The End?

Thank you, to those who knew I was in Bangkok for a project meeting, for your SMSes and concern. I managed to find a taxi to the airport and caught the earliest flight out with help from the friend of a friend who did the flight changes after being woken up with frantic phone calls from another friend of a friend (I guess).

I pray this is indeed the ending to the drama I last blogged about. What else can beat walking right into a military coup two hours I landed, checked into the hotel and went out for a late dinner?
BBC World and CNN were reporting about tanks and a coup right in the area near my hotel when the reception to BBC was suddenly cut off while CNN came back intermittenly. All the local stations were playing patriotic music videos. No news is really bad news in such a situation, especially when the phone calls started coming from family, friends and woken up bosses. There was talk of a curfew and it did occur to me I'd have to find my way to the airport immediately if I want to get out quick. But there was no way of knowing if the streets were safe or if a taxi is available at that time.
After much deliberation, the hotel seems safer and since there was nothing I could do till the morning I tried to get some sleep in between taking peeks out of the window to see if there were vehicles on the road as that would mean there's no curfew enforced.
Surprisingly I was quite calm, largely due to the behaviour of the hotel staff who went about in their usual friendly and helpful manner. Infact I noticed the same calmess throughout the next day, at breakfast, the driver and airport staff. Every Thai exudes an understanding and reassuring attitude towards us even when the hotel lobby was choc-a-bloc with guests trying to find taxis and dealing with the crowd at the airport.

So that was that! In and out of Bangkok within 24 hours, nothing accomplished but an experience to remember. In retrospect, it would have been safe for me to stay on, but then the worst could also happen. Meetings can be resheduled.

I managed to finish the first repeat of Hanging Garden on the flight and much as I tried to knit while waiting for the TV channels to come back, I couldn't concentrate.

I'm enjoying knitting this pattern much much more than the Feather and Fan stole I had frogged to cast on this.

Annie and Doreen , sorry, no ball winders but I did find these mother-of-pearl buttons at the airport. Probably paid too much for them but how could I leave without buying anything knitting related? I had planned to look for hand crafted baskets for my WIPs too. Oh well!

I fell asleep on the couch right after I reached home yesterday and just can't bring myself to get up to get into the office this morning so have decided to take the day off to catch up on the knitting I missed out!