simon43

I lived there for quite a few years. Don't visit in Jan-May >> too much smoke pollution! My goals for 2025: - Improve my Burmese language skills - Travel more within Myanmar (if I have enough time off from work) - Ramp up my educational charity (if $ allows!) - Try not to get killed in the civil war....

This morning I needed to buy a SIM card for MPT mobile network. Since I teach online in the evenings, and since the mobile internet is often 'interrupted', I have mobile data SIMs for each of the 4 Burmese networks - Ooredoo, Atom, Mytel and now MPT. I use an application called Speedify which can bond all 4 connections together, and/or switch seamlessly between networks, should one of them go down. As is often the case, the staff in the MPT shop were more than helpful, checking that the SIM was working OK and adding data top-up to my account 🙂 Driving in a tuk-tuk around Mandalay is rather like trying to find your way through a maze. So many roads become barred by the military/police for entry overnight. My driver had to go up and down different streets that are normally open, zig-zagging left and right until we reached our destination. The police checkpoints usually consist of 3 or 4 police officers, with a further police officer standing at the back with a long gun. Some of these long guns are about 70% the height of the policeman! I scrupulously avoid these officers, crossing over the road, just in case someone decides to start shooting at them.... I've moved into another hotel, because my school will no longer pay 100% of my hotel room cost. However, my new hotel is cheaper than the previous, has a bigger bedroom, and has a swimming pool and free breakfast. It costs about $400 per month, of which my school pays $200. So it works out cheap. I have a great view of Mandalay Hill and the pagodas 🙂 (Strange photo colour 'cos I was too lazy to open the tinted window...)

[quote] "คุณ" is misspelled as "คูณ" which is not a mistake a native speaker would likely make... [/quote] My Thai family definitely would!! Ignorant bunch of in-breds..... 🙂

You managed to type 'LOS' ok....

I wasn't aware that Reform were anti-immigration. They have a policy to control immigration, and they welcome those immigrants who will be of benefit to the UK - similar to the immigration policies of many other countries. A bit different from the open-door policy of Labour.... perhaps Starmer has shares in RIB manufacturers....

Since I started working in Myanmar some 12 or so years ago, I was very much aware of the problems. Go Fund Me not allowed (GFM policy) Paypal not allowed (Paypal policy) Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram currently blocked (military action, but 'illegal' VPNs work) Cash money out and money in only possible by Moneygram/Western Union, and very hard to find an office for those nowadays ATM withdrawals from overseas banks often doesn't work, and the exchange rate is lousy anyway For the Android developer that I hired today, Fiverr blocked my payment to him because I'm in Myanmar. That is Fiverr's loss since I was able to contact and pay him directly 🙂 So there are problems often imposed by external factors. I realise that the USA, UK etc has sanctions in place against major Burmese companies/individuals associated with the military, but that policy can also affect private citizens and their business...

I can't use Go Fund Me - no accounts from Myanmar allowed.. 😞

Having got back 'home', I've been doing a post-mortem on my trip to the orphanages. What was very clear was a) My Android learning app was greatly appreciated by the various teachers and b) it was a real pain to download and install it from my website because unless it's downloaded from the Google Playstore, the phone pops up no end of warning messages about possible viruses etc. This app used to be on the Playstore a few years ago, but Google Playstore T&Cs are constantly updated with changes needed to the app software. I'm not an expert in C programming, so I let the app compliance lapse and now it's no longer on the Playstore. But seeing the demand for my app and also wanting to make some changes to the app functionality etc, I've engaged an Android app developer not only to update the app to bring it into compliance, but to also manage the app on an ongoing basis, to ensure that it is always available on the Playstore for easy download. That leaves me free to do app promotion, and to create new language/vocabulary files for the app library. (Also, most folks that I met only seemed to think that a mobile phone has Facebook and Playstore!. Opening a browser to download from my website was met with a blank stare...) Anyway, that's a cost close on $800, but I see this as an investment for the future 🙂

That's the place where (supposedly), 1,000 Japanese soldiers in WW2 got eaten by crocodiles!

