Gang Fight! Bowler Cops vs. Malpractice Gang

The Postcard

 

A postally unused postcard bearing no publisher's name. The card, which has a divided back, was printed in Saxony.

 

Zoological Gardens, Alipore, Kolkata

 

The Zoological Gardens, Alipore (also informally called the Alipore Zoo or Kolkata Zoo) is India's oldest zoological park (as opposed to Royal and British menageries), and is a major tourist attraction in Kolkata, West Bengal.

 

It has been open as a zoo since 1876, and covers 18.811 ha (46.48 acres). It is best known as the home of the Aldabra giant tortoise Adwaita, who was reputed to have been over 250 years old when he died in 2006.

 

It is also home to one of the few captive breeding projects involving the Manipur brow-antlered deer.

 

The zoo is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Kolkata, and draws huge crowds during the winter season, especially during December and January. The highest attendance to date was on the 1st. January, with 110,000 visitors.

 

History of the Zoological Garden

 

Both east and west of the roadway leading from the Zeerut bridge were untidy, crowded unsavoury slums. The Calcutta Zoo was built on the site of these slums.

 

A very large share of the credit for the establishment of this pleasant amenity resort is due to Sir Richard Temple, who was Lieutenant Governor of Bengal from 1874 to 1877.

 

However, long before the scheme assumed any proper shape, Dr. Fayrer in 1867 and Mr. L. Schwendler (known as the 'Father of the Zoo') in 1873 had strongly urged the necessity of a Zoological Garden.

 

The visit to Calcutta of His Majesty King Edward the Seventh, then Prince of Wales, was seized upon as a suitably auspicious occasion, and on the 1st. January 1876, the gardens were inaugurated by His Royal Highness. In May of the same year, they were opened to the public.

 

The zoo had its roots in a private menagerie established by the Governor General of India, Richard Wellesley. The menagerie had been established around 1800 in his summer home at Barrackpore near Kolkata, as part of the Indian Natural History Project.

 

The first superintendent of the menagerie was the famous Scottish physician zoologist Francis Buchanan-Hamilton. Buchanan-Hamilton returned to England with Wellesley in 1805 following the Governor-General's recall by the Court of Directors in London.

 

The collection from this era was documented in watercolours by Charles D'Oyly. The famous French botanist Victor Jacquemont. visited the menagerie, and so did Sir Stamford Raffles, in 1810.

 

Sir Stamford encountered his first tapir there, and doubtless used some aspects of the menagerie as an inspiration for the London Zoo.

 

The foundation of zoos in major cities around the world caused a growing movement among the British community in Kolkata that the menagerie should be upgraded to a formal zoological garden.

 

Strength to such arguments was lent by an article in the now-defunct Calcutta Journal of Natural History's July 1841 issue.

 

In 1873, the Lieutenant-Governor Sir Richard Temple formally proposed the formation of a zoo in Kolkata, and the Government finally allotted land for the zoo.

 

The zoo was formally opened in Alipore, with the initial stock consisting of the private menagerie of Carl Louis Schwendler (1838 – 1882), a German electrician who was posted in India to assess the feasibility of electrically lighting Indian Railway stations. Gifts of animals were also accepted from the general public.

 

The initial collection comprised the following animals: African buffalo, Zanzibar ram, domestic sheep, four-horned sheep, hybrid Kashmiri goat, Indian antelope, Indian gazelle, sambar deer, spotted deer and hog deer. It is not known whether the Aldabra giant tortoise Adwaita was among the opening stock of animals.

 

The animals at Barrackpore Park were added to the collection over the first few months of 1886, significantly increasing its size. The zoo was opened to the public on the 6th. May 1876.

 

The zoo grew based on gifts from British and Indian nobility - such as Raja Suryakanta Acharya of Mymensingh in whose honour the open air tiger enclosure is named.

 

Other contributors who donated part or all of their private menagerie to the Alipore Zoo included the Maharaja of Mysore Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV.

 

Kalākaua, the last king of Hawaii, visited the zoo on the 28th. May 1881 during his world tour.

 

The park was initially run by an honorary managing committee which included Schwendler and the famous botanist George King.

 

The first Indian superintendent of the zoo was Ram Brahma Sanyal, who did much to improve the standing of the Alipore Zoo, and who achieved good captive breeding success in an era when such initiatives were rarely heard of.

 

One such success story of the zoo was a live birth of the rare Sumatran rhinoceros in 1889. The next pregnancy in captivity occurred at the Cincinnati Zoo in 1997, but ended with a miscarriage. Cincinnati Zoo finally recorded a live birth in 2001.

 

Alipore Zoo was a pioneer among zoos in the 19th. century and the early part of the 20th. century under Sanyal, who published the first handbook on captive animal keeping.

 

The zoo had an unusually high scientific standard for its time, and the record of the parasite genus Cladotaenia (Cohn, 1901) is based upon cestodes (flatworms) found in an Australian bird that died at the zoo.

 

Controversy Associated With the Zoo

 

Pressed for space as Kolkata developed, and lacking adequate government funding, the zoo attracted controversy in the latter half of the 20th. This related to the cramped and unhygienic living conditions provided for the animals, a lack of initiative at breeding rare species, and for cross-breeding experiments between species.

 

The zoo has also, in the past, attracted criticism for keeping single and unpaired specimens of rare species like the banteng, the great Indian one-horned rhinoceros, the crowned crane and the lion-tailed macaque.

 

Lack of breeding and exchange programs has led to the elimination of individuals and populations of environmentally vulnerable species like the southern cassowary, wild yak, giant eland, slow loris and echidna.

 

The death of a great Indian one-horned rhinoceros sparked off speculation about the veterinary efficiency of the zoo. ZooCheck Canada found conditions in the zoo unsatisfactory in 2004. The zoo director Subir Choudhury has gone on record in 2006 as saying:

 

"We are aware that the animals and birds

are not well in the cages and moats.

Efforts are on minimizing their agony."

 

The zoo has also been criticized for the quality of its animal/visitor interaction. Teasing of animals was a common occurrence at the zoo, although corrective measures are now in place.

 

On the 1st. January 1996 the tiger Shiva mauled two visitors as they tried to garland it, killing one. Shiva was later shot and killed by the Indian Army. Another mauling leading to a death occurred in 2000.

 

The zoo has also been criticized for its animal/keeper relations. A chimpanzee attacked and severely injured its keeper in Alipore Zoo, and numerous other incidents have been reported, including the euthanising of an elephant that trampled its keeper to death in 1963.

 

In 2001, it was revealed that zoo staff had drugged the great Indian one-horned rhinoceros into relieving itself more often than normal in order to collect the urine and sell it on the black market as an anti-impotence medicine.

 

The Panthera Hybrid Program

 

The zoo attracted flak from the scientific community because of cross breeding experiments between lions and tigers to produce strains like tigons, and litigons.

 

The zoo bred two tigons in the 1970's – Rudrani (born in 1971) and Ranjini (born in 1973). They were bred from the cross between a royal Bengal tiger and an African lion.

 

Rudrani went on to produce 7 offspring by mating with an Asiatic lion, producing litigons. One of these litigons, named Cubanacan survived to adulthood, stood over 5.5 feet (1.7 m) tall, measured over 11.5 feet (3.5 m) and weighed over 800 pounds. Cubanacan died in 1991 at the age of 15. It was marketed by the zoo as the world's largest living big cat.

 

All such hybrid males were sterile. Quite a few of these creatures suffered from genetic abnormalities and many died prematurely.

 

Rangini, the last tigon in the zoo, died in 1999 as the oldest known tigon. The zoo has stopped breeding hybrids after legislation passed by the Government of India in 1985 banning breeding of panthera hybrids after a vigorous campaign by the World Wide Fund for Nature (then the World Wildlife Fund).

 

Attractions st the Zoo

 

Since the 1890's, wild birds have been nesting in large numbers within the zoo.

 

The zoo displays a large number of crowd-pulling megafauna, including the royal Bengal tiger, Asiatic lion, jaguar, hippopotamus, greater one-horned rhinoceros, giraffe, zebra, and Indian elephant.

 

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the zoo live-streamed virtual tours on Facebook.

 

The zoo has upgraded its customary checking of large felines after a tiger tested positive for COVID-19 at a zoological garden in New York. Prudent steps have been taken, including the spraying of antiviral medication inside the enormous felines' fenced-in area and in the nursery.

 

The zoo features a large collection of attractive birds, including some threatened species - there are large parrots including lories and lorikeets, as well as other birds like hornbills, colourful game birds like pheasants, and some large flightless birds like the emu and ostrich.

 

Layout of the Zoo

 

The Calcutta Zoo has been unable to expand its 45 acres (18 ha) or modify its basic layout for over 50 years, and thus has a rather dated plan. It contains a Reptile House (a new one has been built), a Primate House, an Elephant House, and a Panther House which opens out onto the open air enclosures for the lions and tigers.

 

The zoo also features a glass-walled enclosure for tigers, the first of its kind in India. A separate Children's zoo is also present, and the central water bodies inside the zoo grounds attract migratory birds.

 

The Calcutta Aquarium lies across the street from the zoo, and is affiliated with the zoo.

 

Breeding programs

 

The zoo was among the first zoos in the world to breed white tigers and the common reticulated giraffe. While it has successfully bred some megafauna, its rate of breeding rare species has not been very successful, often due to lack of initiative and funding.

 

One notable exception is the breeding programme for the Manipur brow-antlered deer, or thamin, which has been brought back from the brink of extinction by the breeding program at the Alipore Zoo.

 

The Adoption Scheme

 

An "Adopt an Animal" scheme began at the Alipore Zoological Gardens in August 2013 as a way to obtain funding for the zoo. About 40 animals were adopted as of August 2013.

 

The adopters receive tax benefits, are allowed to use photos of the animals in promotional materials, and get their name placed on a plaque at the animal's enclosure.

 

Sanjay Budhia, chairman of Confederation of Indian Industry, adopted a one-horned rhino.

 

Reforms

 

The zoo is presently downsizing to meet animal comfort requirements laid down by the Central Zoo Authority of India. It has also increased the number of open air enclosures.

 

A move to a suburban location was also contemplated, but was not undertaken based on the recommendations of the CZAI, which claimed that the Alipore site was of historical significance.

 

The CZAI also cleared the zoo of malpractices in an evaluation performed in late 2005, even though the zoo has continued to attract bad press.

 

Ecological Significance of the Zoo Grounds

 

The zoo is home for wintering migratory birds such as ducks, and maintains a sizable wetland. Since the zoo is enveloped by urban settlements for miles, the zoo wetlands are the only resting spot for some of the birds, and are a focus of conservationists in Kolkata.

 

However, the number of migratory birds visiting the zoo dropped from documented highs by over 40% in the winter of 2004–2005. Experts attribute the causes of the decline to increased pollution, new construction of high-rises in the area, increasing threats to the summer grounds of the birds, and declining quality of the bodies of water at the zoo.

The Bundaberg Region.

