Burmese Days Part Three: The Government

He's not going anywhere

Shwedagon Pagoda, Yangon

For most Westerners, the regime in Burma conjures up images of sinister government troops patrolling the streets and shadowy agents of the SLORC (drumroll please…State Law and Order Restoration Council) tapping phones and recruiting informers like the good old STASI. Some travelers even told me that if I keep bumping into the same people all around the country, they are very likely SLORC-operatives keeping an eye on me. Upon arriving, however, I found that people seemed to be living very normal lives just like anywhere else, with little government presence felt at all. Now, I know what you are thinking: “Oh sure, Ben is only saying that because he’s in a basement somewhere in Yangon and has had car batteries wired to his testicles for so long he’s ready to denounce gravity”, but honestly, except for soldiers with machine guns stopping buses and inspecting passports every now and then, the government seemed no more oppressive than say, in neighboring Thailand.

That said, upon arriving I was immediately told that talking about politics in public is a very bad idea not only for you, but also for the people you talk to. Also, I suppose tourists are really only being shown the good parts, with much of the poorer country off-limits. I met a guy who had been doing volunteer work along the Thai-Burmese border, and according to him there are methamphetamine factories there with absolutely revolting working-conditions. Workers are forcibly addicted to heroin to keep them under control, and are given methamphetamine to allow them to work twenty-plus hours a days. Once they drop dead, new people are simply brought in like meat for a grinder.

All in all, I suppose the main effect of an utterly uncaring and incompetent government is insidious and seen most profoundly in the fact that although Myanmar is endowed with many natural resources, the standard of living remains dismal. One can only imagine how different things could be if Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD had been making the decisions for the past twenty years.

On the more comical side of the tyranny is the government’s official newspaper “The New Light of Myanmar”, which is dead funny: full of propaganda and that rich, over-the-top descriptive English that Asians seem so fond of. Based on the articles, it would seem every single village in Burma is on the cusp of becoming a thriving metropolis of science, culture and industry thanks to fatherly government oversight. Also, on the very first page of every issue, a large box indicates “The People’s Desire” in four very 1984-esque directives:

· Oppose those relying on external elements, acting as stooges, holding negative views

· Oppose those trying to jeopardize stability of the state and progress of the nation

· Oppose foreign nations interfering in internal affairs of the state

· Crush all internal and external destructive elements as the common enemy

Real subtle.

Epilogue

If you’re planning a visit to Burma, all I can say is: great choice! Your experiences there will very likely span the entire spectrum of human emotion from utter despair to pure ecstasy, but I promise it will never ever be boring. I would offer a few simple pieces of advice, however:

:

· Apply for a visa in GOOD TIME, i.e. at least two weeks before going.

· If you’re travelling alone, try to get together with other backpackers for the longer bus-trips, as they can really bring you to your knees if you have no-one to laugh about them with.

· Don’t plan on travelling around anywhere during Thingyan.

· Keep your plans liquid, as unexpected shit will come up.

Otherwise, enjoy the hospitality and take it easy!

P. S. Some ska songs just immediately make you want to party. This chief among them.

Mighty Mighty Bosstones: The Impression That I Get

http://new.music.yahoo.com/videos/The+Mighty+Mighty+Bosstones/The+Impression+That+I+Get--2144849

Burmese Days Part Two: The People

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder


For me, the people in Burma are definitely the number one reason to visit. I mean, Thailand is known as “The Land of Smiles”, but by comparison to the Burmese, Thais seem downright depressed. Wherever you go in Burma, people flash the biggest, goofiest grins imaginable at you, and within minutes you find yourself responding in kind and loving it. Even the most stony-faced traveler has to melt at the sight of a big fat smile and an enthusiastic “Hello!” from these guys! It’s a virtuous circle and would be fantastic to see elsewhere too! Unfortunately, if back home you greet someone you don’t know and, God forbid, smile at them, you are quite simply labelled as:


a) …drunk/high
b) …crazy
c) …a foreigner

as no other explanations are even remotely plausible. But I digress.


In addition to being seemingly happy all the time, the Burmese have great sense of humor too. I quickly found out that in Burmese the word “Finland” sounds a lot like the word meaning “to show your ass”. Obviously, this was ripe for comedy, so whenever I was asked where I came from, I would answer “Finland” and simultaneously gesture as if to pull my pants down. This seemed to be pretty much the funniest thing anyone had ever heard, and was met with roars of laughter every single time! Usually friends, family-members and just about anyone passing by would also be waved over for an encore performance. It was a great icebreaker to be sure.


In the context of Southeast Asia, I would say Burma is as close to unspoilt territory as you can get: There are no Seven Elevens or WiFi spots in sight and an air-con bus means some of the windows are missing. You can travel for days on end without meeting any other Westerners, and wherever you go the locals greet you like you’re a rock-star who just cured cancer or something. You can’t fake enthusiasm like that! The result is a rather intoxicating and sometimes overwhelming amount of attention, and I must admit, I did get a bit addicted to it. For example, at the Thingyan festival everyone wants to shake your hand and wish you a happy New Year. Entire pick-up truckfuls of people scream at the sight of you and go absolutely berserk if you graciously spray them with a little water from the stage. Seeing this after knocking back a few club whiskeys, it’s pretty easy to develop delusions of grandeur :)


After Yangon, I headed north to Lake Inle, which is a huge nature reserve in Shan state roughly 400 kilometers away. The trip there was thoroughly harrowing, as it lasted twenty-six-hours and involved a bus, a minivan and a motorbike, of which the bus broke down thrice and the minivan twice. With no other English-speakers on board I had pretty much no idea what was going on, except that the driver kept going to the back of the bus with bigger and bigger sledge-hammers. The locals seemed to understand that a fatalistic shrug is the only reasonable way to mentally deal with bullshit like that. Inle Lake, however, was pretty sublime and tranquil. Set in the hills of Shan state, rice-paddies surround it, and pagodas dot the hillside. No wonder travelers often end up spending more time there than they originally planned, as did I.


On a boat trip around the lake we saw a few things of interest, among the most thought-provoking the long-necked women of the Kayan-people, whom I remembered vaguely from the cover of an old National Geographic-magazine back home. From a very young age, the women wear metal rings around their necks, which gradually push down the shoulders and thus artificially elongate their necks. We were told this was originally done for two main reasons: to protect them from tiger bites (I know, it makes no sense) and to make them more attractive. I suppose now it is simply a matter of upholding the tradition and entertaining tourists. Unfortunately, over time the muscles in their necks weaken so drastically that were the rings ever removed, the women could only let their heads hang loosely; doomed to a life of staring at linoleum-tiling. Gravity be a harsh mistress.


Potty humor


When travelling in Asia, your stomach can easily become a bit punch-drunk from the constantly shifting diet, and hence bowel movements very quickly rise in the list of topics most often discussed with other people. It is not even uncommon to see couples exchanging quick notes over breakfast regarding the consistency and make-up of their stool (seriously, I have seen it). Also, toilet-related survival stories circulate and are often recited to unfazed audiences at breakfast tables. I have heard a bunch of good ones over the course of my travels, but I think I finally heard the best (i. e. the most disgusting) one ever in Burma: Apparently, a young British lad had been on the top floor of a double-decker bus when he had a sudden onset of extremely violent diarrhea. With mere moments to act and not knowing what else to do, he had stuck his arse out of the window and quite literally let fly. Unfortunately, directly below him had sat an unsuspecting Swede with his window open. In what must have seemed just incredibly unfair, the Swede got peppered by some stray shrapnel from above. The Brit had been far too embarrassed to go down and say anything, so his friend had to go and apologize, and apparently, the Swede had “taken it well”. To his credit I have to say that he must have been a better man than I, because honestly, I can’t understand how anyone can take something like that “well”.


P. S. Funniest thing I have seen in ages, guaranteed to brighten your day.


http://www.theonion.com/content/video/study_children_exposed_to



















At Lake Inle, the boatmen have a very distinctive way of rowing with their feet



















Wind-chimes and spires

Burmese Days Part One: The Festival

Mr. T seeking enlightenment

The high point of my entire trip to Burma definitely came the very first day of my stay, and even though I wouldn’t say it was all downhill from there, it definitely didn’t get any better either. It all started when this smoking hot Burmese girl sat next to me in the plane, and I ended up spending the New Year’s water festival with her and her siblings. It was really terrific, as alone I would’ve had no idea where to go! First off, we grabbed a bite to eat at a local eatery way in the outskirts of town. The feast consisted of a variety of dishes, all esthetically about as pleasing as gristle, but all the more interesting otherwise: fish-heads, lambs-brains and the like. Afterward, it was time to join Thingyan, the water-festival, which turned out to be around a hundred times more intense than the Thai Songkran. Within the first few minutes of stepping out of the car, my passport, money and plane-tickets were absolutely soaked despite my so-called water-proof money-belt. Rather than freak out, however, I decided to deal with the problem once I got back to the hotel. That was a good call, since what followed was one hell of a party.