North or South Rakhine state? Are you working there? I travelled through south Rakhine state on my motorbike a few years ago.

A few non-orphanage photos from my trip: This is a large monastery and also apparently a famous eye hospital in Myanmar. An interesting Buddhist site, not sure of the name! This is a small temple in Inle Lake A local fisherman doing the 'standing-on-one-leg' pose at Inle Lake. (This isn't done for tourists - the fishermen use one leg to control the vertical oar as they use both hands with their nets). Nice sunset over the lake. No foreign tourists here, but quite a few Burmese day-trippers from Taunggyi.

He wasn't forced to do anything. He chose to kill himself by consuming excessive alcohol. End of...

I treat Thai people exactly the same as any other nationality, and therefore have friends of all nationalities. I think the only Thai who I didn't get on with was ex-wife #2......

I just got back to my hotel in Mandalay, after 3 days visiting/donating at orhanages and a 6-hour car journey back over the bumpy mountain road. As usual, there were many checkpoints, including a major checkpoint where all vehicles are x-rayed for hidden weapons or drugs. The x-ray machine is a customised mobile unit, with an extendible gantry that goes right over the road and zaps the vehicle moving slowly underneath. (God knows how many bechtels of radiation the car driver gets...). Interestingly, that mobile x-ray vehicle was a modern-looking Ford... Here we came unstuck. Seeing a foreigner in the car, the police officers sent me and my Burmese translator over to speak to the chief police officer. That man had us stand in front of him while he harangued my translator non-stop for at least 20 minutes! My translator kept saying 'sorry' in Burmese and 'ok' to everything that the officer was saying. We were finally saved by 2 rotund Burmese women, who waddled over to pay their bribe money to this officer. These 2 were dripping in gold jewelry and they winked at me :). After they waited for some minutes while the officer shouted at my translator, one of the women physically dug her fingers into the man's ribs and said effectively "Oh, give it a bleedin rest!" in Burmese, at which point the officer let us proceed. My translator later told me that the officer was annoyed at him for bringing a foreigner into this dangerous place. 'What would happen if he gets injured?'. (Well, the chances of ME getting injured are next to nothing, whilst the chances of that officer being on the receiving end of an RPG are somewhat higher!!). I asked my translator later what will happen when the pdf fighters take over this region, (as they no doubt will at some stage). He said that the soldiers will either die in the fighting, or they will run away or surrender, since most of them are conscripts. As for the local police who are aiding the soldiers, they will just change sides...

How about AIOTY = AI of the year? I have no idea who is biotic and who is abiotic on this forum nowadays.....

Thanks BurmaBill, Norfolkandchance. To be honest, I was more annoyed than anything else, because I like custard cremes. And yes - I brought along medicine just in case, so are feeling weak but better now. Now I am in the small town of Nyaung Shwe, which nestles at the north end of Inle Lake, and is where tourists set off for boat trips on the lake. I was last here visiting orphanages 6 years ago, and how it has changed, thanks to Covid and then the military coup. Absolutely no foreign tourists of course. There are local tourists, but my driver tells me that they all stay in nearby Taunggyi, and then make day trips to Nyaung Shwe. So the town economy has collapsed 😞 No large hotels are open, no 'western' food restaurants, no tourist shops etc. The mobile internet is stopped by the military and there are only a few hours of electricity each day... My trip from Mandalay was not so good! As I mentioned, I got food poisoning the day before, so wasn't feeling on top of the world. My driver told me that the main route to Inle Lake had huge delays (4 hours), since every vehicle was x-rayed for weapons. So we took a smaller road over the mountains. This was a 6-hour 'switchback' journey on a small and very bumpy road. Every few km we had to stop for police or military checkpoints. As we approached Kalaw, the military presence was much tougher, and the soldiers were surprised to see a foreigner. At 2 checkpoints, they did not want to let me proceed. But my driver told them that I was an important foreigner, and the soldier didn't want the responsibility of stopping me! So we proceeded. Right now, I'm at a zero-star hotel in Nyaung Shwe. (I won't show you photos of the bathroom because maybe you've just eaten your lunch!). Since there are no minimarts open or western food restaurants, I bought some banana, fried chicken and fresh bread, which will keep me in the land of the living tonight. Tomorrow I'll start my orphanage and monastery school visits/donations 🙂 I chatted with the banana seller, who spoke good English. My Burmese language ability is what language experts call 'pretty crxp'. It's at conversational level for both spoken and reading the language, which no doubt is still much better than most westerners! She told me that I was the first foreigner that she had seen in weeks...