The rich volcanic soils of the plains near Bundaberg and the Burnett River were covered with thick scrub and bush but a few adventurous pastoralists tried to establish sheep grazing there in the 1850s. It was easier away from the Bundaberg site at Gin Gin and Gayndah further inland. More white settlers came in the mid-1860s as timber cutters. In these early years clashes with the local Aboriginal people were often violent. Aboriginal massacres are known to have occurred at Gin Gin in 1850, in North Bundaberg in the early 1860s. The first timber cutters arrived in the Bundaberg area 1867 followed by the first white farmers also in 1867. The first saw mill was erected in 1868. The town site was surveyed and laid in 1870. Experimental sugar cane farms began around 1871 and within a few months the sugar mills was built. As sugar plantations increased Bundaberg ended up with four major sugar mills. The sugar cane plantations were usually owned by the mills, run as large plantations and they employed Kanaka or South Sea Islander indentured labourers. Thus like Maryborough Bundaberg became a main entry point for the South Sea Islanders. The town grew quickly as more farmers took up small selections or acreages often growing maize or small amounts of sugar cane. The local Kolan Shire council was formed in 1873 and Bundaberg was emerging as a town. It became a municipality in 1881 and a city in 1913. The discovery of copper and that start of mining operations at nearby Mt Perry in 1871 really boosted the prospects of Bundaberg. The first bank opened in 1872, the first newspaper began publication in 1875 and a coach service operated to Maryborough until the railway line was completed in 1888. The government wharf in Bundaberg was built in 1875 with the main cargoes being timber and maize. The Primitive Methodists built an early brush and timber church in 1877 and the Anglicans completed their first church in 1876. But the Catholics were the first to build a permanent church which was consecrated in 1875. The town was well established but the big transformation occurred in the early 1880s when the land owners developed the sugar industry to its full extent until sugar eclipsed all other crops. In 1881 the Bundaberg region produced 3% of QLD’s sugar crop. In 1883 it produced 20% of QLD’s sugar crop. This domination of sugar persisted from 1880 through to 1915. New sugar mills started up with the new Millaquin mill in 1882 and mills for the Youngs of Fairymead and the Gibsons of Bingera. Stable prices for sugar assisted with this development of sugar mills and by the mid-1880s more sugar farms were being established reliant on European labour instead of South Sea Islander labour. The 1885 QLD Royal Commission into malpractices with the Kanaka trade meant the government intervened more to control conditions of the indentured labourers and limited the trade. These restrictions were lifted in 1891 to boost the sugar industry again but the emerging labour unions and associations of white labourers opposed the revival of the Kanaka trade as their employment suffered because of the trade. The new Commonwealth government of 1901 made the decision to cease the trade from 1906. As the sugar industry had to restructure itself the QLD government started to build and financially back the sugar mills itself at Gin Gin and Isis. They also tried to control the mills of Fairymead and Bingera and CSR (Colonial Sugar Refining.)The Labour government of QLD established sugar price control in 1915 and set up a board of appeal for complaints from growers against the sugar mills. By 1915 Bundaberg was in fierce competition with sugar cane areas in the Far North QLD and the industry was much regulated. But it has survived well to the present day. This has been assisted by a new port at Burnett Heads which was built in 1962.

 

Apart from the sugar industry the growth of Bundaberg has been assisted by mining, fruit and vegetable growing and the development of side products from sugar – molasses and rum distilling. The first rum was distilled from the Millaquin sugar mill in 1888. The town was boosted greatly by the opening of the railway from North Bundaberg to Mt Perry copper mines in 1884 which in turn encouraged the establishment of foundries and works to support the mines in Bundaberg. By the 1880s Bundaberg has some grand buildings appropriate for a regional city. The commercial and civic heart of the town was in Bourbong Street with the Post Office 157 Bourbong St (1891), the War Memorial 180 Bourbong St (1922), the School of Arts building 184 Bourbong St (1889), the former Commercial Bank 191 Bourbong St (1891) etc.

 

Medical malpractice (wrong patient surgery) is entirely preventable. Human error is behind almost 80% of adverse events in complex healthcare systems, making it the sixth leading cause of preventable death in America.

Our disabled daughter, Christina Nichole, was physically and mentally abused by a doctor and police officer at the Gray's Harbor County Hospital in Aberdeen WA last Thursday, March 11, 2010, while she was there after being transported by ambulance to seek care for a 10-day severe headache and nearly continuous epileptic seizures. She just spent a week in Harborview Hospital receiving her 3rd brain study and medicine change by Dr. Wilensky throughout her life so far, which again diagnosed the many types of seizures she has. Dr. Wilensky's staff had advised her to call 911 to go to the ER, which she did. She was instructed to have the ER doctor call them, with a number they gave Christina, and to make arrangements to have her flown to Harborview, if needed. The ER doctor apparently did not like that, and told Christina to leave, without any work-up or care. Christina requested a different doctor and a patient's advocate. In response the non-caring doctor called the police to have her removed from the ER. The policeman told her to get out of the bed, and she tried to cooperate, but went into a seizure, falling back on the bed. The policeman grabbed her arm, pulling her out of the bed. In the process he damaged her shoulder and neck, and caused her to land on her feet which have both been recently operated on 3 times and are still trying to heal correctly. Her feet were hurt and damaged and she screamed in pain from the abusive, sedistic, arm pulling which resulted in trauma to the arm, shoulder, and neck, as well as her feet. Then she felt nauseaous and reached toward to the wall dispenser for a vomit bag and the policeman forcefully hit her other arm with his fist, not allowing her to get the bag. She again screamed from the new pain of her other arm being hit so hard. She kept falling down because she was still very much disoriented, confused, and unstable from her seizure(s) and the relentless headache, which had been diagnosed a few days earlier when she was taken by ambulance to the same ER for the same reasons, by had a caring doctor who treated her correctly, even though failing to follow standard procedures of care and testing by not taking a cat scan, blood work, or UA, which her family doctor, local neurologist, and Harborview Epilepsy Center had requested when advising her to go to the emergency room, four days in a row while my husband and I were in Seattle where I had surgery at Swedish Hospital leaving home on Monday and returning Thursday night. The policeman continued man-handling her limp body and threw her into a wheelchair without leg and foot rests. He told her to pick up her feet because they were dragging under the wheelchair backwards, but she had no body control to be able to follow his orders. He said she could let her feet drag behind her under the wheelchair because he did not care. He called her a baby and told her act her age when she cried and was terrorized. Her records show clearly that she was in a coma in 2004, declared brain dead, somehow came back but lost 20 years of memory and has daily short-term memory loss and multiple kinds of seizures, including life-threatening grandmal seizures. She looks like a 37 year old woman, but is very much like a 12 year old child when put in stressful situations. She was terrified, feared for her life, and could not understand anything clearly. The officer told her to leave the hospital, go out into the cold, rainy night, with no transportation. She asked to call her parents but could not understand how to operate the pay phone or remember our cell phone numbers. The policeman told her that no one wanted to talk to her so she was on her own and if she did not leave the hospital he was going to arrest her. She somehow left a message on our home phone. As soon as my husband heard the message he called the hospital and told them to keep her there and safe until he could drive the 25 miles to get there. During the wait the policeman intimidated Christina by standing behind her, jingling coins and keys, and threatening her to leave immediately or be arrested. When my husband arrived the policeman attempted to intimidate him by puffing himself up and threatening to arrest them both if they did not leave immediately. My husband took out his notebook and began collecting names and titles. He spoke with the head nurse. When finished he took Christina to our car and brought her home. She was emotionally damaged as much as she was physically damaged, and the brain swelling, headache, and seizures were not treated. The next morning deep bruise marks were showing on both arms and both feet. Her shoulder and neck were in tremendous pain. Her entire body hurt from the abuse, mishandling, torture, and trauma she had experienced. My husband drove her to Olympia WA, to the Capital Mall Hospital emergency room where she received kind and caring evaluation of all her injuries. The staff consulted with the doctor at Harborview Epilepsy Center and they determined an appropriate course of treatment. It was determined that she did not have to be airlifted to Harborview with this treatment plan being provided in this ER. X-rays and a Cat Scan were taken of her brain, arms, and feet. A suspicious spot was found on the Cat Scan that may explain why she was having so many seizures, headache, and brain swelling. It needs to be further evaluated, which she has an appointment with her Neurologist to do. The injuries inflicted by the policeman are severe, but no bones were broken. The bruising is massive and was documented with photographs and medical records by us and the Olympia ER staff. On Saturday my husband took Christina to the local Westport Fire Station to meet with the ambulance crew. Christina is well-known in Westport and everyone on the ambulance crews knows her medical history and has taken care of her dozens of times since we moved here after her coma. They call her their 'miracle girl' and always tell her how much they enjoy her and her always cooperative and happy nature, regardless of how much pain or distress she may be in at any time. The ambulance crew was devastated to learn that Christina was abused by the doctor, nurses, aids, and policeman at the emergency room they took her to on Thursday evening. They documented everything and reported the situation to the local city police department. The Westport police came and was equally upset. He took statements and then called a County Sheriff to the fire station. The Sheriff also took statements and made a report. On Monday (today), 3/15/2010, Christina was seen and evaluated by her family physician, Dr. Jackson, her foot surgeon, Dr. Tronvig, and her Chiropractor, Dr. Failor. They are all shocked and disgusted at what they saw. They all know Christina to be a sweet, trusting, loving child who has survived unimaginable odds and is always happy and thankful. Like us, they cannot fathom how this horrible abuse, neglect, and trauma could have happened to her. Why would anyone want to hurt her this way? Tomorrow she has an appointment to see Dr. Miller, her local Neurologist in Aberdeen. He will do his evaluation of the damages and follow-up on her seizure and headache conditions. He will determine if she needs to begin phychological counseling, either as an out-patient or as an in-patient, because Christina is so severely traumatized now. Coming out of the coma knowing that her doctors fought with us to try to get us to sign papers to allow them to euthanize her and harvest anything viable when she was in her locked-in coma, hearing everything but unable to respond was bad enough, but this added to that is simply too much. She has an appointment to see Dr. Wilensky at Harborview Epileptic Center on March 26, 2010 for further evaluation. I want to stress that Christina was following her doctor's orders to call the ambulance each time she went to the ER while my husband and I were away. Her doctors called her each day, several times a day, to ask how she was doing and to supervise her care while she was home alone. At no time was she seeking 'drugs', as the ER doctor flattly told her and labeled her. At no time did she resist the officer or do anything to warrent him putting his hands on her or drag her feet under the wheelchair. Dr. Wilensky called a prescription of pain pills into the pharmacy for her on Friday to take for her head pain, but she declined to pick up the prescription because she does not like to take pain pills as they make her very sick to her stomach and alter her thinking and feelings. She may take what is prescribed to her at an ER for pain while she is there, but does not want to take it at home. Her foot doctor says that her feet will heal, but her foot surgery recovery has been set back by at least another two weeks due to the damages the officer caused her. The bruises will eventually heal and the pain from them will fade away with time. Her shoulder and neck injuries will heal with the care of the Chiropractor. But Christina's trust in the emergency room at Aberdeen and the police there has been shattered and can never be repaired. The Westport ambulance crew said that they will take her to Willapa Hospital ER from now on, which is about twice the distance, but they no longer trust the Gray's Harbor Hospital ER to take appropriate care of Christina again. When my husband or I take her to an ER, we will make the long drive to Olympia and never let her out of our sight for even a minute. We retained an attorney today to handle this case against the Gray's Harbor Hospital and staff and the Aberdeen Police Dept. and officer. What amazing timing. We are scheduled to give our first depositions this week in Seattle in our lawsuit against Eli Lilly who makes Zyprexa, which put Christina into her coma in 2004. Attached are some photos of Christina's bruises taken on Saturday. If you haven't read the story of her coma yet, you can find it at: pekingeseshihtzu.wordpress.com/christina-nichole%e2%80%99...

 

Where's the outrage, America?

This is NOT ethical medicine.

Research the foreskin.

Say NO to Genital Mutilation.

 

www.BLOODSTAINEDMEN.org

Schirrous cord is an infection in the distal part of the cord that attaches the testicle to the abdominal cavity, which is left behind. This can result in the formation of a closed abscess.

