the sweaty bodies a couple hundred strangers.

Other than this whole bit, New Years was nice. No bombs this year, despite rumors. After the 1am we met up with May and headed back to the house. We played cards together; substituting chips for glasses of beer, until we couldn't say awake any longer. New Year's day we went to the ocean (but not a beach) to eat seafood and visit a temple famous for giving good luck on Jan. 1st.

After the 1st, I had a few band practices, and a party Friday night for Jan at Fam's house. We had an indoor barbecue, fondu style. The Potato crew came, AB Normal, and Blackhead friends, as well as P'Oun and P'1, my adopted brothers and travelmates from the 2007 New Year's trip to Phu Gadueng mountain.



Tomorrow is my first day back to school. It's been a short week-long break, but a good one nevertheless. My schedule is (currently):
Monday: Corporate Relationship Management
Tuesday: Special Topics in Communication
Wednesday: Media Communication
Thursday: Marketing Communication
Saturday: Communication Planning and Policy
Wednesday is the Add-Drop period, which I think I'll use to drop my Saturday course in exchange for a Wednesday afternoon class, and add a Monday morning class a lot of friends are taking.

I was careful, and lucky, in my pre-registration this year to get all my classes to start mid-day: a true challenge. This was done in anticipation for playing music a few nights a week. This means I'll have plenty of sleep before school and free days Friday, Saturday, and Sunday (after a successful Add-Drop period.

Although the Add-Drop starts Wednesday, I'm going to go to tomorrow morning's class even though I'm not yet part of it. Hopefully I'll have better luck adding courses than in previous years.

No set dates yet, but there may be a reunion trip with P'1 and P'Oun to the North around the 10th (next week). P'Ohm and Jan would drive they're cars and we'd leave on a Thursday night and return Sunday, which means I wouldn't miss any class.

Our band is getting better quickly. Por has started playing with a metronome in the practice studio, which takes some getting used to, but makes playing together feel very tight. Feels just right. In a few weeks we should be ready to take auditions.