Bangkok Tweets
 

I've been following Richard Barrow's tweets and photos on twitter along with many of the news organizations.

http://twitter.com/RichardBarrow

Things are much quieter in the red zone, food is available and people are walking about.

Richards last tweet:

"Life is really going on as normal here in Nana despite bring [sic] on the edge of the Red Zone. Amazing Thailand!"

Humm..? My first post was misleading. Richard Barrow has been one of the "go to" sources for the media organizations.

His Bangkok Dangerous map, marking all the "hot spot" on a Google Map, has been often duplicated on TV in the states.

http://maps.google.co.th/maps/ms?hl=...,0.111494&z=14

There are also many photos available in his tweets.

This is the first time we've done the twitter thing, and despite the numbers that show only 4% of tweets are about news, twitter and Barrow have put us on the streets in real time.

Agree that he's well worth following. I've also been keeping an eye on @KevinRevolinski/bangkok-troubles which is a list that includes Barrow.

Barrow posted 3,000+ tweets recently and some were not so uplifting, but these I liked:

"A policeman just came over & banged on my window! Made me jump! Luckily he was only playing with me. He was all smiles and joking"


"Amazing! Just 100 meters from the army checkpoint there're 100's of taxis picking up & dropping off foreign tourists.


"RT @VoxScorpio: Are you saying this mess is the new TOURIST ATTRACTION? ==> If I say yes I would get in trouble again.

Kevin Revolinski is putting a lot of good stuff out also.

BKKApologist @ twitter

Some super stunning unrest photos

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/201...in_thaila.html

Wow, thanks karenmike, and thanks to boston.com for the incredible pictures.

There will be no winners in this battle.

Yeah, the pictures were surprising, this was the "real deal" going on in BkK.

Bad news: RT @UbonFarang: http://bit.ly/aWA9N7 Sea of Red arriving in Ubon Ratchathani to protest

Mark MacKinnon is doing an amazing job of reporting:
http://twitter.com/markmackinnon

Perhaps this is a better place for this picture tweeted by Thai of the fire at Central World
http://tweetphoto.com/23051981

RT @Marilyn_Res RT @georgebkk Reuters: Thai authorities order TV stations to broadcast only govt sanctioned programmes

Unreal: @RichardBarrow Pictures of the Provincial Hall in Ubon Ratchathani http://goo.gl/qOVF

In the past, we've failed to understand how essential to news twitter has become, but we're all on board this tweet thing now and twitter's remarkable ability to quickly disseminate information and oh, so many close up photographs, is truly amazing.

markmackinnon, an East Asia Correspondent for Canada's national paper and with 6,000 followers was pleading for help an hour ago, tweeting that people are dying.

The ubiquitous close up photos, bring this horrifying story home in a way that the news outlets in the states fail to achieve.

Thanks for sharing your links.

Also, please don't forget the Bangkok Dangerous Map:
http://maps.google.co.th/maps/ms?hl=...,0.111494&z=14

to me the revelation is that you can use twitter to piece together a mosaic that describes what's going on far, far better than any single source.

"I am going to switch off my cell phone, go to bed and pray that all of this madness has gone when I wake up in the morning,"

http://twitter.com/RichardBarrow


One thing is 100% for sure, the Fodors Asian Forum is all over the BKK story.

We got tweets, we got thousands of words of informative extended comments and answers to specific questions, we got links to live TV broadcast and up close and way too personal photographs. This (our) Asian Forum has become a one stop shop for all things "Thailand mess" - and that unfortunately, appears to be a gross understatement.

I believe a lot of people on this board feel an emotional attachment to Bangkok and to Thailand -- I know that I do. And the contrast between the laid-back and smiling Bangkok that we'd known and the tension-filled, blood-stained Bangkok of the past weeks is impossibly difficult to comprehend. If the images of Bangkok under siege and on fire are so ghastly to a visitor, one can only imagine the feelings of a resident.

So, it's not surprising to me that lots of information, discussion, and reaction goes on here.

So true, rizzuto. Bangkok is my favorite city in the world, a place I hope to move to when I retire. I have friends in Bangkok, and as much as I hurt, I hurt more for them.

rizzuto - but you know, almost the first thing that struck me about Thailand was the contrast between the beautiful and lavishly decorated temples, and the poverty of so many of the people around them. I thought of medieval Europe, with the massive cathedrals sucking up money that could have gone to improve life for ordinary people. I'm thinking that the analogy for the current situation in Thailand may be England in the early 1600s, or France in the late 1700s.

This might have been posted:


New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/wo...20thai.html?hp

Catching up on Twitter: @legalnomads Wow. Crazy picture of CentralWorld on fire: http://tweetphoto.com/23068132 via @Cake_NBC & @bangkok

An amazing set of 39 photos: @legalnomads Crackdown in #Bangkok: another powerful photoset from The Big Picture http://viigo.im/3zgu

and RT @jonfernquest: RT @Jotman: List of live-blog accounts, some firsthand, of fires of May 19 - http://bit.ly/9LbHRY

rizzuto -- absolutely, and that attachment is something people outside of this travel forum and a few others often can't comprehend and I can never find adequate words to express (perhaps why I had them ink them onto my back?) Grateful for the comraderie, everyone.