 

Schirrous cord is the second most common complication seen when castrating horses, the first being excessive hemorrhage.

 

Although castration is the most common Equine Field surgery it is also the number one reason for malpractice suits in the Equine industry.

 

Read on at vetmoves.com/equine/schirrous-cord-complication-of-a-rout...

The infamous hospital closed in 2013 after numerous complaints of malpractice and Medicare fraud. Organized initially as Franklin Boulevard Community Hospital in the 1920s, it was later renamed West Side Community Hospital until it was acquired by a for-profit investor who later went to the prison. The 56,582 square-foot facility at 3240 W. Franklin Blvd. was purchased for a mere $250,000 in 2014. NOTE: A demolition permit was issued for the entire complex in June 2022.

[Leo Frank Museum and Gallery Curator Commentary-

 

Question: Are the matriculated students at Mercer Law School and practicing attorneys (who have graduated from other law colleges), being proselytized as some audience members have claimed?

 

I spoke in person with some audience members after the historian Roy Barnes' event concluded, to get their feedback and asked others to email correspond with me about their thoughts on the November 12, 2019, Mercer Law School talk on the Leo Frank Case.

 

Unfortunately, due to politeness standards, some of the cuss words I had to star out. Regrettably, going against my monolithic freedom of speech policy, I also had to edit out some of the more inflammatory comments which went far beyond "all the words fit to print." I apologize for that, but practically, I don't want Flickr to shut down this account, due to publishing all the angry words of those attendees.

 

Due to long-standing "smear-fear" threats of being "dossiered" or "doxxed" on ADL, SPLC, and other Jewish civil rights websites with the "race-prejudice" charge, interviewing Mercer Law Students had to be conducted anonymously for them to agree to communicate in private, face-to-face, or through e-mail correspondence.

 

Since I started the Leo Frank Museum Gallery in 2011/2012, I have been deluged with requests, heated debate, and hate mail, including anti-Semitism toward myself and racist accusations that I am a self-hating Jew.

 

My goal in creating this public gallery-space on Flickr is not to stoke the burning embers of this contentious Jewish-Gentile ethno culture war, but to allow people to express their pain and frustration caused in the aftermath of this event; and to promote calm dialogue and get even-handed consensus, after people get their emotions and personal feelings off their chests.

 

The biggest problem that exists right now is that there are two diametrically polarized camps over this criminal affair, with little to no cross-communication between them. I hope to use this Flickr space to bridge that gap by promoting more dialogue, study, research, inquiry, and expression of thoughts, not less.

 

It's ironic and shameful that Jeff Bezos said, "Democracy Dies in Darkness", but then regularly uses his Amazon.com platform to engage in book burning, censoring thousands of books which are deemed unorthodox by Jewish Civil Wrongs organizations.

 

As a Jew, I am ashamed that Jewish ethnic-religious activist groups are at the vanguard of promoting Internet censorship. I hope to fight back against their nefarious destructions of our civil liberties and their grotesque inhumanity of silencing critics. Indeed, "Democracy Dies in Darkness!" ADL-sponsored Big-tech censorship by oligopolies such as Amazon, Google, Twitter, and Facebook, is not the way forward to building understanding between people with different views. I hope to make this gallery space a place where people can let their unheard voices be heard.

 

I'm not alone in these sentiments, but I think it's time for there to be a national inquiry into the official legal records of this case, by all the American attorneys and American law professors of the land, so we can bring it to some kind of closure as to whether or not Leo Frank should be fully granted his vindication or allow his presently recognized verdict of guilt remain a kind of black-letter artifact of history. We also should review the validity of his posthumous pardon which was without exoneration--as to whether or not it was legal. If it wasn't legal, it should be nullified. A retired Georgia judge said for a pardon to be valid it must be agreed to by the living convict, dead people can not make that choice for themselves.

 

Not in any order, we published here some of the attendees' edited commentaries, dispositions that are shared by many Americans, not just Georgians. There is a growing rage brewing amongst Georgians over the centenary Leo Frank case due to the new 2019 efforts by Paul Howard, Roy Barnes, and Dale Schwartz, with Jewish committees in the background, seeking to get a long-dead Leo Frank a new trial. A new trial where neither he, nor any of the originally subpoenaed testifiers are alive, or able to be present for Leo Frank's coming second trial.

 

Multitudes of Georgians and Americans alike, are asking: Is that Justice or injustice? Is that constitutional or unconstitutional? Since I am not an attorney or constitutional scholar, I can not answer those questions.

 

One Jewish law student named "David" to protect his identity, informally stated, "There is too much danger these days of stepping out of ideological lines at law school, and undergraduate colleges/universities."

 

Controversy ruptured in the Fall semester of 2019 at Mercer Law School. Students have reached the edge of their patience after this November 12, 2019, lecture by Roy Barnes was hosted by Mercer Historians of Jurisprudence (I don't know if I got that name right).

 

This background information was released and re-written to alter the "gait" and protect the identity of the Mercer Law Students who were present. They wished to namelessly give their opinions without the consequences of voicing rival assessments. The information below was submitted by email, and also captured in person immediately after the lecture concluded, these impressions were afterward edited so Law professors couldn't identify the syntactical formulation of their students and out them.]

 

@@@@@@@@@@

 

ROY BARNES AT MERCER COLLEGE LECTURING ON THE LEO FRANK CASE, 11-12-2019 (Barnes was Gov. of GA, 20-odd years ago).

 

Students were reticent to speak out about their real feelings in the hallways (except if their names were promised not to be mentioned), out of fear of retaliation or ostracization by Mercer law school professors, so they cautiously wished to remain unnamed. There is a real culture of dread at universities for being singled out and smeared with the "race prejudice card" of "Antisemitism", when it can forever ruin your future prospects of a successful law career. Mercer Law School is no different in these viewpoints of students.

 

"Daniel," said, "It sucks". "Even mentioning the climate of reticence is dangerous because it could imply you might be awakened to the limited and narrow footpath of legal opinions you're allowed to hold in law school. Even saying the term "free speech" these days can get you labeled as using the "alt-right" codeword of "White Supremacists". Law school might as well be called P.C. University (Politically Correct University), where you get indoctrinated in modern orthodox "safe-think" and 'safe-speak'.... he opined."

 

The General Consensus of Attendees:

 

Mercer students, historians, attorneys, and others who were obligatorily required to attend these educational meetings for "continuing credits" are asking why they are being pre-required to silently watch demagogues speak who are "twistorians" not historians, intentionally falsifying the chronicles of the trial to proselytize people into the tiresome cult of rehabilitating Leo Frank, a lethal child-molester.

 

Students often sit through these new-think forums calmly and quietly, but the idea that no one knows about the Leo Frank trial in this the disinformation age, no longer stands. The lack of truthful knowledge about L.M.F. ended a decade ago (circa 2010), when after 97 years since 1913, the brief of evidence was finally put online by the Leo Frank research library @ www.LeoFrank.org and that ended a hundred years of single-dimension hype that he was some kind of tragic civil rights hero ensnared in a Salem witch trial. When people read his appeals records they realize this was no American Dreyfus affair.

 

Mercer students want to know why they only get the defense or Frank-Partisan version of the double murder and never the prosecution side or then-prosecutor opinions of the events?

 

Mercer Law Students are tired of the older generations, from its old crusty pedagogues, new ideological adherent teachers, to fake-news journalists, trying to inculcate them with politically correct activist goals of turning the contemporary events of that legal drama on its head.

 

Mercer Law Students want their professors to know they can see right through the ruse.

 

Mercer Law Students want to learn how to read between the lines, and Mercer students want to learn how to read between the lies, not just be told what to think by dusty old farts who lived their entire academic tenure or worked through lengthy law careers promoting lies about the Leo Frank trial.

 

Mercer Law Students are beginning to think the law school academy in its totality is nothing more than a brainwashing indoctrination mill for powerful forces with certain social manipulation goals.

 

Mercer Law School Millennials would like to say F* you to all the boomers and apparatchik teachers, who are trying to draft us into their racist evangelism of hating on White Southerners and Christians of all colors, and stirring up old blood feuds about over-the-top claims of anti-Semitism.

 

Mercer Law Students don't want to dig up old ghosts for the prior generations who have turned the centenary scandal into a Twilight Zone episode or science-fiction horror film, where the pedophilic monster Leo M. Frank is the "real victim", and the child who refused to yield her virtue to him is an after-thought or an excuse to rationalize attributing wrongful guilt on two American black men (#BlackLivesMatter) for the slaying of the little White girl.

 

Mercer Law Students in unison would like to acknowledge they refuse to be brainwashed by Leo Frank's revolting admirers and want to let you baby boomers know, "F* you BOOMERS, you are like colon cancer."

 

Mercer Law students want their "law college" administrators to know that they can make their own decisions about the evidence of this case. They don't want to be force-fed biased fairylands about poor little innocent child sex predator, Leo M. Frank, unless the trial brief of evidence doesn't actually sustain his guilt--which it most certainly does sustain his guilt. Even the Georgia Supreme Court AGREES. But we don't get to learn that at Mercer Law School because it's run by PC cowards. said "Walt", a second-year law student.

 

"Mercer Law Students want their professors to know that this is exasperating, after 106 years of this nonsense, we now have to inherit this vomit waterfall coming from hobbled, ancient, groveling White cuck, coming out to yakety-yak on us with the supposition we must take on the hereditary mantle of their anti-Gentile blood libel. The Jew trope blames White Southerners of anti-Semitic framing and falsely accuses the black graveyard-shift security guard-on fire watch-for the little girl being sodomized and suffocated with a packing-twine garrot by the Jewish maniac who took her young life away. Nice try, it's not gonna happen," said "Mitch" a first-year student."

 

Leo Frank's Army of Pedophile-Denialists

 

"It's almost like the pedophile-denialists are worse than the killer pedophile himself, Frank. The people who enabled Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby, and other sexual predatory degenerates are worse than the predator freaks themselves. Without these enablers, the fiendish perverts could have never been serial rapists. F* you pedophile-denialists, we are #MeToo STRONG," said "Deb" one of the few female attorneys at the event.

 

"Leo Frank was a serial rapist pedophile, Mary Phagan wasn't the only girl he defiled. Leo Frank also defiled former factory girl Dewey Howell, who told police that after Leo Frank had seduced her in the 1911-1912 time frame, he slithered down backward between her legs and bit her on the crease area adjoining laterally to the vagina. He bit her so hard he left permanent scars on the side of her private parts. This is the man they are defending. This is the man they want a street named after. This is the man they named a memorial park after in Marietta. May the Goddess of Karma put on her steel-toed high heels and kick them in their asses for all eternity, and punish them in Milton's inner hell. #MeToo," said one transgender LGBTQ+ correspondent, who asked to be described as "Rhonda".

 

"Mercer Law Students are incensed they are being told righteously indignant morality tales about a crookedly rehabilitated libertine. The counter showing affidavits in Leo Frank's appeals records, exhibit the culture and climate he created at the National Pencil Company. We're gonna transcribe the 240-something page docs in the GASC files and publish them online. We're not going to take it anymore or allow these faggily pedophile-denialists shovel their horse manure down our throats anymore. We're sick and tired of this crap. We see your four-flusher disinfo campaign, and we raise you an info war with an Ace-high royal flush.", said "Brad".

 

Others not wanting any names mentioned:

 

Mercer Law Students can figure things out for ourselves, and we believe the evidence proved Frank's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. He had a fair trial and was duly convicted. Capital punishment was fitting.

