Monday, October 27, 2008
MYANMAR /YANGON – First Day Impression (Airport to City Center)
NOTA: Bumisepi.com menggalakkan penggunaan Bahasa Melayu kerana objektif utama kami ialah untuk mempromosikan bumi ini sebagai tempat kajian (field study) kepada umat Melayu berugama Islam. Kami menyesal catatan di bawah ditulis dalam bahasa Inggeris (blogger tersebut akan diberi amaran). Walaupun begitu, kami berharap semua pengunjung dapat iktibar dari catatan di bawah.
15 October 2008
The trip was supposed to be a simple one. Checklist items had been ticked off. A ticket from Kuantan to KLIA to Yangon. A single-entry visa. A passport, not expiring within 6 months. A traveler without a family members. Some foodstuff. Some clothing. A notebook computer with built-in wi-fi. (last item is of no use in Myanmar). Those seemed to be a good recipe for the trip to Yangon for first-timer like me.
Canned foodstuff and clothing took a lot of weight so much so that I needed to settle for excess baggage fees before the boarding pass could be issued. Excess of 10 kg at RM31 per kg.
Departure gate G6 of KLIA was quiet except for some Burmese monks returning home and Malaysian workers working in Myanmar. I met an ex-staff of Carigali Hess now on his own visiting friends in Yangon. A young Malaysian engineer from Man Turbo (M) Sdn Bhd was on his way to a place – could not remember the name -- north of Yangon to overhaul a compressor at the power plant. Well, I was proud that Malaysians now have gone places, contributing to the world. There was a Haji A Rahman KK – as introduced by himself -- in his late 50s or early 60s I met at the gate. He was carrying a newspaper something like Harakah in his cabin bag. I gave him salam and we clicked easily thereafter. He was on the way back to Myanmar after visiting his daughter in Malaysia. After helping him to fillup Myanmar arrival card and custom declaration form, he invited me to visit him in Bokpyin -- somewhere north east of Yangon near Thailand border – where his kampong is. He gave me a simple direction to his house. Just find a mosque at Bokpyin (there is only one mosque there) and his house is exactly opposite of the mosque. There are a number of Malay families settling down there, some originating from Thailand and Malaysia and moving there during World War II. They talk the same language. They eat the same food. They are Moslem. Good things is that they still have contacts with family members in Malaysia and frequently visit them.
No white men at Gate G6. No westerners. No camera-lugging tourists wearing shorts. No children running around. This departure gate was really different than other gates. A big security lady of Sikh origin based on her name tag asked everyone to weigh handcarry bag before being allowed to the aircraft, and she was strict. Not more than 10kg, she said. But the process went on smoothly.
Next gate -- G7 -- was much livelier as a group of young westerners were chatting away participatively. And that Gate is going to Bangkok, not Yangon.
Malaysian Airlines flight MH740 left KLIA at 11:05am sharp. No delay at all. The aircraft was an aging Boeing 737 and made a lot of noise when taking off and in mid-air. They should have supplied an earplug like the one supplied by MHS when travelling on helicopter to offshore. May my seat 20F was too close to the wing that I could also see metal patches on the wing, indicating the aircraft was a heavily utilized one, clocking a big number of flying time. Whether it is normal to have patches -- clearly differentiated from the main component -- I am not so sure. Let the engineers worry about that. I just want to arrive Yangon -- a city I will call home for the next 2 years -- safely.
It is almost noon after talking off. Airline serves brunch after 30 minutes in flight, which comes in 2 flavors – roti jala or fresh toast. I chose the first one. The roti jala is fine but the curry is oily and tasteless. I’ve read about passengers complaining about MAS lunch boxes in the papers and now I’m experiencing it. No in-flight entertainment except Going Places magazine with some pages missing. Some passengers played mp3 songs on their handphone, most were taking naps. Down at 34000 feet below, we could see Penang and other interesting islands. Yangon is just 2 hours and 40 minutes from Kuala Lumpur.
Suddenly all the above – a quite departure lounge, a noisy aircraft, no tourists, lunch box – make sense to me and boil down to one thing. Yangon is not a popular tourist destination. People go there for two things only -- work or business. And I’m one of them.
The plane touched down at 12:29 noon (Malaysia time) rather smoothly at Yangon International Airport. The airstrip is not that long but the terminal building is new. I saw many white aircrafts of B737 size with logo MAI. I discovered later it is a Myanmar Airlines International. The airport can only land B737 and below.
Yangon International Airport is not big and not crowded either. Immigration and custom clearance was a breeze. Service staff were friendly and even helped us retrieve the carousel after we handed in the baggage tag to them. At the immigration counter I submitted arrival card and passport and visa. Then I collected my lugggage at Carousel no. 3. Unfortunately I lost a luggage, a smaller one. After lodging a complaint with MAS Office there, I managed to get back the bag after a couple of hours. The bag was finally returned to me at the Hotel I was staying. The bag was my lifeline for a couple of days ahead -- in a way -- as it contained essential foodstuff from backhome just in case I could not find halal food in Yangon.
The final part of the arrival checklist is to go the custom and hand over the Custom declaration form with nothing to declare.
The driver assigned to me is driving 2.2L Honda Accord, old model. He was a young and slender man, always on the phone. He spoke English word by word but easy to understand. Once he lost a word to complete a sentence, he lost the whole sentence. After brief introduction, my first conversation was about politics in Myanmar.
