In August,1988 history was made in Burma, now called Myanmar (although Jim Carrey still calls it Burma). see http://shop.lonelyplanet.com/myanmar-burma/myanmar-burma-travel-guide-10?lpaffil=lpdest-shoppod. I was living Burma’s next door neighbor country, Thailand see www.lonelyplanet.com/thailand.There had been a dictatorship in Burma for 26 years. Most of the world was not allowed to get in. No one was allowed access to a computer except for the government. The travel agents produced lists of people traveling on flights with stencils. Stencils! A paper with purple carbon on the back that could be placed into a roll on a special machine and purple ink copies were made. I had used stencils during the ‘70’s for my teaching materials. I got a sick feeling in my stomach when I saw those travel stencils during my December, 1987 brief trip. “How else did the government control everyone?” I wondered silently.
I was running the Elementary School Computer Lab for International School Bangkok (www.isb.ac.th). This job started in September, 1986. I did not know one Westerner living in Bangkok who did not love it. It was only an hour’s flight to Singapore, two and a half hours to Nepal or Hong Kong and 4 hours to Indonesia. None of my colleagues had traveled to Burma but I found a few travelers at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club of Thailand (www.fccthai.com), a club for news people covering Southeast Asia, and in other places.“You can purchase whiskey and cigarettes in the Bangkok airport and sell both in Burma”, experienced travelers advised me.
I did not realize until I spent a few days in Rangoon just how thriving was Burma’s black market economy.
I was running the Elementary School Computer Lab for International School Bangkok (www.isb.ac.th). This job started in September, 1986. I did not know one Westerner living in Bangkok who did not love it. It was only an hour’s flight to Singapore, two and a half hours to Nepal or Hong Kong and 4 hours to Indonesia. None of my colleagues had traveled to Burma but I found a few travelers at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club of Thailand (www.fccthai.com), a club for news people covering Southeast Asia, and in other places.“You can purchase whiskey and cigarettes in the Bangkok airport and sell both in Burma”, experienced travelers advised me.
I did not realize until I spent a few days in Rangoon just how thriving was Burma’s black market economy.
I am not surprised that the European Union issued a warning on August 14, 2010 to Burma that it had better have fair elections this coming November.
Note- More to follow in an upcoming blog posting. The author speaks Spanish and Hebrew and can converse in French, Portuguese and Thai. She can count to 10 in Russian and Arabic and is currently working on Mandarin.
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