 

Mercer Law Students are no longer allowing curmudgeon boomers and other waddling decrepit old slicksters to trick us into taking one side or the other. We have reviewed the brief of evidence in the GASC appeals, and believe the jury made the right decision. So F* you lying boomers. We can't wait until you're gone, so the little girl and her family can finally have some peace. And if you want to go on for 100 years more, BRING IT ON BITCHES. To those who use phantasmagorical fables to convince us Leo Frank is innocent, when you die, may the devil sodomize you for all eternity.

 

Mercer Law Students are sick and tired of the pro-Frank propaganda being forced down their throats with these mandatory brain reprogramming sessions, where indoctrination and proselytizing is being conducted by agitators with a cynical vengeance for a lost cause. We know it would be the crowning injustice if Leo M. Frank was made officially innocent in 2021 or 2022 by a committee of pro-Frank agitators. They are force-feeding racist and ethnic lies down the students' mouths about non-existent mobs supposedly tampering and bullying the jury every morning as the talesmen walked to the courthouse. WE CALL BULLSHIT ON YOU NASTY LYING STEAMING COILS OF SHIT.

 

Mercer Students reviewing this true-crime or "cold-case" depending on which side you come from want SOUTHERN inquiry into this full thing because the anti-Gentile blood libel, the infoswindles, and the compulsive falsehoods coming out of it are so thick you can eat them with a spoon.

 

APPENDIX

 

Infamous Leo Frank trial, lynching to be reexamined by new Fulton County task force

 

The case will join the Atlanta Child Murders and other infamous Fulton County cases getting a second look

 

Author: Christopher Buchanan, Ryan Kruger

 

TEXT ARTICLE: www.11alive.com/article/news/1915-lynching-of-leo-frank-t...

 

Published: May 7, 2019

 

ATLANTA — A now-infamous case involving the lynching of a Jewish man in Marietta after his sentence was commuted in Fulton County will be one of a growing number of cases getting a new look by a specialized team.

 

Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard announced that former Governor Roy Barnes had brought the case of Leo Frank to his attention years ago. Now, that same case is being reexamined by the newly formed Conviction Integrity Unit - and Barnes is acting as an advisor.

 

"After he was convicted, he was sentenced to hang," Howard said. "His sentence was commuted [by the Governor who was part owner of the law firm who represented Leo Frank at his trial. That law firm was called "Rosser, Brandon, Slaton and Phillips"] and he was placed in a prison in Milledgeville, but he was removed from the prison in Milledgeville, he was brought to Marietta and he was lynched."

 

Frank had been accused [He wasn't just accused, a Coroner's jury voted unanimously 6 to 0 to have him bound over for suspicion of murder, a grand jury voted 21 to 0 to indict him, a trial jury and judge voted 13 to 0 to convict him and sentence him to death], in 1913 of murdering Mary Phagan, the child of tenant farmers who had moved to Atlanta. Her body was found in the cellar of a pencil company Frank managed. Being the last known person to see her alive - picking up her wages - Frank was accused of her rape and murder. [Convicted not just and only accused, and his guilty verdict was never disturbed by the Georgia Supreme Court or the United States Supreme Court.]

 

A jury convicted Frank based mainly on the testimony of a janitor [It wasn't just the Janitor Jim Conley who helped convict Leo Frank, it was also Monteen Stover who said Leo Frank's office was empty at the time Leo Frank said he was there alone with Mary Phagan, and Leo Frank responded to Monteen Stover's testimony that his office was empty because he went to the toilets in the machine department where Phagan was murdered at the same time she was theorized to have been murdered by the police and prosecution team.]. The conviction was appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, where the appeal was denied on procedural grounds - though two justices dissented based on allegations of mob law.

 

Barnes recounted what jurors allegedly faced as they were moved from a nearby location to the courthouse during the trial. [Roy Barnes is making false statements and lying for the Jewish Supremacist civil rights groups who are covertly behind the Atlanta DA's CIU. There were teams of photographers and reporters outside the Fulton County courthouse in July and August of 1913, when the trial was taking place, they never reported crowds shouting anti-Semitic death threats at the jury, every single morning as Roy Barnes claimed on numerous occasions (2 of those occasions caught on film). Leo Frank in his appeals to State and Federal courts, never said he didn't have a fair trial, specifically, because mobs were screaming anti-Semitic death threats at the jury every morning or at all. Roy Barnes is promoting an anti-White hate crime and race-prejudice fraud, he is a disgusting man, lying to get a serial Jewish pedophile exonerated of a crime he committed.].

 

Roy Barnes LIES:

 

"As they would march up the jurors every day to go to the Fulton County courthouse, the crowd would chant, 'Hang the Jew or we'll hang you'," he said.

 

[Everyday?!?! Not even one day.]

 

[Roy Barnes is a habitual liar who is intentionally poisoning the CIU with his anti-Gentile jury tampering calumny, he keeps repeating this Jewish supremacist lie at other open meetings, such as Mercer Law School (caught on film, we have the tape).]

 

Eventually, then-Governor John Slaton commuted Frank's sentence to life imprisonment based on his own investigation - assuming he would be set free once his innocence was officially established. [Not true, then-Governor Slaton state officially in his 29-page commutation (available online) of Leo Frank that he was sustaining the jury's verdict of guilt, only changing the death penalty with life in prison, which was an equal punishment.].

 

Many in the state, however, were enraged having followed media reports damning Frank. His throat was slashed [July 17, 1915]in a Milledgeville prison camp months after arriving. He survived only to be hanged by Marietta [and Atlanta] residents who took him from his cell and took him back to their city. They called themselves the Knights of Mary Phagan [They didn't call themselves the Knights of Mary Phagan, that's a Jewish supremacist hoax] - a group later tied to the revival of the Ku Klux Klan [The Klan was revived due to the 1915 film 'Birth of a Nation'].

 

"There is no doubt in my mind - and we'll prove it at the appropriate time - that Leo Frank was not guilty," Barnes said. [At the appropriate time? He's been going around giving speeches that crowds of people outside the courtroom where screaming anti-Semitic terrorist threats at the jury, thereby tamping with the jury, "scaring" them into convicting Leo Frank and therefore voting guilty out of fear not facts. He is pure evil, he will say anything to rehabilitate the deadly child molester Leo Frank.]

 

While among the oldest, and perhaps the case that inspired the unit's founding [Not "perhaps", The unit admitted the Leo Frank case inspired its founding, with that date being April 26, 2019, the anniversary of Mary Phagan's murder. Proof is on the district attorney's website], the case of Leo Frank is far from the only one being reviewed by the new task force - and not the only one now infamous in the state.

 

...snip...

 

Credit: 11Alive

 

www.11alive.com/article/news/1915-lynching-of-leo-frank-t...

 

Watch the video of Roy Barnes making false statements on TV about terrorist jury tampering efforts on a morningly basis, for a trial that was 25 days of actual in courtroom proceedings.

 

Transcription of the Tuesday, November 12, 2019, Mercer Law School Monologue by Roy Barnes on Leo Frank is available below:

 

Video of the Mercer Monologue on the Leo Frank case and the efforts to exonerate him:

youtu.be/TIviA9GXGQI

 

TRANSCRIPTION BEGINS

 

[Jack Saw Speaks] Alright, good afternoon!

 

Thank you, everybody, for joining us despite the rain and the cold. I'm Jack Saw, I'm the president of Historians in Law School, it's a student organization here at school, and we're excited, together with the school, and with the help of our Dean Kathy Cox, to be sponsoring this event. And we're excited to see such a good turnout, including my fellow students and alumni. Welcome back, and welcome home. And current attorneys here in town. So I'll turn it over to Dean Kathy Cox to introduce our speaker.

 

[Dean Kathy Cox Speaks] Thank you, Jack, and good afternoon to all of you. I want to say a special word of welcome to Judge Hugh Lawson. We are always glad to have you here judge and to my friend, and fellow public servant former state representative, Larry Walker, from Perry, who served in the Georgia legislature with Governor Barnes and me, we're glad that both of you could be here along with so many other friends, alumni, and students today. It's a real pleasure to introduce you to former governor Roy Barnes.

 

Governor Barnes is a lifelong resident of Cobb County, Georgia. He is a “double-dog,” having earned his history degree and his law degree from the University of Georgia and the Georgia law school. He first went to work as a prosecutor in the Cobb County District Attorney's office after graduating from law school, before opening his own law firm in Marietta, where he continues to practice today.

 

The political bug bit him really early. He was elected to the Georgia Senate at age 26, becoming the youngest member of the state senate at the time. He served eight terms in the Georgia State Senate, rising into numerous leadership positions, and also being appointed as chairman of the Select Commission on Constitutional Revision, which rewrote the Georgia Constitution in 1983. So if any of you students want to know any interpretation about the Georgia Constitution, he's your guy! (At least my view! – Roy Barnes interjects) He and Larry Walker, both, wrote the Georgia Constitution that exists today.

 

He made his first bid for the governorship in 1990 and was unsuccessful in a primary Zell Miller who went on to win. But Roy Barnes came back two years later and was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives where I got the chance to serve with him in the House and as a member of the House Judiciary Committee along with state representative, Walker.

In 1998 Governor Barnes was elected as the 80th governor of Georgia. He made education reform and improvements to education, public education, in Georgia a hallmark of his administration with efforts to reduce class sizes all over the state, raise accountability standards, require more discipline in classrooms, and other reforms.

 

He also concentrated on health care reform and remedies for urban growth and sprawl. He took on the very controversial issue of removing the Confederate Battle Flag from the Georgia state flag and he won that battle, changing the Georgia flag, but many believe that battle played a big role in his defeat for reelection in 2002. Nevertheless, he was awarded in 2003 the John F. Kennedy Profiles in Courage award, for his leadership in that effort.

 

Upon his defeat in 2002, Governor Barnes did something that really surprised the legal community, he did not go back to Marietta to start making money. He instead went to work for the Atlanta Legal Aid office as a full-time volunteer, for the next 6 months, committing his efforts and providing one of the strongest signals possible about what lawyers really owe their profession and the community.

 

He did eventually return to private practice of law, where he has continued to work as one of the most successful trial lawyers in Georgia and the southeast. He's known for successfully handling personal injury, wrongful death, and medical malpractice cases, along with mass tort cases, and complex business disputes.

 

There's a pretty well-known saying in Georgia that if you're in trouble, you want Roy Barnes on your side and you don't want to have to fight against him.

 

Governor Barnes, in my opinion, is one of the wisest and most astute political leaders Georgia has ever known, along with being one of the smartest trial lawyers ever to see a Georgia courtroom. It has been my honor to serve with him, and Georgia government. and a special privilege to have him here as our guest today to talk about one of his most recent endeavors in the historic Leo Frank case. Please join me in welcoming former governor, Roy Barnes.

 

[Roy Barnes Speaks] Kathy read that just like I wrote it, so, I've got to tell you just one little side note. We had a lot of controversy is the judges know about Georgia's voting machines and I had this lady that came out to interview me. She says, “did you know they stole the election from you in 2002, with those voting machines?” I said, “No ma'am. I think I lost that all on my own.” so...

 

Van Pearlberg, who's here, used to be an assistant district attorney and is now in the Attorney General's office. Van and I are longtime friends. He's probably a better expert on Leo Frank than I am. So we're glad to have him. Now you're one of the Phagan's descendants. “I am, I'm Mary Phagan-Kean, the great niece.” [Mary Phagan Kean comments, Barnes continues] The great niece – this is Mary Phagan-Kean, who's the great niece of Mary Phagan.

 

I want to turn you back for over a hundred years in Georgia.