“You drive on the right hand side of the road like Americans?”
“Yes”
“I thought you hate Americans?”
“Only military people hate Americans”
Yes, Burmese drive on the right hand side of the road, in contrast with other British colonies like Malaysia. The strange thing is the steering wheel of most cars is at the right-hand side of the car. By right if you drive at the right-hand side of the road, the steering wheel should have been at the left-hand side of the car so that it is easy to navigate and overtake cars in front of you.
Most cars on the road are old, very old indeed, compared to Malaysian standard. Popular saloon cars are Toyota, like KE, LE and SE models. (Later I also found latest modern cars on the Yangon road). Buses come in many shapes and form, from old boxy type with no window to a newer Hino model from Japan. Small dilapidated lorries and pickups carry goods and some are customized to carry people. Long bench are put at both sides of the body of the lorry facing each other. Some have grills to avoid passengers from falling off when turning or braking suddenly, but most don’t. Buses only move when all the empty handrails -- not seats – are occupied.
It is common to see passengers with sarongs (known as longyis) standing on the steps clinging to the last handrail space available, dangerously, on a moving bus.
Truck converted to bus plying the road in Yangon against the backdrop of reddish colonial building.
Roads with patches and holes and the broken pavements are common sight, but still travelable. But nevertheless they are clean and tree-lined. I was told the roads in Yangon was like jungle last time before Nargis cyclone hit early 2008. Trees were everywhere. No rubbish or plastics wrappers around. Good thing is no motorcycles can be seen on the city roads. Yes, it was banned for the public. Only military personnel and policemen and postmen are allowed to use motorcycle. That makes Yangon more environment-friendly. Environmentalists like me like that.
Our car’s aircond unit stopped functioning halfway from the Airport to City Center, a distance of about 20 kms. The driver rolled down the window and I smelled the Yangon’s carbon monoxide for the first time. At a crowded junction waiting for the green light, it was even worse. It was no different that CO in Jakarta (January 2008) or Mumbai (June 2008). Yes CO smells the same everywhere.
Traders Hotel Yangon is located at Sule Pagoda Road. The road leads to a Sule Pagoda and continues to the mighty Yangon river, a lifeline for Myanmar economy. Sule Pagoda is not the biggest in the city but is very strategically positioned on the middle of the roundabout, flanked by shops and surprisingly a mosque. I was told that the very same road in front of my hotel leading to the pagoda was the venue for pro-democracy rally and monk demonstration a year ago which resulted in a crackdown by ruling military regime on Aung San Suu Kyi’s supporters. It was here that one Japanese photographer was shot down by the military during the rally and his dying moment image was shown on the TV everywhere in the world. (See Myanmar – Politik section).
There is a more popular Shwedagon Pagoda covered with gold and is a must-visit place for tourists . (See top-most image).
Shangri-La legendary hospitality greeted me with cool air and fine ladies. The contrast of life inside and outside is very great that I wanted to start counting my blessings immediately. I was late and took lunch alone. Non-halal sections are clearly labelled but to be safe I plan to be a vegetarian (plus seafoods and eggs) when staying here. There must be many Moslems guests staying here as there is a qiblat direction on the ceiling whick made me like at home. No Quran copy though in the drawer. Only a copy Bible. My room 1926 is located a non-smoking floor facing another tall building with Petronas and Hitachi logo across the road. Down there I could see people doing about their daily activities. Further down there is gigantic river with ships and ferries.
Gold-covered (or rather gold-colored?) Sule Pagoda could be seen from Level 19 of Traders Hotel.
Up on the rooftop of the tall building I could see two soldiers -- fully armed – wandering about looking down at the people on the streets. I knew they saw me too for quite sometimes as I was enjoying the view from Level 19. Looking down at the junction with traffic light, I saw another soldier similar to the ones on the rooftop scanning the public.
(NOTE: On second day after coming back from work to the hotel, I noted keys installed at my two luggages were tampered with and not in the position that I put before I left the room in the morning. I didn’t make a fuss out of it as nothing was missing, but the two solders who were staring at me really came to my mind. The safe deposit lock combination was not working from the start from day one).
I booted-up my laptop hoping it could detect any wireless network nearby. There was one available with 2 bar signal but it was secured. There was no broadband in the room not even dialup facility to access internet. There was a sign that said internet access is a controlled facility in Myanmar and therefore not available in the hotel’s guest room. Limited access is available at business center, but at the rate you don’t want to pay. So there went my plan to make use of my new laptop Acer Aspire 2920 with powerful Intel Core Duo processor and 2GB RAM and webcam to communicate with my wife and kids via Yahoo Messenger.
Phone is the only option now. But not quite. I took out my O2 PDA with Celcom 3G SIM card and let it search for Celcom allies among local networks. It kept searching until the battery drained out. None was found. Later I found out that only local phones can call outside. And the rate is unspeakable. No foreign mobile phone operators can do roaming in Myanmar. Forget Celcom. Forget Maxis. Forget Digi. Myanmar is not Celcom territory. Yellow Digi man doesn’t have friends here. I remembered a Celcom guy in Kemaman who told me that Celcom do have roaming partners in Myanmar and even gave me the roaming rates. I wasn’t sure what he meant. Either a complete ignorant or he was just trying to be nice to customers. Celcom – take note and educate your support staff!
A lesson well learnt here –leave your laptop or mobile phone at home when coming to Myanmar.
No comments:
Post a Comment