Day-to-day life in Myanmar

[simon43]

I'm living and teaching back in Myanmar again (I'm in the city of Mandalay again, where I note that the nearest fighting is only 13km away).  \

 

Anyway, I won't comment about the political situation, but I'll maybe post about my day-to-day experiences 🙂

 

So I'm teaching Science at an 'international' school in the city.  As I'm a scientist, and as I've been teaching science previously in Myanmar, the job is very easy and enjoyable.  In my first few days of class, many of my young students asked me my age (I'm going on 66 years old). I gave them a quiz a=25, b=45, c=65, d = 85 years old.  The majority of my students chose 45 years old!!  So they have already qualified for top marks in whatever exam they fail LoL...

 

I took a yellow tuk-tuk to the local Ocean shopping centre (neither tuk-tuks nor shopping centre existed 8 years ago when I was last a teacher in Mandalay).

 

Outside the shopping centre were 20 very large advertising billboards.  3 of them had adverts for clothes and food shops.  The other 17 had adverts for pre-schools, schools, colleges and universities.....

 

At the weekend, I walked once around Mandalay fort, (about 8km all the way round), and then up the hundreds of steps to the top of Mandalay Hill (see my photo).  When I used to do this walk 8 years ago, both sides of the steps were crowded with locals selling trinkets etc for the many foreign tourists.  Today, not a single seller and the only foreigner I saw during my walk around the fort and up/down the steps was myself....

 

 

 

 

[soi3eddie]

Sad for the Burmese people. I was in Yangon last year and saw no tourists. The Burmese people are struggling financially and for freedom. Of course, in conflict areas it's even worse. Now I see a number of travel YouTubers going to Myanmar and making clickbait headings such as "travelling Myanmar in 2024 is tough", "Journey into Myanmar's conflict zone" and "Entering Asia's most dangerous country". Not sure what to make of it having travelled the country extensively in the past. 

[chiang mai]

I look forward to reading more about this, thanks Simon.

[simon43]

Although Mandalay is close to the 'front line', the city is reasonably quiet and safe.  Yes, there are armed police and soldiers, and the road passing the Chinese consulate is blocked off and guarded, after someone chucked a bomb at the building! 

 

Electricity power cuts happen several times a day, but that was also the case many years ago.  For me, one noticeable difference from my first visits many years ago are the large number of solar panel arrays mounted to completely cover the roofs of many buildings. Buildings always had diesel generators, but now solar power is much in evidence.  That's annoying for me, because the solar controller units generate harmonic radio signals that interfere with my reception of UHF/VHF satellite signals 🙂.  Of course, my ham radio transmitter is safely locked up in Thailand.... I will ask the military to renew my Burmese ham radio licence, but the chance of that happening is... er .... fecking unlikely!

 

I'm watched the various YouTube vloggers, and some of those videos are quite interesting and others are fear-mongering.  I note that the UK Foreign Office gives advice to the effect of "don't go there, and if you are there, then get out whilst you still have the chance..."

Edited 3 hours ago by simon43

[Ben Zioner]

6 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Although Mandalay is close to the 'front line', the city is reasonably quiet and safe.  Yes, there are armed police and soldiers, and the road passing the Chinese consulate is blocked off and guarded, after someone chucked a bomb at the building! 

 

Electricity power cuts happen several times a day, but that was also the case many years ago.  For me, one noticeable difference from my first visits many years ago are the large number of solar panel arrays mounted to completely cover the roofs of many buildings. Buildings always had diesel generators, but now solar power is much in evidence.  That's annoying for me, because the solar controller units generate harmonic radio signals that interfere with my reception of UHF/VHF satellite signals 🙂.  Of course, my ham radio transmitter is safely locked up in Thailand.... I will ask the military to renew my Burmese ham radio licence, but the chance of that happening is... er .... fecking unlikely!

 

I'm watched the various YouTube vloggers, and some of those videos are quite interesting and others are fear-mongering.  I note that the UK Foreign Office gives advice to the effect of "don't go there, and if you are there, then get out whilst you still have the chance..."

Any tourists left in this marvellous city? Stayed there in 1986.... 

[Keeps]

Please excuse my ignorance but what is the latest situation regarding Aung San Suu Kyi? How is she now regarded by the general masses? Is she under house arrest? Is she still 'active'?

 

I can only assume with your background, you are probably best placed to comment.

[simon43]

1 hour ago, Ben Zioner said:

Any tourists left in this marvellous city? Stayed there in 1986.... 

The only foreigners that I've seen are a few teachers... no tourists

 

@Keeps - she is still in prison, and has been since February 2021.  She is still highly regarded and respected by the Burman majority ethnic group, less so by other ethnic groups who historically have been seeking autonomy for their regions for many decades.  Being in prison and incommunicado, no word or comments are ever heard from her.

Edited 1 hour ago by simon43