Using my blog as I do (as a convenient way of filing interesting tidbits), I thought I'd post this recipe for UncleBob's Baby Back Ribs which sounds amazing.
Unfortunately, it's started the pissing down rain season and the Weber's got to be retired until next year.
Hopefully I can remember I marked this when next it's fired up...
My internet service has been diabolical for the last couple of days. Apparently, it was due to a damaged undersea cable off the coast of France.
(via the Arseblog forums)
Still loads and loads to be getting on with, but I should mention my latest project, a new forum for Gameware using vBulletin.
Quite fun to do, really, even if I did take a chance in installing the latest beta and going live with it.
Ooh, I do live life on the edge, me.
Ah... hahahaha! It had to happen, really. Disgruntled tatoo artist gets revenge.
I've always wondered if those t-shirts with Japanese characters don't say something other than what we think they do... (via Clayton)
I've been a busy, busy bee the last couple of days and rather than explain in excruciating detail what it is I've been doing, here are some rather more interesting linkettes, courtesy of my friend Pete.
Did you know, that Red sea urchins are 'almost immortal'? No, neither did I. But they are. Apparently.
Did you also know that a knock on the head can get you speaking in a foreign accent that you'd never heard before? Apparently true and all.
Prahlad Jani, an Indian fakir from Gujarat, clains to have gone decades without eating or drinking. Doctors at Sterling hospital in Ahmedabad have confirmed at least 10 days of it.
Take the red pill and experience THE MEATRIX.
Via yon Claudiodio.
Ran across this recipe for Burmese Chicken Curry. I didn't have the turmeric, garam masala or the chick pea flour and so ate it like a soup with noodles.
It was very nice, though I suspect it would be better with the missing ingredients.
I like Gallery sooo much that I decided to migrate all my photos to it.
It makes it easy, because you can specify a URL and it will move them all over to the Gallery database. What could have taken days took only a couple of hours.
Now, all my old personal photos are in the Gallery along with the newer stuff.
Next up, migrating the Photoblog. That's a little trickier because I have to work out how to pull the most recent images from the albums...
News that Burma has released five more opposition leaders from house arrest.
Says the Beeb's Burma analyst, "many diplomats feared it was just another attempt at deflecting international criticism of Rangoon, especially since the current session of the United Nations General Assembly is expected to adopt a tough resolution against Burma in the next day or so."
Isn't that the whole idea?
I love vintage graphic design, especially from the 30s and 40s - the kind you see on old tin signs or forms and brochures in your granny's loft. Vintage Luggage Labels - The Lost Art of Travel and The History of the Luggage Label is very cool indeed.
Clever old Weebl has spawned a series of Anchor butter ads. Have you seen them?
Gives hope to us all!
An interesting introduction to the complicated political situation in Burma/Mayanmar.
Found via the very interesting Burma Photo Project.
A couple of linky links:
I'm disappointed to learn that Cambridge University's primate lab has been approved. As I get older, inevitably I'm interested in living longer, but I don't want it give up my compassion to do so. It's especially uncomfortable because I fear that the research is less about helping people to live longer, but more about cashing in on the significantly wealthy "greying population".
Of course, the value of research into monkey brains was questioned by animal rights groups, saying "the science is flawed because the monkey and human brains differ in vital respects, making many experiments worthless." Obviously many are, but others aren't. Understanding the more general aspects of a primate brain do teach us more fundamental principles and it's disingenous to believe otherwise. For me, the University's poor record on welfare is far more of a problem.
Anyway, understanding the complexity of the brain is important, but we probably have much further to go than we thought. Even the basics are only just being unraveled. One biotech company in the US has produced a detailed protein interaction map which charts 20,405 interactions between 7,048 proteins in a fruit fly's metabolic system. Think about how every thought and action we make is dependant on complex protein interactions and it's clear that there's a lot of research ahead before we get anywhere with the human metabolism.
Connections, interactions, the great internety-web of life... What biological molecule are you then?
I'm DNA: "You're a smart person, and you appear
incredibly complex to people who don't know
you. You're incomparably full of information,
and most of it is useless."
Which Biological Molecule Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla (found at Amberbamberboo)
[Update: then again, maybe not for the monkey lab.]
"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax
Of cabbages and kings
And why the sea is boiling hot
And whether pigs have wings."
News that the military junta in Burma says they are talking with Pro Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, is, I suppose, my cue to discuss what little I learned about politics in Myanmar (Burma).
