Blood Will be Shed

My title for this post was stolen from an ominous Bangkok Post headline. But its not quite what you would think.

Sunday was the first day of the rally. Obviously, i went down to check it out. The official number for the people attending the rally was put around 43,000. The redshirts took over a large feild and over a kilometer of road from the feild (called Sunam Luang) past the Democracy Monument, to a stage they have set up.
On Sunday the mood was jovial. I brought my camera to get footage of it, and people were smiling and waving at the camera, while speeches and protest music pumped through speakers set up all along the boulevard. People were dancing, selling massages, selling food. It was like one big monochromatic party. Some older thai ladies beckoned me and steve over to share papaya salad with them, while one of the more educated of them came to talk to us about their fight and what they stood for. She encouraged us to get red shirts ourselves.

All around bangkok there were people wearing red in support. many people are from hours away from bangkok and cant usually afford to come on vacation so they were evidently seeing the sites and making merit at the wats for themselves and for the movement.

Ive headed down to the rally site almost every day, (because the food is good plentiful and cheap) and it seems like each day the numbers have dwindled significantly. Its painfully evident that just protesting like this every day wont get the government to budge. School was cancled monday and tuesday, but its open again on wednesday as people are becomming more and more certain that nothing bad will happen. (its worth noting that at the rally the redshirts have hung up signs saying "violence is uncivilized" and other such slogans)

Upping the ante, and getting back to the title of this blog, the redshirts have devised a most interesting tactic. They convinced thousands of thier supporters to donate 100ccs of blood. This was all then put into bottles and spread on the ground infront of parliament by a Brahman Priest in a ceremony to curse the government and those who walk through the blood of the people.
The ceremony went off without a hitch.

It seems like the redshirts cannot gain anything without there being chaos. But they cant be the ones to throw the first punch, so i expect this all to calm down to nothing soon.