Andrew Buncombe is a reporter who was in the Wat yesterday, and he was shot during the battle. His terrific report is here: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...e-1977647.html

Back to Richard Barrow

"You know, I have lost 3 kilos in this last week. It's all this walking & keep forgetting to eat!"



If you read through Barrow's tweets from BKK yesterday, you'll find "live" video taken with his iPhone:

"All pictures and videos I am uploading are live. Taken on my iPhone as I walk around Ratchaprasong."
http://twitter.com/richardbarrow


"This was the scariest stretch for us as it was pitch dark. Even red guards were nervous of snipers here. http://twitpic.com/1pczle"


"This is the start of sniper alley that made many of us nervous returning at night. Now calm. http://twitpic.com/1pcy1j"


Catching up now, thanks to everyone that contributed to the Fodors Unrest threads.

The Red leaders have been exposed for the low class scum that they are

vinovino:

If that comment belongs anywhere on this site it's the Political thread, or, better the Lounge.

It appears to belong to the "let them eat cake" school of political thought, and we all know how well that turned out.

Read the Independent piece linked above and consider the quote from a red shirt woman: "As long as I have lived here I have never seen any government so evil" and Buncombe's summary:

"And who within the chain of command was ordering troops to fire so recklessly, so close to so many people, the vast overwhelming majority of whom were unarmed, unthreatening and who – as they had been asked by the authorities – had just left their place in the city centre. Had they had an opportunity to leave, safely, then they would have. Everyone recognised this was the end of their struggle, or at least this stage of it. Pressing, vital questions need to be answered by the highest levels."

thursdaysd,

Can you tell me how many reds were killed and wounded on the last day? You know to support the shooting recklessly at the nonthreatening and unarmed people who happened to just burn the whole city down afterward.

(I'm tempted to feed the trolls, but will pass this one time.)

The NY Times has an interesting piece today where they allude to something I'd seen in multiple tweets yesterday: the firs and looting in Bangkok might not have been as random as they may seem.

Among the large retail outlets, Central World was targeted, while many other nearby large malls (Paragon, for one) were for the most part untouched. Central World is owned by Central Pattana, which seems to have been a target of the arsonists. Also among the targets were the biggest banks, the stock exchange, and stores owned by large conglomerates (7-11s, for example). Obviously there were exceptions to this as the renegade elements of the redshirts were not hardly well controlled, but the arson may well turn out to be political violence rather than just unrestrained and general rage.

Yes I noticed that too. Central World own by Central Pattana who also own the Bangkok Post. The land however belong to the Crown Proterty, both side of the road and that is why I believe they chose to hijacked that area.

I also drove past a mall owned by the Shinawatra family(Oat the son of Thaksin) today, a lot of guards as I think they were expecting retaliation. The Paragon escaped because Khun El had hired over 500 private securities to guard her mall.

Oh and Bangkok Bank has always been the target of the reds and Thaksin because they gave a lot of information to the constitution court as well as the DA for Thaksin's corruption trial.

7-11 belong to CP, a known ally of Thaksin during his administration, so I think that's unintentional.

I know of no other way to describe the Red Leaders except to add that they are greedy, power hungry and selfish, with no love of country or the people who they supposedly promote. Users and abusers of the highest order, paid by a criminal on the run from the law.

Call me a troll if you like, but the truth is the truth. One only has to view thier hateful speeches to see the ugly reality.

@RichardBarrow 51 killed and 394 injured in clashes between security personnel and protesters since May 14 /MCOT

Bad, but not as many as Hanuman was willing to see killed:

May 13, 10 at 9:57pm: "IMO 200 - 500 dead is acceptable if they don't disband and I don't understand what the PM is doing."

An interesting article by Andrew Marshall, who took a walking trip through Rajaprasong today:
http://andrewmarshall.com/blog/voice...the-aftermath/

His blog also has a few other compelling articles.

Thanks for the add'l info about 7-11s and CP, Hanuman.

Yes thursdaysd I still stand by my statement that 200 - 500 dead terrorist is acceptable.

thursdaysd - The death toll for the last day was 13 altogether including soldiers and the 6 that were found dead in the Wat. So 7 people killed and 88 wounded on both side justify writing "reckless" shootings by the army? I suppose the reds had superb aim with their assault rifles and grenade launchers and only shot "recklessly".

That's suppose to read "Shoot UN-RECKLESSLY". My bad.

Hanuman - You apparently think all the protesters were "terrorists" and therefore it's fine to kill them. I doubt it. Meanwhile, this thread is for reporting interesting tweets, rizzuto started a political thread if you want to discuss politics.

For those who might be thinking of going to Bangkok in the near future, here's a blog (of an otherwise commercial site) that lists hotels that are open and closed, and the re-opening dates for some:
http://reservethaihotels.net/765/ban...osures-status/