New Mandala

Here is a nice example of the hydrological mythology that often informs discussions of forest in southeast Asia, and elsewhere. This is from a Voice of America piece about forests in Laos:
The shrinking of forest areas has affected the country’s energy production. Officials say electricity produced by their country’s numerous dams was down 15% last [...]

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Thailand is now witnessing a new spate of interest in non-electoral forms of political representation. Last week Bangkok Pundit provided a brief, but important, post on the PA(S)D’s proposal for “sufficiency democracy”. It is a proposal for 30 percent of parliamentary representatives to be elected and 70 percent to be appointed. Those making the appointments [...]

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A “flash mob” for Burma will hit London tonight as campaigners urge commuters to remember victims of the cyclone and decades of human rights abuses in the country.
- Extracted from Joanna Sugden, “Flash mob for Burma hits London”, The Times, 25 June 2008.  If any New Mandala readers were there, or have thoughts on this [...]

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From The Nation:
As far as the media were concerned, Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej and Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama were “defeated” in first day of the censure debate in the House of Representatives. Headlines in almost all local newspapers backed the opposition Democrat Party saying Samak and Noppadon had lost the battle. The Democrat Party, like [...]

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Toshihiro Yoshida’s journey into northern Burma in 1985-1988

There have been numerous Japanese tales in Burma’s periphery. Some Japanese even participated in cross-border combat activities with ethnic minority armed groups, and a few of them published written accounts. Takazumi Nishiyama, the author of the book mentioned by Andrew earlier in these pages, was one of them. [...]

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Some years back I posted brief reflections on the sporadic “rat plagues” that have devastating implications for people in northern Burma, particularly in areas near the Indian border.  Parts of the Chin and Kachin States, and Sagaing Division, and perhaps other places too, are the hotspots for these rodent rampages.  Adjacent areas of northeast India [...]

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The vocabulary [of Jinghpaw] is not as meagre as has sometimes been stated. The opinion that tribes are found with a vocabulary of only a few hundred words simply reveals the ignorance of the dialect in question and linguistic studies in general. It has more than once been asserted that the illiterate Kachins have at [...]

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Mong bang mum khong withi chiwit “maeying lao” phan mummong khong  “maeying lao” (Aspects of Lao women’s lives, through their own eyes) (2007) by “Nang Thaenkhun” (ISBN: 9789746722711). The book is a welcome contribution on a neglected topic: a study of family law, with special emphasis on divorce law, in Laos. The author is concerned [...]

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I was [later] taken to the immigration office at the airport and on my passport they stamped “Deportee” and a big star. And the special branch guy, took a lot of photographs of me from various directions…
- Statement by Korean freelance journalist, Lee Yu Kyong, who was deported from Burma on Sunday, according to a report [...]

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Courtesy of Bangkpok Pundit I learned of a new political party taking to the streets of Bangkok.  The Pundit has this post in his “light relief” category (alongside, I noticed, a brief piece about Big Brother UK’s Thai housemate).  Hippy politics in Bangkok?  A cookie addict in Hertfordshire?  Crazy times.

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