Really back to the time of 1913. Georgia was a lot different. It had just come out, about 25 or 30 years before, out of the Civil War and a good part of the state was still recovering. In fact, if you look at the tax digest in 1860, it was 1960 until the tax digest recovered at the same amount that it was in 1860.

 

Georgia was also torn. It was torn between the Henry Grady, New South and the Old South, that had been brought down in the Civil War. Grady and governors, were trying to attract to Georgia any industry they could because most of the people we're desperately poor.

 

Now, into all of that comes Leo Frank. Leo Frank, was born in Texas, but he grew up in Brooklyn and he went to Cornell where he studied mechanical engineering. He married Lucille Selig. The Selig family is still one of the greatest and most well-known families in Atlanta – Selig properties, Steve Selig, Slick Selig as his father was known.

 

Well, the Frank's uncle [Moses Frank] owned a majority of what was the National Pencil Factory which was on Whitehall but now is called Peachtree and they divided it up.

 

He was a member of the temple [Formerly the Hebrew Benevolent Society] which is now on Peachtree. And they were mostly reform – the temple was reform Jewish faith and it was led by a fellow that was considered a radical in many aspects and that is Rabbi David Marx.

 

They were mostly German Jews that were members of that community and they were assimilationist and not isolationist.

 

The Orthodox, and some conservative but mostly Orthodox, believe in living in communities separated from other Jewish or Gentile communities, but the reform, and particularly at this time, with a German influence were assimilationists.

 

Those of you who have seen Driving Miss Daisy – Miss Daisy, her son was a member of the temple. The temple was bombed, by the way, in the 1950s [circa 1958] because they were very pro-civil rights [that was never proved] and another lawyer the time, Ada Garland's father, Reuben Garland, defended the fellow that was charged. Who, by the way, was acquitted and this was in the 1950s.

 

Mary Phagan was a teenage girl. She was raised in Marietta, she was buried in Marietta, where I'm from. And child labor was very common at the time. The first industry was really the manual type industry in textile mills, and children were the ones that generally worked there. It was accepted in society, at the time. She was owed a dollar and twenty cents for past wages. Now back then we had the first rapid transit, even though Cobb has none today, but we had the first rapid transit in Cobb County. It was called the trolley line and it was run by the Atlanta Northern Line. So there was a line, a street car that ran every hour going to Atlanta and another one that was returning to Atlanta. She rode the street line, the streetcar down to Atlanta, because the plant was closed, because we were having Memorial Day. Not Yankee Memorial Day as they called it at the time – Confederate Memorial Day, April 26th, [1913].

 

And she knew the plant was closed, but she also knew that Mr. Frank worked there and she wanted to get her dollar and twenty cents because her family needed it.

 

So the plant was closed and she went. There's no question she went there. No question she saw Leo Frank, in my view, but her body was found the next morning in the basement where the incinerator was. Now this is going to become important a little bit later.

 

There was two ways to get downstairs: one was with an elevator, but it was a very rudimentary elevator. It didn't have any brakes on it [False it did have breaks, by a hand cord]. It stopped when it hit the ground and you would jump and ran, then have a break. It just went up a couple of floors.

 

And then there was a ladder that went into the basement. Mary Phagan was found in the basement and there was soot all over her face. Her dress was hiked up and she was found early the next morning by a fella named Newt Lee who worked there. He was a janitor [He was the nightwatchman not the janitor], or you know, worked around the plant.

 

Of course, Frank and the police were called and all of that and Newt Lee was the first suspect. Now remember this was before the time of Miranda. It was before the time of anything that had any essence of being a due process, particularly if you were an African-American in the South.

 

And in fact, both as to Newt Lee and to Conley, Jim Conley, who we'll talk about it in just a moment, who became the star witness. The newspapers would have stories that I've read “Conley, & Lee, Being Sweated by the Police.” Now we can only imagine what “being sweated” was, but it was not uncommon even when I started practicing law. I hate to say this, for police officers to get carried away with rubber hoses and everything else.

 

The police pretty well ruled Newt Lee out and then the idea, the focus turned to Jim Conley. Now Conley was a janitor, a gopher, or whatever ,in the office. He gave three different statements, three different affidavits, which all changed through time. He became the star witness, and what he said was that Frank wanted to have sex with Mary [Phagan], and that he had taken her into the ladies room.

 

His office was on the same floor as the manufacturing and a wood lathe was there [in the machine department aka metal room[. And that he had hit her too hard. This was his final story. And that he called Conley up to take her down to the elevator. She was dead.

 

Now this is going to become critical later. Conley also said that they had mattress tick, which is that striped cloth that was around mattresses and then wrapped her in it to take her down there [to the basement of the national pencil company].

 

Conley also said that he took he and Frank together – took her down the elevator, you know the one that bump! [Roy Barnes is falsifying the story, Leo Frank controlled the elevator with a hand cord] And this became critical later, particularly to Governor [John] Slaton.

 

Frank was indicted based on that testimony and put on trial pretty well. The trial took about a month. Frank was represented by what probably was the best lawyer in Georgia at the time. His name was Luther Rosser.

 

The prosecution was represented by, up to that time, a lackluster prosecutor by the name of Hugh Dorsey. By the way, just as a footnote Hugh Dorsey and his wife's daughter would later marry Luther Rosser's son. Everything is connected. You know there's only seven degrees of separation.

 

Judge [Leonard] Roan was the [presiding] judge and was considered a very good judge and was. The difference in the trials were greatly different [then] than they are today. The Fulton County Courthouse was on Marietta Street at the time. There was no air conditioning, as you might imagine, so the windows were open during the day, and this is one of the things that Oliver Wendell Holmes and Charles Evans Hughes wrote about in the sense, in the case, was the mob outside. And somebody would sit in the window [not true], so is reported in the case, and holler out what the testimony was [not true], and there would be a roar of approval or a boo of disapproval [fake news, this was not the case].

 

There are some that say, and I've read some of these reports, that the jury was sequestered and was kept at the old Kimball house. And I have read some reports of, as the jury would come up from the Kimball house to go to the courthouse every day, parts of the mob would say, “hang the Jew or we'll hang you,” [This is the jury tampering hoax, Leo Frank's defenders promote to trick the public into thinking Leo Frank didn't have a fair trial] whatever it was, and all of them and I don't think there's a lot of dispute about this, there was a mob presence there [There was no misbehaving mob outside the courthouse, Barnes is misrepresenting the case]. The effect they had is open to dispute.

 

Well, to make a long story short, because I only have a little time and I want to get to John Slaton and the lynching. To make a long story short, Frank was convicted and sentenced to hang. Georgia let every sheriff hang his own folks at the time. Fulton County had what was called the Tower and he was to be hung there.

 

The case went to the Supreme Court of the United States, twice. There were two dissents -- Charles Evan Hughes and Oliver Wendell Holmes. And Hughes wrote, and I won't get into it, I read it last night again, about the influence of the mob.

 

John Slaton was governor of Georgia. He was called Jack. He was a rising star in Georgia politics and everybody said that he was going to be the next United States Senator. He was married to the wealthiest woman in Georgia. Her name was Grant, Sarah Frances Grant. She was called Sally. In fact, John Slaton is buried in the Grant Mausoleum at Oakland Cemetery, not his own. He was buried in his wife's mausoleum.

 

The case finally came up to him in June of 2015 [actually 1915]. Now, he had been watching the case and he had started his own investigation in the case.

 

We had crazy times of governors taking office back then. He was going out of office and Governor Nat Harris was coming in and Nat Harris was the governor who signed a bill allowing women to practice law in Georgia. And Nat Harris was the governor coming in and I'm sure, like every other governor, he'd say, “maybe it won't get there before I leave.” But he had been governor twice. We didn't have a lieutenant governor then. He'd been president of the Senate in 1911 when Hoke Smith died and he became acting governor for about 18 months and then Joseph Mackey Brown, the son of Joseph E. Brown, the Civil War governor, served one term in between and then Slaton came back and served the second term – when he caught the Leo Frank case.

 

He [Governor Slaton] read the entire month-long transcript. He did his own investigation. He took detectives and Hugh Dorsey to the scene and he came to the conclusion that there was not certainty as to the death penalty. He middled around as to whether he was actually guilty. He said there was not certainty. He wrote – and I'll leave it here with Kathy in case anyone wants to see it they can – he wrote a commutation order; Twenty-nine pages where he set out the evidence in detail.

 

He talked about all of the witnesses and things that had arisen since that time.

 

One of the things that he depended on was – remember Conley said that he and Frank had taken Mary Phagan down the elevator – and so the police, when they came down – and remember that elevator hit the bottom [not true, it had a hand cord break, Conley reported Frank controlled the cord and stopped it too soon] -- the police reports coming the next morning to investigate said that they found (I know this is indelicate) human excrement when someone had had a bowel movement under the elevator.

 

Well now, that is when they came to investigate and that was a turning point, as you'll see with him, one of the turning points, because he said, that if they had gone down on the elevator, it would have smooshed the excrement and they would have been smelling it. In fact, it was not until the next day that it occurred.

 

Another thing that he relied upon was this: Judge Roan, who had presided over the trial, had talked with Slaton and had written him a letter [It was a forgery], in which Judge Roan said, I have doubt, I have doubt. And if I had the power, he didn't think he had the power at the time, he was wrong and Governor Slaton tells him, yeah, he could have done it, I probably would have granted a new trial [Judge Roan did have the power].

 

There's a lot of litigation that's going on right now for a Georgia Supreme Court on the power of a trial judge sitting as a 13th juror. That is, the right to set aside and put their own judgment in.

 

And so, based upon that and the other facts – there was some hair on the lathe – and somebody testified (remember we didn't have scientific things like we do now), well, that looks like Mary Phagan's hair. After the trial there was somebody that found a microscope and looked at it and a doctor gave an opinion, “this is not the same hair.” That happened after the trial [The examining scientist was likely bribed according to other people stating they were bribed in the Leo Frank Georgia Supreme Court Records].

 

At the trial there had been women that had been brought up, “well, Frank tried to sexually harass me” and another group that says, “Oh, I've worked with him for years and had no problem whatsoever.”

 

Well, and in fact, Slaton received over a hundred thousand letters. He talks about it in his commutation order. He decided he was going to commute the sentence. And he wrote this order.

 

He went home and told his wife, Sally, and she said, “I would” and he said, “I don't know what's going to happen here to us.” And she said “I would rather be the widow of a brave man than the wife of a coward.” And he signed the commutation.

 

Let me read to you part of it:

 

“The performance of my duty under the Constitution is a matter of my conscience. The responsibility rests where the power is reposed. Judge Roan, with that awful sense of responsibility, which probably came over him as he thought of that judge before he would shortly appear..” Judge Roan had died in the interim. “...calls to me from another world to request that I do that which he should have done.

 

I can endure misconstruction, abuse and condemnation, but I cannot stand the constant companionship of an accusing conscience. Which would remind me in every thought that I, as governor of Georgia, failed to do what I thought to be right.

 

There is a territory between a reasonable doubt and an absolute certainty for which the law provides and allowing life imprisonment instead of execution. This case has been marked by such doubt.”

 

He was interviewed a little bit later after that and this is what he said:

 

“Two thousand years ago, another governor washed his hands and turned over a Jew to a mob. For 2,000 years that governor's name has been cursed. If today another Jew” [Leo Frank] “were lying in his grave because I had failed to do my duty, I would all through life find his blood on my hands, and would consider myself an assassin through cowardice.”

 

Now, he went out of office within four or five days, Slaton did.

