"IT'S a scenic drive of about 30 miles (48 kilometres) up through the hills from Taungoo to Thandaung Gyi, a former British hill station in Kayin State just over the border with Bago Region that is enjoying a revival as a tourist destination. The outskirts of Taungoo give way to palm and banana trees, betel nut plantations and paddy fields. The road is reduced to one-way traffic as it climbs through tea and coffee growing country to the little town. The British established Thandaung Gyi as a hill station in the 1850s. It is about 4,000 feet (1,220 metres) above sea level and its cool, clean air and attractive setting offering panoramic views has helped it to benefit, via a grassroots tourism initiative, from a “peace dividend” following the signing of a ceasefire between the Karen National Union and the government in January 2012, which suspended more than 60 years of hostilities. After the ceasefire, PeaceNexus, an NGO, with help from Germany’s Hanns Seidel Foundation, consulted the government, KNU and community members about a livelihoods-based initiative that could best support the peace process. The outcome was the creation by residents of the Thandaung Gyi Tourism Development Working Group, which has supported the establishment of about a dozen guesthouses offering bed and breakfast accommodation. Thandaung Gyi is the only community in Myanmar where residents have been permitted to provide bed and breakfast accommodation. We stayed at the I-Wish guesthouse, which was built in 1912 and has been run by the same Karen family for three generations. There are two large rooms at the front of the original building and simpler rooms in a new block at the back, all of which have hot showers. The service is friendly, the breakfast hearty and guests can enjoy outstanding views across a valley to the nearby Bayintnaung military training base. One of the biggest in Myanmar, it looks weirdly picturesque in the distance. I had travelled to Thandaung Gyi with my family to escape the first days of Thingyan in Yangon, before returning to the commercial capital for the finale. The other reason for the trip was to attend an event celebrating the life and death of a Karen princess and the sacred mountain connected to her violent demise. The annual celebrations were launched 24 years ago. During the long years of fighting between the KNU and the government, Thandaung Gyi was a secure Tatmadaw garrison town. There was much fear in the community then but after the ceasefire in 2012 a more relaxed atmosphere prevailed because of the improvement, if only superficial, in relations between the KNU, Tatmadaw and Thandaung Gyi Township administration..."