Myanmar: the country of smiles

There is so much I want to say about Myanmar, but I wrote a version of this for class and it’s what I have time for.

After visiting a third country of squatting toilets, littered streets, questionable food and feeling anything but clean, I’ve learned what really grinds my gears in a third world country like Myanmar, the number one poorest country in the world. Yet none of the above has really stopped me in my tracks. But man, some of the people I was traveling with… I spent my trip in Myanmar on a Semester at Sea program that took us to ride elephants, play with kids at a local school, and spend time on the beautiful beaches of Ngwe Saung.

Myanmar is known as the country of smiles. Everyone is so damn happy all of the time; being from the East Coast, this is kind of a new thing for me. Each face I saw smiled at us, saying hello in English (they can understand the language, but hello is one of two words they can actually say, the other being Obama), wanting to talk interact with us. So many locals were just overall invested in our presence in their country.

But before I continue, you should know that the vice in Myanmar is called a beetle nut, which is basically a reddish nut wrapped in a leaf that acts like chewing tobacco. It’s stimulating, but turns your mouth red. And you can tell who chews it- overtime their teeth become a gross shade of red with deposits of brown in the creases of their gums and each tooth. So while the entire country smiles all the time, it’s not really that pretty of a site. Quite the paradox.

Anyway, despite the good vibes all around, there was one specific kid on my program that maintained such a resistance to immersing himself, ignorant towards the happiest people in the world. I had seen him the first afternoon in Myanmar, before the program began, at the Shwedagon Pagoda, one of the most beautiful sights I’ve seen in my entire life. As I stood there looking up at the enormous, shimmering golden symbol of their sacred Buddhist religion, I looked away to see this person wearing a bucket hat with red and white stripes and a blue brim tapered with white stars; his t-shirt, front and back, had the same patterns of red and white stripes and a blue bottom stripe with white stars; and on his back he carried a flagrantly patriotic backpack, striking with the same American flag. I’m not one to judge someone’s style, but his outfit made me wonder what people around him thought of this blatant foreign statement of an outfit. I later heard that he was walking around Japan in a shirt that said “back to back World War winners” and wore the same American flag shirt, camouflage pants and combat boots to the Vietnam War museum in Ho Chi Minh…

So as it turned out he was on my Myanmar program, but on another bus/group within the trip so the next time I spent time around him was at the local elementary school. Women there had spent all morning preparing lunch for us that consisted of a noodle soup with some meat and vegetables. When I first saw the meal I knew I wouldn’t be a vegetarian that day (although I did eat around the meat); when this kid sat down across from me and looked down at it, he pushed the bowl towards the center of the table and sat with his hands in his lap with a look of disgust. Everyone has been getting fed up with this kid. Someone next to him asked if he didn’t like the food.

“No, I’m just not going to eat it.”

“Have you even tried it?”

“No, I don’t want to. I’m not adventurous.”

“Well then why did you come on Semester at Sea?”

He responded to some effect of, “I figured, why not cruise around the world on the government’s dime through student loans?” Silence settled over the whole table. As we all withheld a reaction, a teacher walked by the table with the big bucket of noodle soup that she was serving out of, noticed he hadn’t touched it and gave him a huge smile with small laugh. I was amazed. It probably seemed more dramatic to me after hearing what this kid was saying. But with his stubborn resistance to be present in a moment of cultural immersion, I was struck how not only did this woman didn’t seem disrespected or offended, but instead reacted with positivity, enthusiasm and affirmation of his actions.

With such frustration, the constant smiles were almost penetrating. I’ve never felt so welcomed by even the man down the street who caught my eye in the distance, smiled and nodded towards me. There was not a single person whom I felt was rude or even unaffected by- literally everyone was smiling. It took me a little while to understand that people weren’t just going to pass me by with indifference towards my presence. Every local that we encountered, whether a passerby on the street or another customer at a restaurant, was constantly almost yelling at us, “mingdalaba” which means hello. Had it been anyone of them in America, they honestly might hate us. Especially if they visited New York, one of the most cut-throat, hostile, tough-cookie environments in existence. As the poorest country in the world, it sure is a happy place to be.