 

What was the reaction?

 

Well, he had to have the state militia escort him to the train station to leave. He slipped back in from time to time but he stayed gone ten years, before he came back to start back practicing law. He was successful. He went on and was one of the, before a unified bar, he was president of the State Bar.

 

But he never, of course, held political office again.

 

What happened to Leo Frank?

 

Well, Leo Frank was in the Tower, the Fulton Tower, ready to be hung by the sheriff. And so Governor Slaton, before he released the commutation, had the sheriff take him to the state prison, which was not at Reidsville at the time. It was in Milledgeville, because Milledgeville had been the capitol of Georgia until 1868, when it was moved to Atlanta.

 

He was not there for long, until his neck was slit [July 17th, 1915] and he had a big gash in it by an attempt on his life. And then, remember the commutation was on June 21st, 1915.

 

By the way, Frank was scheduled to be hung the next morning [June 22nd, 1915]. So it was right upon...Slaton put it off as long as he could.

 

Well on August the 17th of 1915 [Actually it was the 16th] a group from Marietta got into the state prison in Milledgeville, brought Frank to Frey's Gin road, which is right off 75 and Roswell road in Marietta, and hung him.

 

This was not the first great stain on all of us, in the South. Is that is estimated there were more than 4,000 African-Americans lynched after the Civil War until the 1960s [60% of that number were African Americans, the other 40% were Whites and a small percentage were other]. The last one in Georgia was in the late 1940s at [name unintelligible] bridge, Walton county.

 

But this was the first case of a Jew being lynched. But remember this was a tough time in Georgia. The Ku Klux was not risen yet. But it soon did after this with some of the same folks that were lynchers. And they hated three folks: Jews, Blacks and Catholics, and in fact that's one of the reasons, even as a kid I can remember, prejudice against Catholics.

 

There's a great story that says Richard Russell, he was a great United States senator from Georgia, and his daddy was the Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court. There's a story that Dick Russell fell in love with a Catholic girl and was going to marry her and he went to his daddy and told him that he was going to marry her and he said, “Well, son.” He said, “You could marry her but your days in politics are over in Georgia.” And he never married. That's a whole 'nother story. Because there's a provision in his will that says he wants a gift to go to a certain person that is exactly [unintelligible] things like that.

 

But these were the leaders of the community.

 

There's a famous photograph of the lynching with Frank hanging there and to the right is the superior court judge, standing there. His name was Newt Morris.

 

If you get interested in this case, this case will drive you crazy, but if you get interested, the book you should read is 'The Dead Shall Rise' [2003] by Steve Oney.

 

Steve Oney came to see us in the eighties. I was always enthralled with the case and Tom Watson – one of the things I hadn't mentioned – Tom Watson, who was one of the great political leaders – Hugh Dorsey went on to become governor from this. Tom Watson went on to become a United States Senator.

 

Tom Watson had a newspaper called The Jeffersonian and he printed headlines in red [Not true, we have all the copies of his newspapers and magazines]. And it was scandalous, the reporting on the trial that occurred every day. “Jew pervert,” he used words like that in the headlines instead of being factual. [Barnes is wrong, Tom Watson did not comment on the 1913 Leo Frank Trial, until 1914. "Jew Pervert" wasn't published until the late summer of 1915 in Watson's Magazine.]

 

Here's some of the ones that were involved – Steve Oney has devised it up:

 

Joseph M. Brown. Well, he was governor from 1909 to 1911, 1912 to 1913, right before Jack Slaton. He was from Marietta. Charlie Brown, his grandson, just died last year. These folks are still around.

 

Newton Augustus Morris. He was the superior court judge and his great nephew is on the city council of Marietta. I once said, I said, “You can't be an old Mariettan unless you had an ancestor that was at the lynching of Leo Frank and it's just about the truth.

 

Eugene Herbert Clay. He was the son of the United States Senator. He was mayor of Marietta, but at the time that this occurred he was, what we called him then, the solicitor-general, the district attorney today. I always loved the old name, solicitor-general. I wish they hadn't changed it. They still call him solicitor today.

 

He is the one that presided and called the grand jury in to listen to evidence about who had taken Leo Frank and lynched him. Surprise, surprise, the grand jury returned a finding that it was “persons unknown” in the community.

 

John Tucker Dorsey. His son later, Jasper Dorsey, would be president of Bell South or Southern Belle as we called it back then. John Tucker Dorsey, he was one of the best trial lawyers there was. He was a member of the general assembly. He was chairman of the prison committee and that's probably how they got in so easily down in Milledgeville.

 

He served as district attorney for two years, John Tucker did. He had been twice convicted of manslaughter. I mean, folks were a little bit different back then, you know. And had served in imprisonment on the chain-gang and then was later pardoned by the governor so he could go to law school and become district attorney. He was a distant cousin of Hugh Dorsey, who was the prosecutor.

 

Fred Morris, he was a Marietta lawyer. He served his first term in the general assembly. He organized the Boy Scouts in Marietta and then went off to the lynching of Leo Frank.

 

Bowlin Glovitt Glover Brumby. Like I said, had every prominent family in Marietta. He owned the Marietta Chair Company, you know, the Brumby Rocker? This is where it comes from. Oney describes Brumby as the very image of an arrogant Southern Aristocrat and that nothing angered him more than Yankees.

 

The field commanders, those were kind of the planners, the field commanders was a fella named George Daniels. He ran a jewelry shop on the Marietta Square and was one of the founding members of the Rotary Club.

 

These folks were not riff-raff.

 

Gordon Baxter Gann. He was from Mableton, by the way, but he was ordinary and was former mayor of Marietta.

 

Newt Mays Morris. They called him “Black Newt.” Now Black Newt would whip 'ya. He ran the chain gang in Cobb County and they called him “Whippin' Newt” or “Black Newt.”

 

William J. Frey. He had been the sheriff of Cobb County from 1903 to 1909. He prepared the noose used to hang Frank and may have actually looped it around Frank's neck. Frey's Gin, Frey's Gin road, the location of where they hung him, was his property.

 

E.P. Dick Dobbs. He later became very prominent. His family moved north and he was the mayor of Marietta at the time.

 

L. B. Robeson was a railroad freight agent. He lent his car to the lynch party.

 

Jim Brumby, Grover Glovitt Brumby's brother – he owned a garage and serviced the automobiles before they went. It was a big affair to go from Marietta to Milledgeville at the time.

 

Robert A. Hill was a banker. He helped fund the lynching – made sure they had money for gas and other things.

 

George Swanson, who was the current Sheriff of Cobb County in 1915, and two of his deputies, William McKinney and George Hicks.

 

Cicero Holton Dobbs. He was a taxi driver and operated a grocery store. He was also my wife's grandfather, who knew nothing about this before Steve Oney wrote the book and was very upset about it.

 

This case had been whispered about for years and years and years and even among the Jewish community, Steve Selig, told me, he says, “We never mentioned the case, never mentioned it in the Jewish community.”

 

D. R. Benton was a farmer and an uncle of Mary Phagan's.

 

Horace Handy was a farmer.

 

Kuhn Shaw, that's J. F. Shaw's, who died about five years ago, father. He was a mule trader.

 

Emmett and Luther Burton. We had an Emmett Burton serve, this was the great uncle and grandfather of Emmett Burton who was on our county commission for several years. These were two brothers who were believed to have sat on either side of Leo Frank in the automobile that took him from prison to death. Emmett is said to have been a police officer and Luther, a coal-yard operator.

 

Yellow Jacket Brown. You know, everyone had a nickname. An electrician who rode his motorcycle to Milledgeville and cut the telephone lines before they got there, so that nobody could call out.

 

Lawrence Hainey, a farmer.

 

What has amazed me about this case was: how could the best folks in town, the best and leading citizens of the county and of the city – how could they have gone crazy? I ask myself that in our national politics every once in awhile now. How could everybody have gone crazy?

 

What happened to Rudy Juliani?

 

I don't know. We could always have a discussion of that.

 

But what was it?

 

Now I know there's two or three things on the other side that everybody tries to bring up. One is, well, they just felt that they were carrying out the lawful sentence that was handed down to Leo Frank. That is what Newt Morris is reported to have said later.

 

And then, the other thing is, Luther Rosser and Jack Slaton had practiced law before [not before they were law partners during Leo Frank's trial and his appeals], and that Luther Rosser paid Jack Slaton off to commute the sentence.

 

Now let me tell you something. Jack Slaton had the wealthiest wife in Georgia and at that time, husbands, as you all know from studying law, managed the affairs of the wife. Why in the world, to destroy his political career which was very bright, would he have taken any money? And you cannot read this commutation order without seeing that it is a man that was greatly troubled about it.

 

So the last thing I'll talk about a little bit: was Leo Frank guilty?

 

I don't think there's any doubt, and there are few that I think that argue with this today is, he did not get a fair trial [False, the Supreme Court in their majority decisions ruled he had a fair trial]. Not under the circumstances that we would consider today – coerced statements, no scientific, all circumstantial [False, the witnesses later provided affidavits that Leo Frank's defense team tried to bribe them to retract their trial testimony].

 

The testimony of an accomplice.

 

There is a reason the common law and the law of Georgia says that, the testimony of an accomplice must be corroborated and a confession must be corroborated and the reason is because of how both of them might have been obtained.

 

I don't think he was guilty. I think Conley killed her. There's not any doubt in my mind that Conley killed her [Barnes opinion defies the evidence and testimony, and majority decisions of the judges at the time]. But at least there is substantial reasonable doubt as to whether Frank killed her [false statements]. There's two little things and then I'll try to answer some questions. I know we got started late and I know ya'll got other places to go.

 

There's two things that are happening. One is, the district attorney Paul Howard of Fulton County has created a commission to look into several cases.

 

One of them is this case [Leo Frank case] and another one is the Child Murders case. And they've got about a dozen, half a dozen to a dozen cases they're looking into to see, to make sure, that there's guilt. Now Wayne Williams is still alive and in the prison.

 

The other thing that has happened in all of these matters and I think is the import: what is the role of lawyers and judges?

 

Listen, we are trained to look at facts. There is only a little thin line that separates us from lynchers and a mob and it is lawyers and judges that are trained to not let passion and prejudice overcome us all.

 

And it is difficult. It is very, very difficult. And it is not an easy path. It is a tough path.

 

You know, we believe as lawyers, that everybody is entitled to representation. That was our theory all along, but not our practice. Read about the Scottsboro boys, read about through the history and the cases that you stay.

 

But it is required even more now than ever. That even though everybody cusses us as lawyers, and they do, you know, all the time. Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be lawyers. You know, it's the story instead of cowboys.

 

But it is the lawyers that have to protect the rights of the individual. And if we ever lose that, that we're not willing to sacrifice ourselves and our reputation and our prosperity, for the rights of those that we represent or what we know is right, then I want to tell you, we're lost, we're lost. It's a very thin line.

 

Always be the guardians against prejudice, hatred and passion. Sit back and use the skills that you're being trained in and they will be honed much more as you start to practice, to analyze critically, everything that you're presented with.

Thank you, and God bless you and I'll be glad to answer a few questions.

 

I know we don't have much time but I'd be glad to answer any questions. Yes, ma'am.

 

Audience Member Question: Was anyone from that long list of lynchers ever prosecuted?

 

No, nobody was ever tried. And what happened was, Luther Haines, who was [?] judge, good friend of Hugh, Luther Haines practiced law with John Tucker Dorsey, when he was a young lawyer.

 

And, of course, I was assigned to Luther's courtroom when I was a prosecutor and he and I were great friends until the day he died.

