Myanmar’s Ancient Ball Game Fights to Survive Amid Chaos

In the heart of conflict-ridden Myanmar, an age-old sport is waging its own quiet battle for survival. Chinlone — a mesmerising mix of dance, dexterity and discipline — is Myanmar’s traditional ball game, and for many, a cherished cultural balm in an increasingly fractured nation.

“Play day is always a happy day,” says Min Naing, a 42-year-old player. But with civil war raging, poverty rising, and materials running scarce, those happy days are becoming fewer.

Played in bustling Yangon courts and dusty village sheds, chinlone is part sport, part performance. Men pass a rattan ball between them using feet, knees and heads in rhythmic flow, while women perform acrobatic solo routines — sometimes atop chairs, twirling umbrellas or spinning flaming hula hoops.

Yet the sound of the cane ball — once likened to music — is fading. Since the 2021 military coup, participation has plunged. Conflict and inflation have choked the livelihoods of the game’s artisans, who painstakingly hand-weave each ball from jungle-sourced rattan.

Master craftsman Pe Thein, 64, likens inspecting his work to “checking diamonds or gemstones”. But his prized rattan, harvested from war-torn Rakhine state, is now dangerously hard to come by. “It should not be that we have players but no chinlone makers,” says Maung Kaw, another veteran ball maker.

Chinlone dates back more than 1,500 years and was formalised as a national sport in 1953, part of Myanmar’s post-independence cultural revival. Today, it’s a defiant symbol of identity in a nation under siege.

Players, like 16-year-old prodigy Phyu Sin Phyo, train relentlessly — even while sick. “It is important to be patient,” she says, eyes fixed on the burning ball she balances while spinning fire.

Despite hardship, chinlone endures — played under overpasses, around blacked-out street lamps, or wherever there's space and spirit. “When you hear the ball, it’s like music,” says Win Tint, 74, vice-chair of the national federation. “When you play chinlone, you feel like dancing.”

The question now: can the dance go on, or will the silence of war claim one more part of Myanmar’s soul?

-2025-06-04