Impasse at the Airport
It’s day 6 that the PAD has occupied Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi and Don Meuang Airports and officials are now putting the economic losses at an incalculable level. Incalculable. Not many things in this world as incalculable.
Today I walked past my travel agent on the way to lunch. My travel agent is impossible to miss. Her office is on a busy corridor leading from the Sky Train to the elevator bank of the building and only a glass door separates her from passersby. The other reason that my travel agent is truly unforgettable (besides being a good travel agent) is that she is actually a “he.” Always immaculate and eye catching in her carefully chosen clothes, she sashays around and is always ready to critique my outfit or my makeup du jour.
Today she beckoned me into her office, waving her manicured hands at me from behind the glass. And she asked, as so many have, if I knew when they would open the airport. (I don’t, of course. And soon, I hope.) She said that she would be paid half her salary this month and that the travel agency could close if the situation continued. But, she said, her plan was to sell iced coffee from a cart if she was no longer a travel agent. We talked a bit about what was happening and she asked me about the foreign perspective. We agreed that blockading the airports was not really hurting Mr Thaksin or Mr Somchai–the PAD’s avowed enemies, but ordinary Thais, just like her.
I’ll hear more of these stories, I expect, as the crisis goes on and after it ends. I’ve been covering this crisis since the very first rallies since early 2006 and the global economic slowdown and its effects on the Thai economy, which was already slowing.
The fallout may indeed be incalculable, but when it’s people you know, people who make your life a bit easier by being good at their jobs and a bit more pleasant by just being in it, the costs suddenly become measurable and terrible.
December 2nd, 2008 at 6:18 pm
[...] their jobs, especially those who are working in the airports. Thai Tales had a conversation with a travel agent: “Today I walked past my travel agent on the way to lunch. She said that she would be paid [...]
December 3rd, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Has the romours of a possible coup somewhat eased now that the PAD is leaving the airport?
What do you think is the future?
It appears that the now-defunct PPP is forming a party. Does that mean the PAD will take to the streets again?
I think the recent incident has left a very bad aftertaste. The police and military have refused to take action against PAD, not even when they storm the airport! If there PPP had not been dissolved, it looked as if Thailand was spiraling into a civil war with the government in “exile” (in Chiang Mai).
December 5th, 2008 at 3:48 am
[...] seus empregos, especialmente aqueles que trabalham nos aeroportos. Thai Tales conversou com uma agente de viagens: Today I walked past my travel agent on the way to lunch. She said that she would be paid half her [...]
December 22nd, 2008 at 3:30 pm
i travel to BKK once a month and for the past 3 years, i have learnt a little to survive in Thailand, well you will know when it is safe to go somewhere, and when it is not.
and because of the airport closure, my friend has to take a 36 hours bus ride all the way back to Singapore! BKK - Hatyai - Penang - KL - SIN, well probably he enjoyed the scenary.
December 27th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
I’m waiting to read more of the stories you hear on the blog. Am sure they will be similarly interesting!