Travel and tyranny in Myanmar

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To recommend a travel destination, e-mail mattlamers@heraldm.com - Ed.



By Richard Treat



The bus from Inle Lake, a popular tourist destination in eastern Myanmar, follows a potholed road - sometimes dirt, sometimes paved - through the mountains on the way to Mandalay. Karaoke music videos with Burmese script play on the TV. Two ladies in front of us spit into plastic bags and periodically heave while a kid behind us sings along with the video. Outside the bus it`s dark, minus the made-in-China florescent lights, powered by small generators, which give the landscape a post-apocalyptic feel.

An elephant passes in the back of a construction truck, and the song changes. Random pictures of Korean celebrities - Rain, Kim Tae-hee, Lee Hyo-rhee, others I don`t recognize - flash on the TV screen to the accompaniment of a Burmese song. Judging from the hotel staff in Yangon asking about actors from the popular Korean sitcom "Boys Over Flowers" and the families sitting on plastic stools watching Goryeo Dynasty period dramas in a cafe in Nyaungshwe, the Korean Wave has hit Myanmar.

Sometime between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m., the bus stops. ID checkpoints were the first glimpse at restrictions imposed by the military junta.

All the passengers, minus some Buddhist monks, get off at a military checkpoint and show their ID cards. "The whole thing is ridiculous," a taxi driver confided. "A hooker can`t stay in a hotel in the city listed on her ID. So she buys one ID from Mandalay, one from Yangon. Maybe five different ones. They`re not hard to get on the black market."



At a Moustache Brothers show, a famous comedy troupe that incorporates traditional dance, music and comedy, one joke goes: "I had to go all the way to Bangkok to get my teeth fixed. And this Thai dentist looks at me funny and asks me why I came all the way to Thailand to get my teeth worked on. `Why`d you come so far?` he asked. So I looked at him. `How can I get my teeth fixed in Burma,` I said. `In my country, I can`t even open my mouth.`"

The joke underlies a distressing political actuality, one where humor can lead to imprisonment. Par Par Lay, one of the Moustache Brothers, for example, was sentenced to seven years hard labor for telling politically tinged jokes. Currently blacklisted, the Moustache Brothers are forbidden from performing in public; they do, however, perform for tourists inside the family home in Mandalay without government incursion. "The government knows tourism means money," said Lu Zaw.

Though human rights abuses in Tibet may attract more Western media attention, the actuality in Myanmar - governed by the military-led State Peace and Development Council - is abysmal. Amnesty International estimates there are some 2,100 political prisoners at the time of writing, including Nobel Peace Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who was found guilty of breaking the terms of her house arrest and sentenced to three years on Aug. 11, 2009, a sentence that was later reduced to 18 months.

In addition to political arrests, the military junta has been accused of numerous other abuses, ranging from coercing citizens into forced labor to forcing people to walk in fields to "clear" landmines. Despite such abuses, the United Nations has failed to ameliorate the situation, largely as a result of China`s position on the U.N. Security Council.

While some activists, including Aung San Suu Kyi, have advocated a tourism boycott on Myanmar, others question the effectiveness of such a strategy. According to Justin Westnage in the National Times, for example, "The tourism boycott has not worked and the Burmese people are poorer both financially and politically as a result." Moreover, if one applies the same logic of boycotting tourist destinations vis-a-vis human rights abuses, other destinations, such as Tibet, a region with similar human rights abuses and more travel restrictions, should also be avoided. As Free Burma Coalition member Marcel Schonenberger noted, "If you start thinking about not coming here because of the government, you will have to start thinking about whether to go to China, Laos, Tibet, or even the United States."

While Myanmar might not be an idyllic destination for all, it is relatively safe (as long as you stay away from the off-limit zones) and has a lot to offer. Due to its proximity to India, for example, it was one of the first points in the southern transmission of Buddhism, dating back to King Ashoka`s reign in the 3rd century BCE. Common itineraries often take in the "forest" of stuppas on the plains of Bagan, the gold-leafed boulder-shrine at Kyaiktiyo, and the golden stuppa at Shwedagon in Yangon, which is purported to contain some hairs of Siddhartha Gautama.

The country also offers an abundance of natural beauty - Inle Lake and the mountains around Hsipaw and Kalaw - where travelers can stay in The Viewpoint, a simple mountain inn (read: no electricity, no running water), "traditional" villages, or monasteries for a small donation. However, if you`re tired of the pressure to buy trinkets at Angkor Wat, or annoyed at the tuktuk drivers in Bangkok, the people in Myanmar, who are laid back and somehow positive, oftentimes surprisingly candid about the oppressive government, may be the biggest draw.

The easiest way to obtain a Myanmar visa is at the Myanmar Embassy in Bangkok. If you are a journalist, writer, director, activist, or hold any other profession along those lines, omit this on the visa application and write English teacher. At the time of writing, tourists wanting to go beyond areas along the Thai border have to fly into Myanmar. U.S. dollars can be exchanged for Myanmar kyat in the country. There are no ATMs in Myanmar, so bring enough cash. Spend responsibly in Myanmar by avoiding any government-run businesses.

(richardtreat@gmail.com)