For perhaps the first time in 20 years, I got food poisoning yesterday. Spent the evening emptying my stomach into the toilet, and then a very unpeaceful night... I'm travelling today to the orphanages. My stomach is ok now, but I feel rather weak. Hopefully I'll improve as the day passes. PS - It was a custard creme that did it!

I have no wealth, so I don't have to worry about flaunting it. But (for whatever reason), my status amongst the locals here in Myanmar is rather high, (probably down to the fact that I'm a foreigner, old, a teacher and a charity worker. The locals can't duck enough as they pass me! 🙂

They have many jets that they use to bomb and kill innocent civilians. All jets and spare parts purchased from Russia and China....

About 6 months ago I lived down in the Khao Lak area, a few km back from the beach. If I take off my house rental cost, then I was spending less than 5,000 a month on food, internet and utilities, (not because I could only afford 5k, but because I was interested to see what my monthly budget was). I cooked my own food, (bought fresh from the local market), I did a lot of walking (maybe 5km+ each day (because I prefer to walk for health reasons, nut use a car or motorbike). Life was simple, cheap and healthy! [quote]...and had nightmares the trees were talking to me [/quote] However, I think your monthly medical costs (psychiatrist etc), will send you over budget...

[quote] ... Once the code is scanned, all the information from that phone will be sent to scammers. They receive all access to the phone. All personal and financial information is accessible to the scammers and often the victim's bank accounts are drained. ... [/quote] Lol, urban legion.... totally impossible. The QR code is typically used to forward the user to a phishing website. But a QR code in itself cannot do what you state above 🙂

Yes, I know about the 2 rates - I've lived/worked in Myanmar many times since 2012. My comment was that my $1=4,400 kyat is not a black-market rate. It is the rate offered by the government-registered currency exchange offices on the high street, (hardly an 'under-the-counter' rate!).

I had a half-day today (Wednesday) because some of my students have to practice for our school's winter sports festival on New Year's Eve. Apparently, my promotional video last week has attracted the highest ever number of hits on the school Facebook page, (so that means 10 hits LoL!), and I have therefore been ordered to be the official announcer on that day 🙂 I visited a school book shop today and stocked up on more books that I need to take next week on my visit to the orphanages. I also invested in some pipe-cleaners and cotton wool.... Now I wonder what they are for? 🙂 Mandalay is very quiet now after dark. There is no evening curfew, but numerous teens and young men are being 'conscripted' off the streets to fight in the army against the civilians. Naturally, this is keeping most young men at home after dark 😞 The kyat to USD exchange rate is all over the place! If I exchange USD to kyat in a bank or withdraw kyat from my Bangkok bank account via the ATM machines here, the exchange rate is about 1 USD = 2,100 kyat MMK If I change USD notes in the local (registered) currency exchange office (which I did today), the rate is $1 USD = 4,400 kyat MMK!! Naturally, I avoid withdrawing from an ATM machine....

I learnt yonks ago that slowly and carefully with deep intent, is the best way to do anything 🙂

I usually give ChatGPT a few concise instructions and it produces good images, BUT it seems to be dyslexic and unable to put form correctly-spelt words! Viz: please create an image with the letters of the alphabet from A to Z in order, and please also write the sentence "The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog"