These pictures were taken in Burma during a six-week visit in February and March, 2002. They are washed-out because they were copied from slides.
Although parts of the country have been out of bounds to foreigners, and transportation was a bit rough, it was one of the most interesting countries I've visited, and I'm sure it still is
. When change comes (perhaps soon) it will be dramatic, because when I was there you would swear it was 1950. For example, the town of Myitkyina in the north may (have) be(en) the last place in the world where 99% of the traffic is bicycles.
Southeast Asia is extremely varied, cheap and easy to visit. The most interesting countries are the least visited: Burma, Laos and Cambodia.
U Sein Win was a man who approached Therese and me in Bhamo and invited us to his house. The only furniture in his sitting room was a partly assembled helicopter. He said he had constructed it by looking at pictures, without access to any expert help or manuals. In the evening he would meet us at another location and show us a video of his maiden flight.
There were five foreigners in Bhamo that day. (We knew this because there was only one hotel that was allowed to accept foreigners). We felt this was easily the most exciting thing happening in Bhamo that evening, so we went along
. The video began with U Sein Win driving in to a military base. There were several stern-looking men in uniform standing around the helicopter. U Sein Win said good-bye to his family and climbed inside. The rotor began to turn slowly, then faster. Dust was stirred. The rotor continued to turn. After a while it slowed, then stopped. U Sein Win got out and hugged his family.
I had two very memorable trips in Burma. The first was a 29-hour train ride from Yangon to Mandalay, the slowest and perhaps the best train ride of the many I've taken around the globe. For lengthy stretches we were advancing at a walking speed. We arrived at midnight in a pitch-dark Mandalay.
The other was one of the best boat trips I've ever had, three days from Bhamo to Mandalay. The scene was little changed since Orwell's sojourn here in the 1920s. Each sleepy village we stopped at was instantly transformed into a frenzy of activity. For sleeping, each of us was assigned a rectangle painted on the deck, and because the passengers were very friendly, this worked very well. (I later had a boat trip along the coast where my mates were not as agreeable).
Slow days
Monday, March 25, 2002
Yangon, Yangon, Myanmar
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2025-02-07