It Feels Good To Complain -- An introduction to Myanmar

Coming to Myanmar in the rainy season. It's not all roses.

I always had it in the back of my mind - one day I'll go to Burma. My affection for the country knows it as Burma, and the former capital as Rangoon, the old travel hub for this part of the world. Great writers, generals, and business men (I assume it was mostly men back in the twenties and before) have lived here, and no doubt that's why I have an exotic notion of the city and country. And then of course there's Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who due to my watching the BBC, which always esteems her highly, has a strong influence on my romantic notions of this place - the colourful mysterious world of Burma. But I think I should call it Myanmar. The name 'Burma' comes from the largest ethnic group in the country and so could be seen as being non-inclusive, especially if the many minority groups are expected to identify with the country. There are still civil wars going on, so it's a relevant point.

 

In truth I'm largely ignorant about this country. We -- my wife and I -- flew in to rain, with a sense of jungle not far from the runway. It felt good. Then I was picked up from the airport by my new company's employees -- smiling and cheerful young women. Once we got close to the guesthouse the taxi driver began having problems, not wanting to drive through accumulating water at low points in the road. We later found out that almost all the streets around the guesthouse flood when it rains a lot, which it regulary does this time of year (May to September). Once we'd settled we began to realize that Myanmar wasn't a quaint little Thailand. Of course, Myanmar, is not little. It's two and a half times larger than the UK, and is over 25% bigger than neighbouring Thailand. The truth is that Myanmar is incredibly poor. There is no money, or no money allocated, to fix the drainage system to allow the rains to run off, as they more rapidly would in Thailand. You don't know how good something is until you don't have it anymore -- good drainage systems for the rains, good internet for down time and work, good clean street food.

 

The streets in Yangon, once you get away from the central tourist and shopping spots, are muddy and full of litter. The rains wash the mud along the sides of the roads. There are not the resources to continually clean up. Rubbish accumulates in local community dumps beside busy streets and markets. People sort through it, looking for valuable glasses, plastics and metals. Street dogs roam in packs or alone, looking for scraps from old wrappers, or discarded food. Somehow the old packets find their way to the sides of the roads. I soon learnt that flip-flops flick up mud, all the way from your bottom to the bottom of your ankles. If you walk in the streets, everyday you need to change your trousers, having made sure to handwash thoroughly enough to get the specks of mud off the night before. The smell requires the clothes to have had a good soaking to be eradicated aswell. I'm getting used to it.

 

I'm a complaining foreigner. The complaining foreigner risks the condemnation of proper travellers and backpackers who pass through South East Asia and India loving everything. How cute are those needy eyes! Look at the art in that old man's stern face, moulded by suffering and hunger! Look at those angry young men condemning the indifference of the photographers. How you can see the indignation! Look at her bent back. What a tough cookie! All so photogenic. That proper traveller is me. But I feel as though I'm switching to the self-indulgent, self-serving deva ex-pat. Where's my clean food?! Why aren't the roads clean?! Why are you trying to charge me more than the locals?! And then there's complaint for its cathartic value. Many a man or woman loves to complain about a place only to miss the colour and chaos when they're gone. Do you really want a clean formulaic life of regimental existense?

 

The thing about Myanmar is that there really is so much to be done here, and which can be done. The things it seems to lack, from the perspective of a spoilt Westerner, new in the country, are good government services. It really is admirable if people as individuals can stir up concern for cleaner streets, for the poor living in shacks by the railway lines, their homes surrounded by mosquito waters, for the orphan children, for amputees sitting roadside of parked cars so that the pedestrians who have to walk roadside to avoid the obstructions on the pavements might potentially give them some money. I submit Myanmar as an example of a country without adequate government services. It's hard to compare it with more economically favoured countries but it seems evident that governments do some things better than citizens left to find their own solutions -- their services are necessary.  I also submit that Capitalism, uninhibited by embargos and the like, can help Myanmar rise up out of the tough times it's gone through.

Reviews

[JoeM]

I, like you, had this rather romantic notion of Burma, with its rubber trees, completely withour any evidence, except for the rubber, of course.
You describe it well, brushing the scales from my eyes.

[Joshua Knight]

Thank you. It's still a lovely country though :)