New Mandala

Myanmar government figures for the latest financial year have been released and essentially it’s more of the same.
Gas sales to Thailand amounted to about US$2.38 billion, a slight drop on last year’s $2.53 billion, and continued to be by far the largest export earner. However, the volume exported dropped sharply from 516 billion cubic feet [...]

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Thanks to a reader, here is another of our occasional updates on the rattus rattus situation in mainland southeast Asia. IRIN News reports that owls are being recruited to the fight against rats in northern Laos. As in other parts  of the region, bamboo flowering is blamed for high rat numbers:
Experts attribute the unusually large [...]

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There was a flurry of media excitement last week when it was announced that a prehistoric reptile had been granted a highly auspicious royal title.
The ancient land turtle was named “Basilochelys macrobios, in honour of His Majesty the King” according to The Nation. Drawing on my longstanding expertise with scientific nomenclature, I translated the royal turtle title [...]

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I hope that every one of us will keep our Thainess by eating Thai rice, not farang rice…I thank everyone who has worked on the rice patent issue.
- King Bhumibol Adulyadej quoted in “HM King praises Thai rice patent”, Bangkok Post, 25 June 2009.
I don’t spend much time scouting around for this kind of thing [...]

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There’s been another — albeit less tragic — mishap at a major Buddhist shrine in Myanmar, less than one week after the collapse of Danok Pagoda on May 30.
Exile news website Mizzima reports that eight monks were injured on June 4 when a lift malfunctioned at Myanmar’s largest standing Buddha, which is located near the [...]

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The “hair bridges” story about women in Sagaing Division selling their hair to raise money to rebuild bridges reminded me of another article published in The Myanmar Times, by journalist Cherry Thein.
The bridges the women are hoping to rebuild are on a section of the road between the Sagaing Division capital Monywa and Alaungdaw Kathapa [...]

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From the agricultural cycle of the Pulangka Yao to military “confiscations” by the KMT
Douglas Miles ( CIU, Ascona; James Cook University, ex Tribal Research Centre, Chiang Mai)
Aiontay has made the briefest comment (comment 7, May 14, 2009) to date relating to my initial New Mandala post (May 5, 2009) and to subsequent exchanges with others who have [...]

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Stir-fried or grilled, Vietnamese can’t seem to get enough of Cambodian rat meat, and the global influenza outbreak as well as recent heavy rains have proven a boon for both consumers and exporters.
- Extracted from Ek Madra, “Flu fears, rains buoy Cambodia rat exports to Vietnam”, Reuters India, 18 May 2009.
Long-time readers will know that [...]

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Image 1: Supplementary incising of a poppy capsule with a three-pronged scalpel. Yao who have worked elsewhere compare the intensity and delicacy of the task with embroidery.
Off-farm and Beyond Ockham in the Northern Thai Highlands: Further Philosophising on Opium, Overseas Aid and the Applied Anthropology of Tropical Agricultural Development
Douglas Miles (Anthropology, James Cook University, ex [...]

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One of the earlier posts I made on New Mandala highlighted a sign of ASEAN goodwill at an intersection outside Pitsanulok in central Thailand.  On this first day of May 2009 I thought it would be a nice idea to draw it, once again, to readers’ attention.  If you click on the image you will [...]

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