Fri 13 Feb 2015

Yesterday was a public holiday, Union Day. On Wednesday the internet went down in the whole of Dawei. Maja reckons it was shut down intentionally, to coincide with the holiday. Very possible. Having people with spare time and access to information can be hazardous to the well-being of a healthy dictatorship…..I mean democracy. We were not able to accomplish everything we wanted, but we did draw more money.

This morning we took the vomit-mobile back to the beach. From what we’ve heard from other travellers, the far south is very restricted and not worth the effort or hundreds of dollars. The government controls just about everything and tourists need to pay for permits, tour guides and more permits to visit the area. According to what we’ve read, the money goes straight into the pockets of government officials, instead of profiting the community or environment. We’ve donated enough money to the Nkandla Fund for my conscience to be clear about not giving to the needy government of Myanmar.

Apparently, the establishment on the beach is less than legal, but we’re happy to support a local, hard-working family. They are very friendly and extremely generous towards us. The north is very touristy and we don’t enjoy seeing other white people. If we went exploring we would just look for another beach, like this one.