Ko Ko

I have to dedicate a posting to one young man we met in Bagan. The most westernized of any local we met, Ko Ko was probably 22, brash and your typical tourist hustler. He had big gold rimmed sunglasses and a slightly tight, v-neck metrosexual shirt. His hairstyle was black with flaming orange highlights and styled like any current US boy band member. He was incredibly image conscious and would fit in well in LA, NY or other major metropolitan area. His English was excellent.

He was smart and inquisitive and as interested in mining information about western culture as he was in mining our pocket books to fund his sand painting drawings.  We spent an entire lunch chatting with him while he pitched artwork to us and we were struck by what he symbolized.

Ko Ko was the perfect embodiment of the changes that the Myanmar culture seems to be undergoing. On the one hand, he was everything Myanmar people are known for; friendly, quick with a smile, willing to help and eager to talk about their land. On the other hand, he had clearly embraced (and was striving for) a very western life. The boy band hair and sunglasses (sorry world), the iPhone, non-traditional dress, conveyed his image and his desire to move to Australia, where and he was determined to work in his friend's restaurant and not "eat chicken" his whole life. And by "eat chicken" he meant that he wanted to date many Australian women and enjoy the variety of life.

While we thought we had him pegged initially as a self-serving hustler, we later ran into him when Rhonda's scooter had died on the side of the road at night.  While I went for help, Ko Ko saw Rhonda, tried to get the scooter started, and when he couldn't, he stayed and chatted with her until help arrived.  His Burmese sense of community and genuine sincerity were so evident, I can only hope those qualities don't get lost in the westernization of this country.