Censorship is bad, no matter who tells you otherwise. The OpenNet Initiative is helping countries determine what is censored for them and how their country is looking from a censorship and surveillance point of view.

So, having issues getting to your favourite site, check out the OpenNet’s URL checker to see if someone had deemed it so bad, that you won’t get to see it,

Current Filtering in place for Political Content

Copyright of image rests with the OpenNet Initiative

On the Third Lunar Moon in November (Nov 5th this year), Bangkok celebrates the festival known as Loy Krathong. If you break it down, it essentially means “float lotus shaped vessel” Usually, the Krathong is made out of banana leaves, flowers, with a candle and incense in the middle.

The traditional line is the Krathong are a tribute to the Goddess of Water. Its believed by lighting the Krathong and floating it away down a river, pond, lake that one’s bad luck and sins will be carried away. Therefore, starting giving you a chance to start over for a new year.

OH - and there’s a lot of fireworks and stuff. :)

(picture credit: Google, and the dude Google riped the image off)

And that’s your basic lesson on the festival,

Now on what Loy Krathong actually means to the younger Thai generation, I would have to say Loy Krathong has become Thai’s version of Valentine’s day (of course before Valentine’s day got mainstream here.) I’m sure most can imagine how romantic the idea of going on a date, and lighting a bunch of candles along with thousands of others along a river bank, and watching a parade of incandescent flame float away into the horizon, you can see it right?

According to Public Health Ministry, there is a 10% increase in young Thai girls losing their virginity on Loy Krathong night. So, I guess after promptly wishing and washing away their sins, they feel the urge to start the accruing new sins for their fresh start. Sounds about right to me. Just kidding. Sort of.

I can see the Thai paper headlines, “Bangkok teens go buck wild, at sight of 3rd lunar moon”

Of course to be consistent with the elders pursuit in saving the youth from the darkside, the Thai Police annually steps up their patrols at โรงแรมม่านรูด or “curtain hotels” in Bangkok. (If you don’t know what curtain hotels are, I’ll save that for another time) In order to ensure, no funny business is going on because we all know losing one virginity should never happen until your 30, because that’s when all those old farts lost theirs. (smirk)

Anyhow, I’ll be heading over to Royal Navy Yards to wash myself of my impurities, and promptly spending my new life with my best friends from the past life Johnny B. and Durex at my favorite fly-by hotel on Petchaburi road “Jim Plee.”

I Keed, I Keed. Sort of.

Happy Loy Krathong!

[2:30] Tomorrow (actually today) Sept 20th will be a Government Holiday, All Banks will be closed, including the Stock Market in order to settle things down.

[2:00] Check out this blog http://19sep.blogspot.com/ based on the today’s coup date. Clever fellow, courtesy of Kit

[1:30] Apparently, the elder man from before is Retired Lieutenant-General Prapart Sakuntanak… now who was that lady?

[1:27] Some Thai Guys, photoblog of the scene >>> here

[1:24] Oh, the rep has changed. Coming on to basically say Police & Army should not move unless given orders from the King. The King has power of the PM for now? All Government should operate as normal under the Head of each Deparment except for the Department of Defense, he should report to coup who is controlled by the King - is the King really behind this?

I seriously doubt it would be an action the King would sanction. Just because they said they are loyal to the King doesn’t mean he approves of it or authorizes it.

[01:10] The 1997 Constitution has been revoked… I heard rumors eariler this month that the King thought it was flawed… maybe the King is involved in this? a Pre-Coup to prevent planned-coup by another faction? Possibily……

[12:47] There goes CNN, BBC and all the International cable news channel… now just a matter of getting the Internet down…. I’ll see you guys when Thailand becomes civilized again…

[12:46] Hrm, apparently my friend’s father who’s a House of Rep for Thai Rak Thai has disappeared, along with a few other Reps…. this is touching a little too close to home

[12:45] So this represenative came on TV and basically due the fact that two major political parties - Thai Rak Thai & Democratic party cannot come to civilizied conclusion and thanks to constant escalating protests by the PAD. The Army has taken temporary control of the order of Thailand until the two sides can come to a agreement. He says the Army has no intention of running the country and “will” return the “power” back to the citizens of Thailand as soon as the country is settled. Apparently, the speech was prepared by the Army General Sonthi Boonyaratglin.

[12:43] Side note, guess the Army isn’t smart enough to block the Internet yet…. since they already killed the radio & tv stations… lets see how long it takes for them to figure it out….

[12:30am] Apparently, the “represenative” of Sonthi has stated the are sanctioned by the Royal Family. I seriously doubt the King of Thailand has actually sanctioned this… 10 bucks by the time this over… Sonthi and his faction is going to ousted, deported and exiled from Thailand… its 2006 not 1991/1973

I spoke way too soon.

picture credit > Manager Newspaper

So after recieving 20 text messages all saying the same thing for since 7 o clock “I got inside information, there is going to be a military coup in BKK” from a bunch of friends and elder people. I got my ass out Nung Len and headed home.