Always, when thinking about the political situation there, I was aware that I was never going to see everything (or maybe even anything) that is wrong with the country. We travelled along the Ayerwaddy River and stayed at Lake Inle and while the people in those regions live simple lives, they are healthy, well-fed and seemingly quite happy in their communities and in their family lives. Rivers mean trade, easy transport and fertile agricultural regions, and these days, a tiny bit of tourism. It was hardly to be otherwise.
One thing was clear, however: despite restrictions on the right of assemby, the people are not afraid to speak their minds. On the trip, we had the opportunity to speak to a wide range of people, all (of course) English speakers and most well-educated. Besides our guides (6 different ones for different regions), we spoke to hotel staff, students, ex-pats (of which there are only around 2,000 in the entire country), taxi drivers and others. At one point, we attended a presentation by a member of Aung San Suu Kyi's party who had been imprisoned for 2 years by the junta. The talk, incongruously entitled "Colonial Burma" turned out to be, in actuality, a discussion of post-WWII Burma and the pro-democracy movement.
The country's history is hugely complex - from pre-colonial times to the Japanese occupation to independence and up to the present day - understanding Burma and its problems could take a lifetime of study. Add to this a people comprised of 135 different and often warring ethnic tribes (echoes of Afghanistan and Iraq) and you have a situation that has no easy fixes.
The people, as well, are possibly quite unlike those of any other country. Everyone who's ever visited comes away believing that the people of Burma (not just the Burmese, who are their own ethnic tribe) are the warmest, gentlest, most generous and polite people on the planet. They are also hugely religious, but religious in the non-fanatical, gentle way of Buddhism which never seeks to impose itself on anyone. Self-knowledge, charity and community are paramount and so it's no surprise that for a proportion of its modern history it was a socialist state. Even today, certain regions are divided between those who support communism and those who support democracy.
The people I spoke to were, not surprisingly, critical of the junta, blaming it for corruption and severe financial mismanagement of the country, but there did not seem to be, as I expected, a huge outpouring of support for "the Lady" either.
One man, a well-to-do professional, believed that she was not likely to ever lead the country. The people there, despite loving her for her strength and kindness, consider her an outsider and believe that she was elected only because her father was the famous and well-loved General Aung San, who helped to broker a peace deal amongst the ethnic tribes back in 1948, just before his assassination (officially by political rival U Saw, but rumoured to have actually been committed by the former leader General Ne Win). Suu Kyi was raised and schooled in India and then spent much of her adult life in England after studying at Oxford, only returning to Burma when her mother took ill in the early 80s.
Personally, I have to question some of the economic policies that have been presented. Most of her manifesto is in the Burmese language and only portions have been published in English, but it strikes me as a bit too open market a bit too quickly. The country is mercifully free of McDonalds, of Coca-Cola adverts and frankly, of pollution and crime and opening the flood gates to free market foreign investment is worrying to me.
Many of the villages we visited had pretty basic electricity supply. Often it went only to a single building which housed a TV and satellite dish for the use of the villagers. It was in these villages, I was told, that theft, crime and violence was more prevalent. This is not to say that I would begrudge anyone electricity or material wealth, but we (or actually, they) should recognise that the consumption of material goods comes with other, not-so-welcome additions.
I also worry that democracy is seen as some sort of magic wand that will solve all problems and defeat all ills, but like most countries, only the wealthy and educated will vote and people, by their nature, are hugely self-centered. We also know that democracy does little to prevent corruption and that the drive for profit nearly always outweighs genuine concern for the people.
None of this means, I hasten to add, that I in any way support the current government or its methods or that I do not support a drive towards democracy. What I hope for most is that the remarkable people of Myanmar will be given the chance to teach all of us what is important and worthwhile in our own lives and that we are given the opportunity to visit and do business with them in a way that does not impact on the way they choose to live their lives.
I'm not sure you could find a bigger animal-lover than myself and the whole issue of the sheep stranded on a ship because Australia refused to take them was simply appalling to me.
But news that Animal Rights activists have laced the sheep's food with pork to make them unsuitable for Muslim countries is completely beyond the pale.
Feeding meat to herbivores is cruel enough but to essentially make them completely unfit for human consumption is abject stupidity. I say all 46,230 are shipped to the animal right's dude's home and left in his back garden. Since he's so dead-set against live exports, he won't be able to shift them anywhere else. What a moron.
Yet more photo stuff as I found my site listed on Photoblogs.org - The Photoblog Resource.
So, I've gone in and linked myself to my photolog. Thanks to whoever listed me in the first place!
The 2004 Issue of the Itchy Guide to Cambridge has just been released and features photos by me (not all of them, of course - just a few). Excellent guide as well - you can tell they're local. Any guide that deems Henry's "house of horrible" is A-OK in my book.