 

But he knew I was interested in the case and he showed me, one time, a file that John Tucker Dorsey had in his office and had a list of the names of those who were involved and that's the way Oney finally broke it. He broke it through two people. Through Luther Haines and through Bill Kent.

 

Now, as they began to die, you know, in the 30s, 40s, 50s, several of them confessed on deathbed. But nobody was ever prosecuted.

 

I will tell you a footnote about Herbert Clay. I don't know if it's true or not, but Luther told me this. I said, “how did Herbert Clay, how did he die?”

 

He said he was holed up with a prostitute she hit him over the head with a liquor bottle and killed him.

 

Anybody else?

 

What we did in the 80s, and what we are trying to do now and how they differ, this was addressed in the 80s...?

 

In the 80s, when Governor Harris, he got involved in the case, and Frank was issued a posthumous pardon based on the fact he did not receive due process [not true, he was pardoned on a technicality that the State failed to protect him while he was in prison, Leo Frank had exhausted all his appeals].

 

What we're trying to do now, a group of us, that has been helpful, Dale Schwartz and several others, is to pardon him on the basis of anti-Semitism and have an extraordinary motion new trial. It's not going to do Leo Frank any good. See, the people say, “Well, why are you digging up all this?” The reason we're digging up all this is because it should be a testament and a monument that this should never happen again. It's the reason we continue to teach that Auschwitz, in fact, did exist and that six million Jews were killed. And so, that's what we do it for [It's disgusting Roy Barnes is manipulating the great European War, which was won by the United States, and has nothing to do with the rape-murder of Mary Phagan to argue a homicidal pedophile should be exonerated.]

 

We right the wrongs.

 

And hopefully we're not involved in making them. Even though there were several lawyers that were involved in the making of this wrong. And that's the reason it is so important for you to understand that difference. Thank you!

 

[End of Transcription]

 

Information on Van Pearlberg law.georgia.gov/van-pearlberg

 

Several sections of his monologue stand out

 

Roy Barnes during his speech at Mercer Law School on Tuesday, November 12th, 2019, in his monologue acts as if it's axiomatically a hard-fact that the primitive freight elevator in Atlanta's National Pencil Company of 1913, could NOT have been used during the noontime hour of Saturday, April 26, 1913, to transport Mary Phagan's dead and defiled body, down from the second floor of the factory, down two flights to the factory's cellar. The supposition of his reason why it didn't happen that way, is because the police took the freight elevator down to the said basement on Sunday morning, April 27th, 1913, it crushed some feces in the ground tray of the elevator shaft. At face value, and with limited information about the incident, it could easily be believable for those unfamiliar with the reports provided by investigators.

 

To summarize, Barnes touches briefly upon The elevator's maneuverability with dramatics, "Boom", referring to the "the shit in the shaft" (as journalist-author Steve Oney labeled it), and the smooshing of Conley's feces at the said base tray at the hard dirt floor ground in the elevator shaft at the front section of the basement, below the street entry of the National Pencil Company. Roy Barnes hints at this as something which tends to impeach Conley's testimony about how he and Leo Frank moved the cadaver of Mary Phagan and his series of evolving affidavits eludes to how the events took place. The undercurrent of Barnes' statements are this provides more exonerating evidence for Leo Frank, as part of a larger suite of perceived opinions on evidence absolving Frank of the rape-murder for which he was duly convicted.

 

Roy Barnes, presenting limited information, tries to make it out like the elevator was automated and that it would go all the way to the bottom on its own, after presumably pushing a button? But that's not how the elevator worked based on the descriptions of it. There was actually a rudimentary pull cord to pause the elevator's descent or ascent (not modern computerized numeric floor buttons like we have today), it wasn't just that the elevator cut off on its own presumably flipping a power switch when it reached the basement, the driver of the vertical elevator car had control.

 

Jim Conley in his testimony at the Leo Frank trial and his affidavits, finally talks about how Leo Frank was so nervous with the elevator control cord that he hints it might have stopped the elevator before it hit the bottom on their descent, and again too soon before they ascended to the above floors, going back up toward the second floor. Leo Frank was said in Conley's testimony to have stopped the freight elevator too short, and upon exiting it, he tripped inside the elevator car catching the floor as he was trying to get out of it and thus fell backward right onto Jim Conley.

 

Surprise, Surprise, Roy Barnes never mentions these above-detailed descriptions in his 2019 monologue on that particular incident, of using the elevator to move Mary Phagan's body away from the metal room, located opposite Leo Frank's business office, to the rear corner of the basement where it was intended to be burned in a furnace--which Barnes essentially cites as a reason among others, why Leo Frank is innocent, and supposedly proof that in the noon hour of Saturday, April 26, 1913, they didn't use the elevator as the means to transport the battered and bruised corpse of the 13-year-old girl to the basement. Therefore the only other way down was for Jim Conley to carry Phagan down from the second floor from the staircase to the factory lobby, the most high traffic place in the factory, with big palatial full glass window doors, with the streets filled with people, looking all around at the bunting and without locking the front door while transporting a dead body so Alonzo Mann could walk in on the scene. We're supposed to believe it was Jim Conley on the second floor is who did the murder, and Leo Frank knew nothing about it, even though it happened in his vicinity.

 

James "Jim" Conley's meticulous details in several evolving affidavits and his trial testimony no August 4, 5, and 6th, 1913, at the Mary Phagan murder trial, about these said events, tend to show Leo Frank's nervous-erratic demeanor immediately post-murder and his mishandling of the elevator brake cord.

 

The freight elevator likely would not go all the way down to the cellar tray by a matter of some inches, because police initially described during their initial investigation at 3:40 o'clock a.m. that there was lots of trash in that bottom-most tray, and also found Mary Phagan's parasol right smack in the middle of it (there is even a contemporary diagram sketch of it). The police described the contents of the tray and moved that trash around, in search of clews, they might have moved the trash enough or removed some of it, so that later when they took the elevator down, it could actually go down all the way completely to the bottom. Later that morning in the presence of Leo Frank, they took the freight elevator down on April 27, 1913, in the daytime morning, when they had done so, it smooshed Conley's natural deposit he left there in the said tray.

 

What Roy Barnes also fails to also mention is those first-responder police officers who investigated the crime scene that morning on April 27, 1913, specifically reported they saw drag marks from the elevator shaft entryway, 140 feet across the hard dirt floor to the rear of the basement where garbage was normally staged before being burned in the oversized furnace. The furnace provided heat and hot water to the factory. He uses the excuse that he has limited time, to give the audience the information they need to make an informed decision, to instead focus on the then-present and then-former government officials and prominent citizenry who organized to hang Leo Frank on August 17th, 1915, in fulfillment of the Mary Phagan murder trial jury's unanimous decision to recommend "no mercy" for Leo Frank on August 25th, 1913, to therefore have the defendant be sentenced to capital punishment, and Judge Roan's ratification the next day of that verdict and sentencing decision on August 26, 1913.

 

[End of Commentary on the Leo Frank Exoneration Via the Shit in the Shaft Hoax]

 

Flyer Size 7" x 11"

 

The Leo Frank Case With Former GA Governor Roy Barnes, Tuesday, November 12, 2019, Noon to 1:00 o'clock P.M. in Bell-Jones Courtroom "Hear from one of Georgia's best trial lawyers about one of the State's most notorious lynchings and the renewed investigation into the evidence from the controversial trial."

 

Lunch Provided.

 

Location:

 

Bell-Jones Courtroom

Mercer Law School

Macon GA 31207

 

Time:

 

Tuesday, November 12, 2019, Noon-1 P.M.

 

[emailed in from students of the Frank-Phagan case in Georgia]

 

APPENDIX

 

news.mercer.edu/former-georgia-gov-roy-barnes-to-discuss-...

 

MACON – Former Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes will describe to Mercer Law students his efforts to reopen one

The Bundaberg Region.

The rich volcanic soils of the plains near Bundaberg and the Burnett River were covered with thick scrub and bush but a few adventurous pastoralists tried to establish sheep grazing there in the 1850s. It was easier away from the Bundaberg site at Gin Gin and Gayndah further inland. More white settlers came in the mid-1860s as timber cutters. In these early years clashes with the local Aboriginal people were often violent. Aboriginal massacres are known to have occurred at Gin Gin in 1850, in North Bundaberg in the early 1860s. The first timber cutters arrived in the Bundaberg area 1867 followed by the first white farmers also in 1867. The first saw mill was erected in 1868. The town site was surveyed and laid in 1870. Experimental sugar cane farms began around 1871 and within a few months the sugar mills was built. As sugar plantations increased Bundaberg ended up with four major sugar mills. The sugar cane plantations were usually owned by the mills, run as large plantations and they employed Kanaka or South Sea Islander indentured labourers. Thus like Maryborough Bundaberg became a main entry point for the South Sea Islanders. The town grew quickly as more farmers took up small selections or acreages often growing maize or small amounts of sugar cane. The local Kolan Shire council was formed in 1873 and Bundaberg was emerging as a town. It became a municipality in 1881 and a city in 1913. The discovery of copper and that start of mining operations at nearby Mt Perry in 1871 really boosted the prospects of Bundaberg. The first bank opened in 1872, the first newspaper began publication in 1875 and a coach service operated to Maryborough until the railway line was completed in 1888. The government wharf in Bundaberg was built in 1875 with the main cargoes being timber and maize. The Primitive Methodists built an early brush and timber church in 1877 and the Anglicans completed their first church in 1876. But the Catholics were the first to build a permanent church which was consecrated in 1875. The town was well established but the big transformation occurred in the early 1880s when the land owners developed the sugar industry to its full extent until sugar eclipsed all other crops. In 1881 the Bundaberg region produced 3% of QLD’s sugar crop. In 1883 it produced 20% of QLD’s sugar crop. This domination of sugar persisted from 1880 through to 1915. New sugar mills started up with the new Millaquin mill in 1882 and mills for the Youngs of Fairymead and the Gibsons of Bingera. Stable prices for sugar assisted with this development of sugar mills and by the mid-1880s more sugar farms were being established reliant on European labour instead of South Sea Islander labour. The 1885 QLD Royal Commission into malpractices with the Kanaka trade meant the government intervened more to control conditions of the indentured labourers and limited the trade. These restrictions were lifted in 1891 to boost the sugar industry again but the emerging labour unions and associations of white labourers opposed the revival of the Kanaka trade as their employment suffered because of the trade. The new Commonwealth government of 1901 made the decision to cease the trade from 1906. As the sugar industry had to restructure itself the QLD government started to build and financially back the sugar mills itself at Gin Gin and Isis. They also tried to control the mills of Fairymead and Bingera and CSR (Colonial Sugar Refining.)The Labour government of QLD established sugar price control in 1915 and set up a board of appeal for complaints from growers against the sugar mills. By 1915 Bundaberg was in fierce competition with sugar cane areas in the Far North QLD and the industry was much regulated. But it has survived well to the present day. This has been assisted by a new port at Burnett Heads which was built in 1962.

 

Apart from the sugar industry the growth of Bundaberg has been assisted by mining, fruit and vegetable growing and the development of side products from sugar – molasses and rum distilling. The first rum was distilled from the Millaquin sugar mill in 1888. The town was boosted greatly by the opening of the railway from North Bundaberg to Mt Perry copper mines in 1884 which in turn encouraged the establishment of foundries and works to support the mines in Bundaberg. By the 1880s Bundaberg has some grand buildings appropriate for a regional city. The commercial and civic heart of the town was in Bourbong Street with the Post Office 157 Bourbong St (1891), the War Memorial 180 Bourbong St (1922), the School of Arts building 184 Bourbong St (1889), the former Commercial Bank 191 Bourbong St (1891) etc.

