Don't Inhale

It’s not all lovely and picturesque… Walking down the main road in Sittwe in the morning, my senses are assaulted by the acrid dust, the wood smoke and the noxious smells backing out of the sewer. The morning chorus is the clearing of lungs, perhaps due to the daily inhalation of dust, but I just can’t get used to the guttural sound and the resultant spitting. On the other side of the street I saw a man kick a puppy, and all I could do was give him a dirty look, unable to lay into him in his own language and tell him to pick on someone his own size. Most dogs are emaciated and suffer from mange. The majority of the people on the street- and there are many – are filthy. And they all stared at us, like they had never seen a foreigner before. At first it was quaint but then became downright annoying to not be able to walk down the street unmolested. This scenario is in contrast to Rangoon where only a few people will turn and look, while the majority can’t be bothered. In Sittwe, we were also pursued by more beggars than I have ever encountered in Burma and a few children became quite aggressive, following us for over a kilometer and throwing pebbles at Anne to get her attention.

Other images are typical of Burma: orange-robed monks carrying black alms bowls walk single file down the street, men carry two square cooking oil cans filled with water balanced on a stick (many people don’t have running water and carry their water form the town well); trishaws drivers in longyi and conical rattan hats. I am afraid it would all look like a big jumble in a photograph. A stroll through town invites a thousand stares, and the friendly “Hello!!” is sometimes replaced with something less innocuous (although I am not sure they even know what they are saying). I started to ignore one and all. I wondered how, in a town that undoubtedly sees many tourists, did I warrant such extreme curiosity? Especially after I saw a cowboy on a bicycle and no one gave him a sideways glance! It was a Burmese man, but still… he was dressed head to toe in yellow-gold American cowboy garb (hat, vest, jeans and boots), and had on modern sunglasses on top of that!