When I first moved to the UK, I lived in a little town on the Norfolk/Suffolk border called Diss. Certainly attractive in it's own little way, but probably due to being smack in the middle of where it's smack in the middle of, I can't say it's the friendliest town in England.
Amusingly in the news today as Diss's Christmas lights appeal nets just £5.
More Myanmar photos in the Gallery, the latest starting on page 3.
These are all taken with my older camera (the Fuji 2800Z) and you can see the difference. It just doesn't like extremes of contrast...
Don't forget, there are descriptions on most of the individual photo pages and you can leave comments if you wish.
Uploading photos to MT has become a bit of a drag, I have to say, so I've installed Gallery, which is pretty amazing, especially considering that it's free.
My first album contains a selection of images from my trip to Myanmar.
[Update: perhaps worth pointing out that there are descriptions on the individual photo pages. Alternatively, the slideshow thing is pretty groovy...]
The vast majority (more than 80%) of Myanmar's 45.5 million people live outside of its cities and the economy, such as it is, is primarily agriculturally-based. Timber, including teak, is the main export along with rice and oils (sesame and a rape-seed type oil). Teak exports are a government-controlled industry of which they are highly protective. In fact, all teak trees belong to the government and if a teak tree is on private property, it can not be cut without official permission.
Once upon a time, Myanmar (Burma) was one of the richest southeast Asian countries and the region's top rice producer, but of course, times are hard these days. Economic sanctions by the EU and US means that exports must all go out through neighbouring China, Thailand and Laos before, inevitably, making it to Australia, the US and EU. I assume that this means that Myanmar itself gets a much smaller piece of the pie.
Another industry hard-hit by sanctions is the textiles trade for which the country has long been famous. For the few tourists in the country, a visit to the silk weaving factories is inevitable and each region specialises in a particular pattern or product. We visited a couple of these on our trip and it was interesting to see people at work on their rickety wooden weaving frames.
In the photo at right, the woman is preparing silk thread for the "ikat" method of silk weaving. The silk is essentially "tye-dyed" and then the resulting multi-coloured threads are meticulously lined up on the loom to created a patterened cloth.
Silk is imported in its raw state from China and is spun and dyed locally and then woven into intricate patterned bolts of cloth. The weavers we visited worked long hours, seven days a week for around an average of about $1.20 a day. For the most part, this did not appear to be piece-work and the pace seemed leisurely, but of course, we only saw a few places - most with fewer than 20 workers. Of course, the pay seems outrageously low and indeed, it is a low wage even for that country, but costs are also low. A pound of rice costs around $.25US and meat about $1 a pound. In the factory shops, silk cost around a $10 a meter, but can be bought in non-tourist shops for a fraction of that. A shoulder bag (for which the people of Shan state are famous) costs a tourist about $2 to $6, but a local would probably pay less than half of that. This website gives a good outline of the types of weaving that is done in Myanmar.
Handcrafts are everywhere and I marvelled at table after table of carved wooden objects, silver, paintings, bamboo goods and lacquerware on sale wherever we went. Sometimes there would be tables stretched as far as the eye could see at the entry to a pagoda but only us few tourists to buy anything. I felt bad for them - most saying "lucky money" meaning that if I bought it, it was the first sale of the day. This at 2 or 3 in the afternoon. Needless to say, you could get great deals and heavy bargaining is expected, but I could rarely bring myself to go too low - sometimes paying the first asking price. I'm sure they laughed at me when I left, but $5 is a working week's wage to them and the cost of a pint for me.
Lacquerware is everywhere and, again, a trip to a lacquerware workshop is inevitable. We were explained the process which involves a number of steps, starting with the sap of the Melanorrhoea usitata applied by hand to wood, bamboo or horsehair vessels. They are then placed underground for two weeks to harden before being incised and handpainted. Again, try this site for a good description of the process.
Another common handcraft and one that produces goods most commonly used by the people of Myanmar is goldleaf. In the photo at right, the men are pounding gold into leaves that women in the next room will form into small, one inch sqaures pressed between sheets of paper. You can buy these squares of goldleaf at monasteries and temples for application to the Buddhas. Of course, it is almost only men that are allowed to directly apply the goldleaf so I never bought any. I guess men are in much greater need of merit than are women. ;-)
From Mandalay airport we proceeded to a local market where we were able to get our first glimpse of life in Myanmar. My first impression was how clean the markets appear to be. Having spent some time in the Carribean, I sometimes hesitate to venture too deep as the smell can sometimes be a little overwhelming, but the markets in Myanmar are not at all like that.
