Journal entry; Saturday, December 1st 2001
It’s Saturday evening and I’m sitting on a Chinese bus in Burma. The air conditioning is streaming through the vent above my head, and I’m freezing my butt off. I’m headed north for Mandalay. Right now the bus is stuck between a traffic jam and an on-coming parade. Every now and then someone slams the bus with their fist and yells, its a little un-nerving.
Throughout all of this, for our entertainment, there's a Burmese soap opera blaring from the TV monitor at the front of the bus. I’m not sure of the plot but I think it’s girlfriend mad at boyfriend, father mad at boyfriend... at times like this I’d like to be home in Canada watching a good Habs-Leaf game.
The bus ride from Rangoon to Mandalay was 15 hours. I survived another epic long distance, overnight bus ride in the developing world. Mandalay is a frontier boom town. It’s known as the city of red, green, and white; rubies, jade and heroin. Burma is the largest exporter of opium in the world. Annually, over 3,000 tones of raw opium are produced. More than half the heroin sold on the streets of North America is refined from opium harvested in Burma. It’s shipped through Laos, Thailand and China to the West – and the government profits directly from the trade.
Mandalay feels like a border town. Shops ooze with "Made in China" labels on everything from toilet paper to toasters. At this moment in history China is Burma’s best friend. China trains the Burmese armies, supplies arms, and is the biggest threat to Burma’s sovereignty. Over 10 million Chinese have moved to Burma in the last 10 years. The Burmese people fear that they are becoming a puppet state of the Middle Kingdom.
For centuries Mandalay was the ancient capital of the Burmese Kingdoms. In 1857 King Mindon built the royal palace, now a famous tourist destination. Situated in the middle of the city, the palace is surrounded by an 8 kilometre moat, 70 metres wide and 3 metres deep. In 1994 hundreds of labourers were forced to re-construct the moat – all for the benefit of tourists.
Annually, each family must supply a labourer to the military for two weeks; conditions are inhuman and the stint often lasts longer than two weeks. If you have money you can buy your way out of forced labour, but most of the people are too poor to pay the bribe. Exploited as slaves, the exact death tolls are not available, but thousands have perished building the nation’s railways, highways, and enhancing the government’s "city beautification programs."
Some how, Mandalay has managed to remain the cultural heart and soul of Burma. I love the performing arts and I was curious to see an "a-nyeint." Performers act on stage while a small orchestra plays songs, and together they render skits, often with a satirical content. Traditionally a-nyeint troupes are hired for family celebrations or for religious holidays.
The Moustache Brothers, probably the most popular a-nyeint troupe in the country, attained international media attention after they were arrested following an Independence Day performance in 1996 at the home of Aung San Suu Kyi.
U Pa Pa Lay, and his cousin U La Zaw, were arrested and imprisoned for courageously applying a comical and critical commentary with political content in their performance.
Finally, in July 2001, five and a half years after their arrest, Pa Pa was released. Throughout his incarceration he lived with his legs shackled together and he crushed stones with a sledge hammer. When the guards came to release Pa Pa, they told him to gather his things and get ready to leave.
He thought he was being moved to a different prison. Pa Pa remarked, "I’m sad that I didn’t get a chance to say good-bye to my friends inside. They will have no idea what happened to me."
On July 13, 2001 Pa Pa called his family from the train station to tell them he was on his way home. Two days later, when he arrived in Mandalay, his wife and family were in complete disbelief.
Throughout the years of Pa Pa’s imprisonment his brother Lu Maw kept the troupe alive from their home.
"The show had to go on," Lu Maw stated.
On July 26, 2001, 13 days following Pa Pa’s release, District Chairman Tin Tun banned the Moustache Brothers from touring – but they still appear nightly from their home.
I sat in a small audience of 15 foreigners, from Belgium, France, the Netherlands and the United States. We were ushered off the street into our seats, offered tea, and then the show began.
Hand made marionettes, adorning the walls, provided the backdrop as Lu Maw directed the show. The performers captivated their audience with legends and stories to illustrate tales from Burmese mythology.
The show concluded with the brothers pleading with all of us to notify Amnesty International that they had been blacklisted from touring.
Lu Maw remarked, "Now they’re trying to starve us."
Their bravery is truly remarkable.
The following morning I set out early to catch a ferry across and the great Irrawaddy (Ayeyarwady) River to the ancient city of Mingun. The Irrawaddy River flows 2,100 km from its source in the Himalaya to the Andaman Sea.
In the late 18th century Mingun was home to King Bodawpaya. He ordered the construction of a massive stupa, but the building came to an abrupt halt when he died in 1819.
From the shoreline I stared in awe at the stupa’s size. Apparently this was only one-third of the intended size. In 1838 an earthquake split the monument and cracked the massive structure.
We disembarked and within a few minutes I scrambled up to the top of the stupa, hoping that the crack had settled. Mingun is definitely one of Asia’s best secrets. I counted 22 tourists in the four hours I was there.
Later, as I sat sketching under a Neen tree, I watched an old gal smoke a cheroot, (a Burmese cigar) and wondered what she has seen in her lifetime. Children danced around the tree, horse carts plodded up the dusty track, and hawkers attempted to sell postcards. I sat in peace before catching the 1 p.m. ferry back to Mandalay.
"The best time to sleep in Mandalay is in the afternoon," says Mike the Aussie.
He’s right, I thought as I arrived back at my guest house. The previous night had been horrendous. Power outages are a fact of life in Burma. Nightly, in our district, the power went out around 10 p.m. Then, for our convenience, the staff fired up the massive generator. The noisy engine sat just outside the front door, so anyone with a room facing the street had to listen to the roar of the engine all night long.
Around 4 a.m. I just couldnít take it anymore. I always try to be a good guest when I’m travelling, but this tapped me out. I went down stairs to the lobby, woke up the night reception fellow, and pleaded with him to turn the generator off.
"Not possible madame," he replied sleepily.
"Why?" I enquired. "Everyone is a sleep, we don’t need the lights on."
"Not possible until 6 a.m."
Defeated I went back to my room, put in my ear plugs, covered my head with my pillow and tried to sleep. I awoke sometime later, the generator was off, but through a blown out speaker came the chanting of monks from the neighbouring monastery.
After my peaceful afternoon nap I searched out Shive PY Moe Cafe, the Starbucks of Mandalay. Burmese teashops are enchanting. They’re a major social institution for locals and great for people watching. I ordered my lah peq ye (black tea with milk) and scribed. Dairy products are virtually non-existent in Burma. Black tea is served with condensed milk, it tasted so good, I ordered a second cup. On every table top was a pot of Chinese tea in an aluminum pot, its the chaser after the lah peq ye.
In their longyis (a traditional sarong-style skirt for men) the staff of teenage boys hustled around writing orders, delivering food, and attempting to keep their patrons happy. One such patron was a parrot at the next table. He was eating something gray and pasty out of a saucer.
My agenda the following day was to get up early and catch the ferry downstream to Bagan. The journey would take 10 hours, and I wasn’t sure if there would be food on board, so I set out to pick up a few things for the trip.
I wandered into a small shop and bought two cans of pineapple juice, two packages of dried sesame bread crackers, and a roll of toilet paper – all for about 50 cents (355kyat). The toilet paper was made in China, and I must say that the condensed roll was the best value for your half buck. I calculated that I’ve bought toilet paper in 31 different countries and I estimated that this roll would last a week. We shall see.
