Burma 1984
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan 2018
Burma 1984
Our entire time in Burma was under the control of Tourist Burma, the government-run travel bureau that was charged with managing the travels of all foreign visitors in the country. It was therefore not surprising that our guide services, land and air transport and accommodation were all in government-run enterprises; the reality is that there was almost private enterprise in the Socialist Republic of the Union of Burma.
Our accommodation in Rangoon, the government-run Strand Hotel, was a Rangoon landmark. Opened in 1901 under the ownership of the Sarkie brothers, who also ran Raffles Hotel in Singapore and the Eastern & Oriental Hotel in Penang, the Strand was once one of the grandest hotels in Asia, a glorious colonial outpost in Britain’s Empire of the day. Its decline began with the Japanese occupation of Rangoon during World War II, and following Burma’s independence in 1948, it was largely neglected until taken over by the government in 1963. Since that time, it has been getting dustier and dustier as the years have marked on. No-one would mistake it for the Raffles Hotel in Singapore these days!
Having said that, the rooms were remarkably cheap ($25 per night for bed and breakfast), and they had working air conditioning. Perhaps because so few travellers come to Burma these days, the hotel was surprisingly well maintained, although the ancient open-walled elevator didn’t inspire confidence as it creaked and groaned its way up and down with a speed that seemed only marginally faster than a glacier.
The colonial charm endured, with old overhead paddle fans, and a manually changeable sign beside the reception desk with Rangoon’s air schedules shown (and unfortunately labelling Aeroflot Soviet Airlines as “Aeroflop”). Perhaps the most exquisite feature of the colonial past was the “Lost and Found” cabinet in the foyer, with dusty items that must have been mis-placed at least half a century ago; I say this because I didn’t see much evidence of ladies using miniature folding fans or men using fob watches during my stay in Rangoon. The picture was completed when we stepped out the front door and encountered a line of old Fords and Chevrolets – meet the Rangoon taxi fleet. Despite their large size, each taxi could take only three passengers, all in the back; this was because the three front seats were universally used by three others – the driver, the owner, and the mechanic.
Our tour of Rangoon this morning (May 1st = Worker's Day public holiday) commenced, appropriately at Kipling’s “beautiful, winking wonder”, the 2500-year old Shwedagon Pagoda. We were reminded of Kipling’s initial impression when he first saw the Shwedagon: “Then, a golden mystery upheaved itself on the horizon – a beautiful winking wonder that blazed in the sun, of a shape that was neither Muslim dome nor Hindu temple-spire. It stood upon a green knoll, and below it were lines of warehouses, sheds and mills… Up till that sight my uninstructed eyes could not see that the land differed much in appearance from the Sunderbunds, but the golden dome said: ‘This is Burma, and it will be quite unlike any land you know about’.”
The symbol of Rangoon, this 100-metre high stupa is said to contain more gold than the vaults of the Bank of England, together with 5,448 diamonds and 2,317 rubies, and is surrounded by almost 100 smaller temples and pavilions. It is a centre of faith for Burmese Buddhists and an architectural wonder for any visitor. More than any other place seen on the study tour, it is a building that overwhelms the individual, making him or her fully aware of their own insignificance. As well as the myriad of Burmese life on display at the Shwedagon (such as Buddhist devotions, washing images, begging, selling caged birds to set free in order to gain merit, cheroot-smoking old ladies, and so on), we were also privileged to witness a part of the ordination of several young boys into the Buddhist monkhood on the central platform of the pagoda.
Our Rangoon tour continued with a stop in the city centre near the Sule Pagoda, which marks the centre of the British-designed grid layout of Rangoon’s streets, followed by a drive past Royal Lake to see the Karaweik Hall and Shwedagon Pagoda from a different angle, and finally to the Chauk Htat Gyi Pagoda to the somewhat grotesque 70 metre long reclining Buddha (the world’s largest such image).
From here: a drive to Rangoon’s Mingaladon Airport saw the group have an airport lunch before leaving by a Burma Airways Corporation (BAC) Fokker F-27 (registration XY-ADZ) to Heho on the Shan Plateau. Like all our Burma Airways flights, this flight was smooth, punctual and uneventful apart from the superb low-level views we had of the beautiful pagoda-studded Burmese landscape and the friendliness of the aircrew, which saw most of the students taking the controls of the aircraft for brief periods! That might sound scary, but it was great for my photography because the standard manoeuvre for each student during the time he was given the controls was up, down, dip right and dip left – every time the plane dipped left, there was a clicking sound; it was the shutter of my camera as I captured the great view downwards.
Temperatures in Burma are reported in degrees Fahrenheit, and Rangoon had been 105 by day and 97 by night. Happily, the temperature at Heho was somewhat cooler due to its elevated location on the Shan Plateau. Our transport here consisted of a small bus plus a Land Rover to take the surplus numbers and luggage, and in this fashion we travelled from Heho to the provincial capital of Taunggyi, an old British hill station.
On arrival in Taunggyi, we explored the local markets where ethnic minority people dressed in colourful costumes sold bright red and orange spices (that looked hot enough to eat through metal!), vegetables, well matured fish, and poultry kept alive in cages ready for inspection by the discerning buyer who likes her meat fresh.
The main street of Taunggyi was also noteworthy for its old cars, colonial architecture and dentists’ signs with large, colourful “eye-catching” portrayals of dentures, gums and fillings. The students learned something of the freedom of movement we take for granted in Australia from the patrols of bayonetted, machine gun holding security guards at the Taunggyi Hotel, our accommodation for the night. We were told that we could not venture further east from Taunggyi for safety reasons. This was because rebel troops from the Shan State Army controlled the territory from about 25 kilometres to the east all the way to the Thai, Lao and Chinese borders.
Tuesday
1 May 1984
Day 7
Rangoon to Taunggyi
