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Burma: The moral dilemma



Burma: The moral dilemma
SATURDAY MARCH 21 1998
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By Bill Glenton
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It needed something richly spectacular to impress the obviously wealthy
passengers on this luxury cruise. Our call on one of the world's poorest
relations seemed the last way of doing so.

Yet their Cartier watches and diamond jewellery looked as dull as coffee
stall cutlery compared with the golden magnificence of our landfall at Burma.


Like some giant solar powered lighthouse to the gods, the towering, 326ft
high gold and jewel-encrusted Shwedagon Pagoda, gleaming in the blazing sun,
made a hypnotic sight for us spoilt westerners.


If the contents of Fort Knox's bullion vaults had been put on public
display, the impact on the many Americans aboard could hardly have been
greater. Minds spent preparing for more sordid, unhygienic displays of third
world life went into reverse shock.


Close up, on our excursion there, this enormous, incredibly ornate eruption
of Buddhist faith looked even more like some Hollywood spectacular. But the
many Technicolor, intricately designed temples, shrines and mammoth, weirdly
styled idols - far beyond anything found in Disneyland.


It was Shwedagon, however, that brought us firmly down to earth and reminded
tender sensitivities of dirt and disease. Or rather, the religious
insistence that we walk around this 2,500-year-old world-famous shrine in
our bare feet.


It spoke volumes for that pioneering spirit of the US that the mostly
elderly passengers - who might normally regard walking with shoes as an
activity sport - shed their expensive footwear, socks and tights to comply.


There was, at first, a certain nervous tenta-tiveness as delicately
lacquered toes trod warily between reddish splodges of betel spit and other,
equally suspicious, stains. But the beauty of the surroundings soon overcame
any phobias.


Or as the joker in our pack, Mamie, from Palm Beach, announced
philosophically: "What the Hell ...what's athlete's foot compared with
getting mugged at home?"


It was the colourful humanity of this bustling pilgrimage site that captured
the mind as much as anything. The petite, brightly garbed Burmese women,
bearing gaudy bouquets to lay at favoured shrines, mingled with saffron
robed monks in a ceaselessly moving floor show.


By comparison, we supposedly richer tourists looked downright dowdy. The
pungent smell of incense sharpened another of our soft-ened senses while the
sight of gnarled old Burmese women smoking potent green cheroots gave the
powerful anti-smoking lobby among us extra cause for wonder.


This was east-meets-west in a way Kipling never imagined - a rare example,
too, of the tourist brochures proving less appealing than the reality.


Against the more basic surroundings of the capital, Yangon (Rangoon to most
of us), Shwedagon looked as odd as putting marzipan on a bread pudding.


Apart from a handful of high-rise blocks and a few new hotels, the city has
not changed that much from British colonial days - except to become more a
human anthill. I returned from an attempted stroll through streets packed
with milling crowds and pavement traders feeling that I had been submerged
in a rugby scrum.


There are few, greener, more relaxing havens than the delightful former
royal park and lake with ornately carved royal barges. You can also still
enjoy sanctuary in that famous old watering hole for British expatriates,
the Strand Hotel, where they eased the White Man's Burden with gin slings.
New owners have made it more luxurious while retaining its traditional,
dignified atmosphere.


When you have as supremely comfortable a womb as the 8,282-ton Song of
Flower, moored near the city centre, there is no need for such a haven.
Nothing softens the clash of cultures more than travelling with all the
pleasures of home and more besides.


No desert oasis beckoned more strongly for weary camel drivers than our ship
did for passengers as they hurried back to wash away the least appealing of
Rangoon's features. Not, however, before they had been met by white-jacketed
stewards with scented flannels and a refreshing drink.


But not even a sanctuary as attentively secure as this can be entirely
immune to the more penetrating facets of tropical life. At our berth in the
muddy Rangoon River, it was not the dawn that came up like thunder so much
as the dusk descending in a cloudburst of tiny wings.


Huge squadrons of flying insects homed in on our bright lights to land and
cover the superstructure, decks and swimming pool in a moving carpet. Any
notions of a romantic stroll under the moonlight were rapidly dispelled as
passengers stayed firmly below in air-conditioned comfort and safety.


Normally such a hazard would be short-lived - most cruise calls last less
than a day - but our visit was exceptional in that the ship stayed four days
in Rangoon so passengers had the option of going further afield to see more
of Burma's pagoda attractions.


Behind the powerful pagoda lure, however, lay a more uneasy current of
politics. Should we be visiting Burma at all? A largely unasked question,
but one there all the same. Were we by the very act of being tourists
supporting a cruel dictatorship?


What conscientious objections may have existed were diminished by the
grandiosity of golden Shwedagon. Any that remained were finally dispelled by
the smiles on the faces of local traders as they gratefully received the
outpouring of our dollars.


For most of us, political correctness failed to compete with the temptation
of the remarkably cheap gems, jade, precious metals and handicrafts that we
found for sale.


But, when contemplating a tropical cruise, it is palm trees and golden
beaches that count for more than the politics. None of the nearly 100
passengers aboard were so happy as when we left Rangoon and reached our next
call on the Thai resort island of Phuket.


What made it specially appealing, and underlined the handy virtue of a small
cruise ship, was that we were landed straight on to one of the more alluring
beaches. Song of Flower carries its own roomy landing craft, which put us
ashore without our even needing to take our shoes off.


The fact that there was a hotel of comparable four-star standard immediately
handy was a bonus. Its amenities were freely available to us, along with a
juicy lunch buffet and free drinks. To make sure we remained spoilt the
ship's stewards landed with us.


With a staff of nearly two to every passenger, lifting a finger became more
like a commando exercise. What the ship lacked in amenities and
entertainment compared with those larger cruise vessels it made up for in
roomy cabin comforts and first-class service.


The Song of Flower may rate behind a few ships on the luxury scale but it
lacks nothing in exclusive intimacy and such appealing features as open
sitting for meals, full cabin service and all drinks and tips included in
the fare. Most tours were also part of the deal. Given all this, its average
daily rate of just over £400 is good value.


As we sailed on, via charming Penang and Kuala Lumpur to Singapore, our
final destination, I relished the thought that, in spite of what Kipling
wrote, east and west can come to terms ...even if you have to tread warily
at times.


The Song of Flower is operated by Radisson Seven Seas Cruises, Quadrant
House, 80 Regent St, London, W1R 6JB. Tel: 0171-287 9060/ fax: 0171-434 1410).


The 1998-99 programme includes cruises around Europe before it sails for
south east Asia again.