Short of the dried fish stalls, they were truly cleaner and far less smelly than many British open markets and much nicer than the fruit market in Boston's Faneuil Hall where I found the mess and rotting fruit pretty disgusting.
(click on images for a closer look)
Not entirely sure what's being sold here, but I assume it's a drinks cart and a case of medicinal remedies.
The markets offer all manner of things - from handcrafts to medicines, from t-shirts to tomatoes. Usually the front of the markets offer the handcrafts and sometimes the stall-holders can get a little aggressive with tourists - especially as there are so few of us. At this market I saw very few non-locals other than ourselves, so we were sold quite hard. Opium pipes, puppets, Buddha images and wooden carved objects were common here as were a variety of interesting mechanical devices, knives and other paraphanalia that I'll describe later.
From there we went to Mahagandaryone Monestary where we watched its 1000 monks collecting their morning alms. In Myanmar, I was told, it is compulsary for all young men to become a monk at least once in their lives. This can last for as little as 5 to 10 days and therefore, becoming a monk is not a life-long commitment. In fact, some of the people I spoke to said they had entered the monestary many times in their lives, sometimes simply as a break from the stresses of life. Living in a monastary is free, but of course it is an austure life where eating after noon is not allowed, heads must be shaved and shoes can not be worn when collecting alms or within the monastery. Again, the monastery is an important part of Myanmar society that I'll describe later as we passed through rather a lot of them!
Technically, monks aren't allowed to collect alms directly from women (nor are they able to touch them), but clearly this is a malleable rule. The monks also collect their alms in age order, so the littlest ones are at the end, but there is always plenty for everyone. The meal is mainly of rice, with a little meat and veg thrown in and they then take them to a communal dining hall where they eat.
Mingalaba means hello, goodbye, welcome and all sorts of auspicious wishes in the Burmese language. I used it as often as I could, but inevitably got "hello" or "goodbye" in English in return!
I'm not really sure how to begin to describe what could possibly be the most beautiful place on earth. A Swiss woman who has lived in Myanmar for the last 9 years told me she always describes leaving the country for Europe as returning to the "real world" but I can't help but think that Myanmar is actually the real world - a world of deep spirituality, of modesty, respect and good manners and of the great joy of humanity. Politics aside, it's an amazing country and although I spent only a short time there, I feel as though I've seen a lot, learned a lot and fell completely in love with the place.
Anyway, not knowing where to begin, I think that perhaps the beginning is a good start...
After a 10 and a half hour flight, a short stop-over at Bangkok Airport and another hour and a half flight, I arrived at Yangon airport. Noticible was the lack of armed soldiers, something I was used to seeing in European airports. I was also expecting my luggage to be searched, but only noticed a body temperature scanner as I passed through the gates. Once I collected my bags, I was quickly approached by a taxi driver who offered to take me to my hotel for US$5.
We had been advised that credit cards are not accepted in Myanmar, due to the sanctions imposed by the US government and in fact, it is quite impossible to find any bank or institution that will accept them. Apparently a Swiss Visa clearing house was recently shut down and this makes traveling in the country a little trickier than it already is. As a result, I had to carry a rather large amount of cash in small denominations which made me a little uncomfortable, but I was soon to get over that.
Twenty minutes later, I arrived at the pretty Pansea in the embassy quarter of Yangon (formerly Rangoon) and it was in this area (and only here) that I began to see armed guards. The Pansea itself is a beautiful hotel, and at US$168 a night, one of the most expensive in the country, but since I only needed to pay for 2 nights (coming and going), I decided to treat myself. The first night, unfortunately, was a little wasted as I went straight to bed after dinner as I needed to be back at the airport for the flight to Mandalay at 7am the next morning.
I quickly recognised two of my traveling companions from my cousin's description and made my acquaintance. The one is a reflexologist from the Bahamas accompanied by her mother who also lives and works in Nassau. The next morning (unbeknownest to me at the time), I also ran into two more couples that I would get to know well on the trip - one from Sidney, the other from New Zealand and both long time friends and associates of my hosts.
Our next stop was Mandalay - where the flyin' fishes play*!
To be continued...
*from a well-known and somewhat disrespectful (in my opinion at least) Kipling poem...
Just arrived back in the UK with lots and lots (and lots) of photos. I saw amazing things, met incredible people and had a wonderful time.
But first, a good long kip...
(ooh, and sorry about the temporarily dead site - a little issue with credit card numbers but all is fine now.)
I'm off on my holiday now and will be back around about the 13th of November. See you when I get back!