The heart of the festival was basically a street absolutely jam-packed with people and pick-up trucks. Now, when I say “jam-packed”, I mean each pick-up had about thirty people riding in it, with even the roof, bumpers and bonnet occupied, and the people between the pick-ups were squished so tight they could hardly move. This undulating mass of people and cars continued for roughly two kilometers in both directions up the street, so there must’ve been tens of thousands of people there. The street itself was lined with so-called VIP stages, about fifty of them, which were basically huge wooden dance floors with showerheads fitted throughout the roof to keep dancers soaked. The fronts of the stages had hundreds of water hoses installed so that passing pedestrians and pick-up truck occupants could be sprayed with water as they struggled to get by. This may sound malicious and prone to fist-fights breaking out, but was actually very light-hearted and good-natured. As if the normal garden-hoses weren’t enough, some stages actually had real fire-hoses as additional artillery, and while we were walking around somebody even managed to knock my sunglasses off with one. Unfortunately, they were never to be seen again as they sank into the knee-deep muddy water on street we were wading through. Sadly, there would’ve been absolutely no way to keep my camera dry or safe there, so I left it home and consequently have no pictures of the party :( I did, however, get some off the internet, which probably convey the atmosphere better than any desription I could give.

Electro-music was blaring from each stage, and entry apparently cost around 45 dollars apiece. Luckily it turned out we had some connections to one of the VIP stages, so we got in scott free! I am told our stage was run by the “Don King” of Myanmar boxing, which apparently is similar to Thai boxing, expect that head-butting is also allowed. Good old-fashioned wholesome family-entertainment in other words, comparable to a Disney film. Anyway, we whiled away the day on stage drinking, dancing and spraying passers-by with as much water as possible. It was weird and wonderful, and I was sad to see the water eventually run out and the streets begin to clear. Till next year though!

P. S. My favourite Radiohead song by far:

Radiohead - High and Dry

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qFfFVSerQo

Burmese Days - Prologue

“This is Burma. It is quite unlike any place you know of.”
-Rudyard Kipling


Burma is a country full of contradictions: Half the time you will embrace it with all your heart, while the other half you will be wondering what the hell you’re doing there. It will make you want to tear the eyeballs out of your skull, but at the same time restore your faith in the inherent goodness of mankind. Stepping off the plane in Yangon is like stepping into a time-warp, and travelling around is like it was in Southeast Asia decades ago, with the tradeoff between comfort and adventure being heavily tipped toward the latter. Kipling seems to have known what he was talking about.


In chronicling the Burmese excursion, perhaps I should start at the very beginning, as even getting a visa there was a hell of an ordeal.


Four simple rules for dealing with Asian bureaucrats


Want to get a visa for Myanmar? Might I suggest that instead, you find a sharp object and stab yourself in the groin repeatedly? It will be faster and almost certainly less painful. Of the above-mentioned options, I foolishly set out to accomplish the former, although plenty of sharp objects would have been available to me. The resulting escapade really showed me the meaning of an “emotional roller-coaster” and I believe the only fair way to chronicle it is as a timeline.


April 9th, 2009


7.30 –Wake up early to be at the embassy as soon as it opens.


8:50 – Brave death by darting in and out of highway traffic to get to the embassy.


9:00 – Arrive at the embassy reeling from the near-death experience, and find it is not open although it should be.


9:30 – Embassy actually opens.


9:32 – Find that the box labelled “Tourist visa applications” is empty.


9:33 - Enter queue to tourist visa counter.


9:50 – Get to the counter and tell the man behind it, let’s call him Gaylord, that the visa forms have run out. He apologizes and hands me one, but makes no effort to replenish the box, thus forcing everyone else to queue up for one as well.


10:00 – Re-enter queue with the form, having checked the box: “I will not interfere with the internal affairs of the Union of Myanmar.”


10:15 – Reach counter once more. Gaylord informs me that the embassy will effectively be closed for nearly two weeks starting Saturday. I know this already, so I calmly ask for an express visa. Gaylord says he will need to see my flight itinerary to prove I really need one. Of course I haven’t got it printed out, so now I have to find someplace with a printer and be back at the embassy before it closes for lunch at eleven.


