New Year's Eve

Some friends of ours, Jen and Kat, from Korea had spent some time down in Ko Samui before joining us in Bangkok to see the New Year in. We wondered around our little part of town taking in the sights. Jen and Kat got themselves a candle balloon and set that off over the river, took a while to work, but eventually went soaring off into the sky.
We met up with a friend of Jen’s who teaches in Bangkok and loves it there. It was nice to meet someone that loves the place! We spent the early part of the evening on Khao San Road. We went to a packed out bar that had a guy in the corner on a guitar, churning out tunes that we were all crooning along to.
To see in the New Year’s itself we decided, with half an hour to go, to high tail it down to the Grand Palace. We managed to get there with about ten minutes to spare. Unfortunately Jen had to find herself a bathroom. We managed to find some, but, predictably, the queues were not insubstantial. Still, we were in a good enough place to see the fireworks. However, with about five minutes to go, Courtney decided it would be a good time to find gum. Despite the fact that a) there weren’t any convenience stores nearby, b) it was 11:55 p.m. on New Year’s Eve and c) her sense of direction in Thailand wasn’t exactly tip-top (she got lost in Wat Pho). Needless to say she wasn’t around when the fireworks went off. I was more than a little worried that I was going to spend the rest of the night looking for her. Fortunately she came bounding round the corner a few minutes later. She was a little disappointed that we missed the fireworks but I was just glad that she was okay.
Not being the rock and rollers that Jen and Kat are, Court and I called it a night soon after that. It has since become a joke between us now that if we only have a few minutes before we have to go do something that one of us will suggest looking for gum!