New Years is Cancelled...

It seems that they have cancelled all New Year celebrations in Thailand due to the tragedy. I don't know how successful that will be. We shall see. I have no special plans as of yet.

Thanks for the handful of people who emailed me inquiring if I was still alive! Also, my sister who sent me a rather rude email informing me that I should be sending out mass emails telling people I'm ok. Is that how it should work? For those that have any idea what I'm doing know already, I don't live anywhere near the beach. Thailand is not an insular country the last time I checked the map.

I nearly got swept up in a brawl the other night on Saturday. I went out with some considerably younger friends. I stepped out of the disco we were at for a few minutes (The damn disco doesn't sell heiniken! What am I supposed to drink?) I came back and found a bunch of rather large guys screaming at two of my friends from London. It seems one of these goons got it into his head that one of my friends called him gay. I jumped right into it and tried to ask what they were yelling about and managed to calm it down without taking or giving too many hits. Its rare to see any homophobia here. Foolish tourists aside that is. I don't get why people are such morons. This particular disco is where all the bar girls take the tourists. I don't particularly like it as I get into or mighty close to a fight 1 out of every 4 trips to the place, but a lot of my friends like it as its the only really good place to go if you want to dance any night of the week. Ahh well. It was still a fun Christmas! Met a girl named Cabinet! Or rather the Thai equivalent of the word, ตุ้. Thats a first for me. Usually their nicknames are adjectives, animals and the like.

I studied lanaguage for about 5 hours yesterday and I got some new words for all you languge buffs who religiously read my site and can't get enough of all this probably useless knowledge!! (Or rather by teaching the words I am more likely to remember them then just using them in my flashcard program alone. Either way...)

Today's possibly useful vocabulary:

不安障害　（ふあんしょうがい）－ Anxiety disorder

恐怖症　（きょうふしょう）－Phobia

มหันตภัย - disaster

แผ่นดินไหว - earthquake