10:22 - Dash out the door and start asking random people where I can go online. Finally, by simultaneously accosting an older woman who speaks English and a young girl who looks like she actually uses the internet, I get directed to a net-cafe.


10:28 – Brave death once again at the highway traffic junction.


10.40 – Find an internet cafe


10:41 - Realize that there are no available computers at the cafe, because school kids are playing World of Warcraft on all of them.


10:45 – Lessons must be starting or something, because dozens of kids leave at once. I print my itinerary off, thank the owner profusely and run back to the embassy in one of the most impressive flip-flop sprints ever seen.


10:57 – Arrive at embassy drenched in sweat, documents in hand.


10:58 - Find that embassy is actually open till twelve.


11:00 – Get in queue behind an annoying Brit and an even more annoying Canadian. They talk loudly and rudely about the admittedly slow employees at the embassy. I can tell Gaylord doesn’t like it, and I’m a little worried this might affect everyone’s chances at a visa.


Rule #1 for dealing with Asian bureaucrats: They all consider themselves masters of their own little domain, no matter how insignificant it might be! Show some respect or prepare to be frustrated!


11:10 – Canadian gets turned down for an express visa, and is informed that the first possible day he can get one is in two weeks. His flight is in two days. The asshole refuses to believe it, and keeps nagging at Gaylord, who gets more and more annoyed. Finally, after whining for about ten minutes, he walks off sulking.


11: 20 – The Brit is also turned down, and he just goes ballistic, screaming at Gaylord. In the end, he walks off to join the Canadian in the corner of the room. At this stage, I am very, very worried.


Rule #2 for dealing with Asian bureaucrats: Never ever lose your temper. If you lose face or cause them to lose face, any hope of finding a reasonable solution to the problem can be abandoned.


11:30 – I approach the counter and ask politely for an express visa, but unfortunately already know the answer: “No, no, express visa, you can get visa first in two weeks!” My flight is in less than a week, so I’m devastated. I’ve been really looking forward to this trip, and can’t even get a refund on my airfare. Fuck fuck fuck.


11:32 – Decide death is too good for Brit and Canadian. Will send hitmen after their families.


11:35 – Brit speculates that they refused our visas because of the New Year’s celebrations, which are sure to incite protests, which in turn they don’t want Westerners to see. My opinion is that these two idiots were being disrespectful, and effectively fucked over everybody else in the queue, who are now also being turned down uniformly as a frustrated Japanese man tells us.


11:40 – Hoping against hope, I queue up again. The jerkwads stay in the corner of the room.


Rule # 3 for dealing with Asian bureaucrats: Be persistent. Make it less trouble for them to do what you want than to keep refusing you.


11:50 – Reach the counter and enquire carefully what the problem is. Gaylord says that some “officer” needs to be there to sign express visas, but he will be away for two weeks. I ask discreetly whether the issue could be circumvented somehow, whereby Gaylord gestures at the assholes in the corner and whispers: “Come back at 1:30, don’t tell them.”


11:55 – As I am walking off, the retards ask me if anything has changed. Without a second’s hesitation, I say: “Nope, though I might try again in the afternoon.” A half-truth, I suppose, but I feel a little guilty. Just a few hours on Myanmar soil and I am already selling out my fellow Westerners. What will I be doing after two weeks, torturing dissidents?


12:40 and 13:20 – Two more near-death experiences in the midst of midday traffic at the junction of doom, but I no longer get the same kind of rush from it as previously. I mean, the cars are hardly even trying to run me over.


13:30 – Back at the embassy. No jerks in sight, and Gaylord instructs me to sit and wait.


13:50 – Embassy is nearly empty, and I have seen half a dozen well-behaving Westerners get turned down for a express visas already under the same pretence of an absent “officer”. Something weird is going on, and things are not looking too good when Gaylord gestures me to the counter.


Now we get to the final rule of dealing with Asian bureaucrats: MONEY TALKS!


13:51 – Give Gaylord my application documents, with one “additional document” enclosed between my passport: a 500 Baht (~ten Euro) bill. He smiles and says “It is all clear, Sir.”


