I made it to one of the last frontiers I’ve wanted to travel to over the tail end of the Chinese New Years break. The place? Burma or as it calls itself: Myanmar. What follows are a bunch of incoherent ramblings concerning this enigmatic military playground.

So is it Burma, Myanmar or Pyi-daung-zu Myan-ma Naing-ngan-daw? In Chinese, it’s been called miǎndiàn (缅甸)(remote suburb) since the Yuan Dynasty set it up as a puppet province during its hegemonic heyday.

When the British came along on one of their jolly old imperial journeys, they first went through India, where it was called Brahma-desh or Barma, both were probably derived from the Burmese name Bama. These were taken and eventually mutated into “Burma”, and thus Burma became the English name. Fast forward a century or two, and the military government is throwing a temper tantrum when it finds out through democratic means that the people of Burma don’t really want to be ruled by a bunch of authoritarian douche bags. Some point not long after, they decided to rename the English name of the country to Myanmar, not to distant from the Burmese language name of Myanma that’s been used for centuries.

The problem now is that…well…you can’t just pick your own name! Especially not in a language that isn’t your own! That’s just fucking idiocy. It’s why you’ve got Chinese people running around with names like “Fenwick”, “Colour” and “Sandwich”. Thankfully, the major English-speaking countries have refused to recognize “Myanmar” and continue to use Burma. It should be noted that some media whores outlets do indeed use “Myanmar” hence the confusion.

Personally, I will continue to use Burma, as that’s what my grandparents always used, and being as they were born in the country in question, I think they knew what was what. Alas, when I arrived in Burma, and referred to it as such to the locals, they had no idea what I was talking about, so I quickly started saying “Myanma” in order to squeeze important facts out of them. For example what brand of beer they preferred. Sadly, it was “Myanmar Beer”.

Filed under: dragons