Turned on the Thai TV stations…. great - all the stations have happy pictures drawn by children and pictures of the Royal Family with some happy Army music playing…

This is a bad sign…

Turn on CNN…. Tanks rolling around Parliment and Prime Minister house…. Oh crap this is a really bad sign….

Side note, My friend’s comment - “This is 3rd military coup, I’ve been through!” I chuckle a bit.

Oh man… everyone go find the nearest uncle who’s in the Army.

Crazy times in Bangkok…

I can only imagine what the King is thinking at this very moment. Something, to the tune of “What the hell is wrong with the people who have power in this country?” Apparently, they all suffer from meglomania.

image001

Originally uploaded by pipsy!.

nokia short (no) film moonlight finale

thr-sat 24-26 november 2005, 19.30pm
at to die for, h1, thong lor

click on picture to enlarge for details.

growing up in bangkok, didn’t feel that i missed out too much on halloween. at the international school there were lots of american kids, and man oh man, did they know how to celebrate the day. it was all very strategic, there were certain zones you wanted to get into for trick or treating. mainly the us embassy living compounds: they were a couple on sukhumvit soi 39, and some on mahadlek luang by rajdamri. and if you were really playing children’s politics, you’d know who to make friends with in order to get into the US commissary and stock up on candayyy… or what we called “american candy” because there’s a difference. between ruffles, jolly ranchers, starburst.. and say… mun mun, ole, and sugus.

the annual halloween parade held at school was always something fun to look forward to and an opportunity to get your picture in the paper if you had a really kickass costume. imagine 500 elementary school children from all around the world, dressed up in anything from homemade to store bought costumes walking around in a circle for an hour in the sweltering heat to let the parents home video the event and just take pictures. it was so much fun! even the games we played and the lame ass classrooom-conversion-to-spooky houses.

i was in choir too, and we’d always go sing at neilsen hays library on halloween. we’d all get dressed up and sing some sort of showtune and some sordid pop song that was of the moment. i remember it being absolutely horrendous, because this was way before the library had air conditioning and wearing a 6 inch thick jack-o-lantern suit was not. fun. looking back, the people that turned up to watch us were the exact same people who came to our school’s halloween assembly: our parents.

last i heard of the halloween celebration day, was that it was combined with the “sanook fair” (a great fair on its own right) into something highly retarded called hallownuk.

My daily taxi provides me with many things to write about it seems. Today there was volume 1 of a magazine called ‘By The Way’ hanging behind the front seat that had a nice picture of the use-to-be-white fort near Khao San road at night. I didn’t pick up the magazine or show too much interest in it because I didn’t know how the taxi driver might react and it was in Thai, but it’s a good idea - beats twiddling your thumbs in traffic!

This Wednesday will be 3 weeks of living in BKK. Four weeks ago I was certain that I would be killed either crossing the street or on a motorbike by now. I still have several years for that to happen, but it hasn’t happened yet!

I moved in to a small apartment in the prakanong area the first day, and have been pretty happy with it. The only downside is that it could possibly be the most likely place for me to loose my computer and camera equipment. My neighbors tell me this is the most frequently robbed apartment building. 4 motorbikes and a couple TV’s in the weeks I have been here. But it is pretty cheap. 4000 a month.

I do have a question. In Thailand, traffic moves on the left side of a road, passing on the right. So why do the skybridges, and general pedestrian traffic, walk on the right and pass on the left? I don’t have a picture now, but the arrows on the sidewalk are pretty clear.

Tomorrow I buy an iron and board. A belt from school too. Tuesday is the first day of orientation. I’m pretty excited.

It seems the Metroblogging network is booming right now with the introduction oh Lahore, Pakistan joining us.

Already they have a post touting their food street (along with a really good picture of it), but can it compare to Bangkok where food is available everywhere?

Note : I’ve edited the entry with a photo… just to make it easier to understand what I was trying to write about 16/6/05

Having read the newspapers today and saw the picture of “Rub Nong” which means welcome freshy in English kind of disturb me. It’s the culture that Thailand’s Universities established in order to create unity for the newcomers and current students. I think that some of the activities are very inappropriate and morally wrong… Take a look at this pict for example.

This picture was taken last year at one of the private university. It’s one of the activities aiming to “create the bond between Freshies and current students at university”

I never had a chance to join “Rub Nong” activity in Thailand as I spend most of my student years in Australia, Maybe… elaboration of Rub Nong might be a good way out and replace with “University’s Orientation” instead
Read more

if you’re into hip hop and all you can drink parties:

the 1.2 party crew are organising a party on
May 13, 2005 at P.O.F.
(behind emporium) on Sukhumvit 24 from 8pm till 2am

(unless you’re sure your face looks like the
crypt keeper, thais bring your i.d., non-thais
a passport/copy of passport with your picture
and d.o.b)

hiphop vibes by dj b, ono, meeh
silksounds presents fresh2death

for tickets call: 06.624.0990

sponsored by coke (the drink), clan mcgregor