14:00 - Walk out of the embassy with a receipt to pick up my passport the next day with a visa attached. Feeling pretty friggin’ smooth, if I don’t say so myself :)


Next day - Wake up to find that the prime minister of Thailand has declared it an extra public holiday because of the protests, so I am scared shitless that the embassy will be closed after all. No need to worry though, good old Gaylord had it covered and by late afternoon, although emotionally utterly punch-drunk, I had a visa in hand


After this, there was also the rigamarole of getting money into the country. Burma has no ATMs, nor any accepted credit cards, so you basically have to bring with you all the money you plan to use. The only accepted currency is the US dollar, and the going black-market rate for exchanging them into kyat, the local currency, is around one thousand kyat to every dollar. The Burmese government, however, refuses to acknowledge that their currency could possibly be so worthless, and so the official rate you get at banks is a ludicrous six (yes, SIX) kyat to the dollar. If this rate is to be believed, Burma is surely the most expensive country in the world, with bottle of water and a simple noodle costing around 50 dollars and 200 dollars respectively. Some added challenges include that only pristine dollar-bills are accepted, with crumpled-up ones being practically useless. Also, certain serial numbers are widely-rumoured to be counterfeit, and hence are not accepted by anyone. The end result is that you carry your dollars around with the utmost care, and obviously change your money at the black-market, which is also a bit of a hassle because they try to screw you over at every turn. After changing money you find yourself carrying these absolutely massive wads of Kyat around, feeling a bit like a drug dealer or professional gambler or something.


But is it ethically acceptable to go? After all, does visiting the country somehow condone the government, which lost by a landslide in the democratic elections of 1989 to the National League for Democracy (NLD), only to void the results and arrest most of the NLD leaders? The reason many people are concerned about this is that in 1996 the military regime launched a “Visit Myanmar”-campaign to promote tourism, and Aung San Suu Kyi , the charismatic leader of the NLD, pleaded for people to “Visit Myanmar later”, as she feared a visit could be seen to legitimize the government. Since then, however, several high ranking NLD members have begun to advocate tourism as well, and the “Visit Myanmar”-campaign has of course long since ended. Unfortunately, Burma’s main sources of income are heroin, timber and minerals, and most of the proceeds from these go straight the pockets of the greedy generals. Tourism, however, is a great way of getting money directly to the people, as you can easily boycott government-owned operations and only use private, family-run enterprises. By the way, it’s funny how in Myanmar even hippies agree that private enterprises are somehow good and pure, whereas publicly owned ones are evil and greedy. A refreshing change from home ;)


P. S. If there’s a song on the planet that spells C-H-I-L-L, it’s this one.
Sneaker Pimps – Six Underground

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrvk1bmTayg

Good night, sleep tight, the bedbugs will bite.

First-person shooter simulation of me water-fighting in Songkran.

Once again, I find myself in a sweaty little guest house room in the back-alleys of Khao San Road in Bangkok. I was getting a bit anxious about the increasingly ominous stand-off between the red-shirts and the government, but thank goodness things seem to have settled down for now. Outside, the Songkran madness is still going full blast, and it is turning into one hell of a party! Back home, there are simply not enough water-fights available for adults to partake in, much less massive parties with water-fighting as the concept! Event-organizers take note.

I’ve pretty much gotten used to the cockroaches and rats here, but I have to say I had a pretty nasty experience in the guesthouse I was staying for the past few nights. In the mornings, I kept finding these bites all over my body, and they were often in neat, straight lines, which can usually only mean one thing: bedbugs. The ferocious little bloodsuckers live in the furniture and the mattress, and only come out to feed when you are asleep. The guesthouse was, however, by far the nicest (and most expensive) where I had stayed, so when I couldn’t find the actual culprits, I assumed it was just esthetically minded mosquitoes or something. Imagine my shock when last night I woke up to find big bedbugs scurrying all over the pillow! What followed was the famous “ten-minute check-out”, where you pack your bags as quickly as possible in the middle of the night and just get the fuck out of there. I sprayed enough insecticide in my backpack to turn it into an entomological Auschwitz, but I’m still worried I’m carrying the vermin and their eggs around with me now. If I find any, I guess I will go to the nearest 7-11 and ask them to put my bag in the freezer for a day or two. The bites on the other hand have swollen up into enormous welts, and itch like crazy! It’s taking all my self-restraint not to scratch them with those rusty nails protruding from the wall. Fuck.

So, tomorrow morning I am heading to Myanmar/Burma, where they are just starting to celebrate their New Year. In a surprising turn of events, this also takes the form of a gigantic water-fight! I have no idea what the internet connections are like there, but apparently there are only a few places you can even get online. Also, I’ve heard the local government takes a screenshot of computers in internet-cafes every five minutes, so I might just stay pretty much incommunicado rather than let them get all Orwellian on my ass. Will definitely post about it after I get back though! Laters!