 

This was an independent team in 1951 and had players from various major league organizations. Pete Cerick died 1/30/2015 and this was the only known photo taken during his baseball career. Of this group Howard "Mace" Pool, Dick Masley, Vito Valenzano and Ken Boehme survive. The whereabouts or fate of Kenneth Fowler, from Kipp, KS, has not been determined.

 

1951 Iola Indians

 

Back Row: Al Cunningham (Phillies), Stan Klemme (Giants), Jim Sanders (Cardinals), Dave Newkirk, Pete Cerick, Pete New and Mace Pool.

 

Bottom Row. Floyd "Nig" Temple, Joe Vilk, Dick Masley (Giants), Ken Fowler (Phillies), Vito "Duke" Valenzano, Ken Boehme (Yankees) and Paul Weeks.

 

This site takes you to Floyd Temple and his 28-year coaching career at Kansas Univ. www.kuathletics.com/news/2014/9/22/BB_0922143304.aspx

  

The

KOM Flash Report

for

Week of March 8, 2015

  

Another charter member of the KOM League passes away:

 

Loren J. Olson, 89, Neosho, Mo., died March 1, 2015, at his home, following declining health. Loren was born Jan. 3, 1926, in Big Rapids, Mich. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II, in the Pacific Theatre. Loren worked in the banking industry for many years and had worked in Joplin, Mo. and Sarcoxie, Mo. areas, retiring in 1986.

 

He had played minor league baseball for the St. Louis Browns and then coached American Legion Baseball. He was a former member of the Board of Regents of MSSC, now MSSU and was an active Christian servant. Loren married his wife, Lilly, on Oct. 11, 1974, in Oklahoma and she survives of the home.

 

Also surviving are five children, John Olson and wife, Mary, of Joplin, Teresa Olson-Babcock, of Joplin, Richard Crowder, of Neosho, Larry Crowder and wife, Lisa, of Jefferson City, Mo. and Linda Hames and husband, Jeff, of Claremore, Okla.; four sisters, Glenna Fisher, of Sturgis, Mich., Barbara Vining, of Big Rapids, Ruthann Kailing and husband, Leo, of Reeds City, Mich. and Mary Johansen and husband, Floyd, of Big Rapids; nine grandchildren, Rasia, Luke, Patrick, Bradley, Tim, Chris, Alec, Travis and Tessa; and one great-grandchild, Elsa.

 

Memorial mass will be held on Thursday, March 5, at 1 p.m. at St. Canera's Catholic Church, Father Ruben Rustrepo will officiate. The family will receive friends following the service until 3 p.m. at the church.

Contributions, in memory of Loren, may be made to the MSSU Foundation, in care of Clark Funeral Home, PO Box 66, Neosho, MO 64850.

 

Ed comment:

 

Loren Olson signed with the St. Louis Browns as a pitcher and was sent to Pittsburg, Kansas in 1946. He was short-term member of that team but played a “ton” of baseball in the Southwest Missouri after his professional career concluded. He was a fixture on the ball field whenever Mickey Mantle, the Boyer brothers, Don Gutteridge, Gene Stephens, Allie Reynolds et. al. used to play “for fun” at the close of each baseball season. Olson was in the game held at Miners Park in Joplin, in October of 1953 that Mantle and the Boyer brothers played in order to raise money following the death of Joe Dean “Red” Crowder on Grand Lake of the Cherokees.

 

Unfortunately, Olson wasn’t with Pittsburg at the time any of the team photos were taken. Thus, the photo attached to his obituary is the only one I have seen of him. Although I did speak with him on the telephone over the years. www.joplinglobe.com/obituaries/loren-j-olson/article_cc19...

 

Here is the Miami, OK News-Record account of the preview for the benefit game played for the Crowder family.

 

Oct. 17—(Special) Rosters for the "Joe Crowder benefit game," which is to be played Sunday afternoon at Miners Park beginning at 2:30 o'clock, was announced today by Joe Becker, who is in charge of arrangements.

 

The Tri-State Miners: Mickey Mantle, New York Yankees; Cliff Mapes, Kansas City; Ray Clark, former Joplin Miner; J. E. Landon, Bill Drake, Travis Kunce, Max Buzzard, Jimmy Rogers, Ray Pace, George Garrison, all ex-minor league players; Lloyd Shafer, formerly with Baltimore; John Lafalier, Harry Daniels, Howard Scheurich, Don Boyd and Jerry Ferneau, all prominent semi-pros, and Jack McGoyne, manager.

 

The Joplin All-Stars: Ferrell Anderson, manager; Gene Stephens of the Boston Red Sox; Cloyd, Kenton and Cletus Boyer, all in the Cardinal system; Gale Wade, Cleveland Indians; George New, Baltimore; Bill Rose, Colorado Springs; Al Billingsley, Lilburn Smith, Tommy Gott, former teammates of Crowder on the Joplin Miners; Don Gutteridge, Pittsburg; Freddie Schenk and Bill Gill, former Miners; Woody Fair, manager of Duenweg's team; Boney Turner, Don Cross and Loren Olson, former minor leaguers. Zeke Johnson, former KOM league and Western association umpire, will help Kenny Magnus of Joplin and Vernon Tappana of Webb City, officiate.

 

Ed comment:

 

A New York newspaper reported claimed there was more talent on the field that day at Joplin than in the recently completed World Series. I take one exception to the Miami News Record lineup for the game in 1953. Zeke Johnson was never a KOM umpire. Also, I believe that the guy identified as Don Cross was Don Gross. And, there is something that a reader from the Neosho/Joplin area might know. His obituary lists Richard and Larry Crowder as surviving sons. Someone can explain that to me if they know the details. I’m sure they are some kin to the late Joe Crowder.

 

________________________________________________________________________

Peter A. Cerick, Esquire

www.obitsforlife.com/obituary/1043810/Cerick-Peter.php

Peter went home to be with the Lord on January 30, 2015 after a long struggle with dementia.

Peter was born on May 22, 1931 in Washington, D.C. After graduating from Western High School in 1949 he played professional baseball for the Cleveland Browns, a farm team for the Orioles. His play was interrupted due to the Korean War. He joined the army and served from 1953 – 1955 in communications first at Fort Jackson, NC and then at the Pentagon.

He attended George Washington University and graduated with a degree in business administration. He went on to obtain his law degree from GWU in 1961.

Peter worked as an adjuster for State Farm then opened his law office in Herndon, VA. He had a general practice for many years before specializing in personal injury and medical malpractice. He retired in 2004 and then provided services pro bono through Legal Services of Northern Virginia for several years.

He coached Babe Ruth baseball in the 1960’s, was an active member of the Herndon Chamber of Commerce, held offices in the Virginia Trial Lawyers Association, and started a program known as Helmets for Kids with the Herndon Police Department.

Marriages to Jean Watt and Mary Ann Fields ended in divorce. He is survived by his wife, Sharon, of 31 years, four children from his first marriage; Laura Collins of Gainesville, VA; Paula Ellish of Clearwater, FL; Michael Cerick of Huntersville, NC; Dana Cerick of Chicago, IL; a stepson, Michael Ross of Pittsburgh, PA and two grandchildren, Evan and Olivia Cerick.

 

Ed comment:

I was able to contact Pete Cerick many years ago and found him to be an interesting man. He signed with the St. Louis Browns and first appeared with Pittsburg, KS during the 1951 season. The Browns released him and he signed with the Iola Indians and pitched for them in parts of both 1951 and 1952. The team photo in which he appeared at Iola and the one that was attached to his obituary showed that he hadn’t changed much in physical appearance except for the gray hair.

August 8, 1951

FREE GAME TONIGHT Fans are invited by Earl Sifers, Iola club operator, to attend tonight's Carthage-Iola game at Chanute without charge. Iola is the "home" team in the regularly scheduled game with Pittsburg playing here. Lloyd Brazda won his fifth game against three losses in going seven innings of last night's bat fest. He was pounded for 12 of the 14 Iola hits. Cliff Ohr finishing and pitching two scoreless rounds. Lefty Dick Masley, suffering his fourteenth defeat, was the loser and victim of Ponca City's big third inning. Pete Cerick, big left hander recently turned loose at Pittsburg, finished out and was a victim of lola's loose defensive play. He gave only four hits in five innings but walked five. AI Cunningham, batting left- handed, hit a home run over the 325-foot left field fence in the five- run Iola third, after manager Floyd Temple reached base by error. Don Stewart homered for the Dodgers in the third with one on, clearing the center field fence. The short-handed Iola team used pitchers Dave Newkirk and Joe Sanders at first base. Bill Schrier being absent and reported as having a case of tonsillitis.

August 13, 1951-Iola Register

THE TOLA REGISTER, MONDAY EVENING, AUGUST 13, 1951. Revival After Twin Loss Bartlesville -won its thirteenth straight victory over the Indians in the second game of a doubleheader there Saturday night, but Iola was again in good form at Chanute last night, topping Pittsburg 8-4. Pittsburg and Iola are scheduled at Chanute again tonight. The Indians have won two and lost two in their four appearances there, and were capable in their defeats, which were by scores of 3-1 and 4-3 with Miami. Harold Hoffman, the veteran Coffeyville pitcher, righted the Redskins again last night, pitching seven and two-thirds innings. He had rescue work by Dave Newkirk, who the night before had been an 11-3 victim of Bartlesville due to wildness. Pittsburg scored three in the eighth, getting three hits and two walks to trail only 5-4. After Iola added the same number in the last half of the inning, Newkirk held the Browns in the ninth. Paul Weeks continued to rise in the Indian offensive picture, leading the attack with two hits, two runs- batted-in, one run scored, and three stolen bases. Pittsburg used three pitchers, the www.flickr.com/photos/60428361@N07/16457530888/in/photost... getting six of their nine hits and five runs off Lloyd Koehnke. They led all the way after starting with two in the first Inning. Plate umpire Frank Rainier chased Pittsburg's (Hugh) Ben Lott from the game in the seventh for remarks over a ball-and-strike decision. Newkirk walked six in the first inning of the second game at Bartlesville Saturday, resulting in a 6-0 deficit. He stayed until the third, when Pete Cerick replaced him. Joe Vilk pitched another of his strong games in the seven-inning twilight contest, losing 3-1 to Dan Anderson. When Vito Valenzano batted in a run in the second inning, Iola claimed a 1-1 tie that held until the sixth. In both Bartlesville scoring rounds, the defense was a little neglectful toward Vilk, who gave only five hits. Brandy Davis, second up in the first, reached base on an error at third, and after he was forced. Cotton Drummond batted the run in. Two infield hits, an error, and a third strike squeeze bunt by E. C. Leslie produced two for the Pirates in the sixth.. Hits and runs —off Newkirk 4 and 7 in 2 and 3; Cerick 5 and 4 in 5 and a third U. —Lewton, Wells. A—640.

 

5/7/1952—Iola Register

Cerick and Black Leave-the Indians The lola baseball club was minus two of its recent members last night, and the pitching staff was numbering only four men. Pete Cerick was given a release yesterday, Manager Floyd Temple reported, and Charles Black, first baseman who came here a few days ago from the: Yankee' farm system left the club. Cerick, a lefthander, joined lola last: season after being, released it Pittsburg. He has pitched in lola only once, a two-inning relief turn Saturday night. Black also had been used only in reserve capacity since arriving. He was not here long enough for a satisfactory trial. Temple said three Cuban players, an infielder, outfielder, and pitcher are on the way here to join the Indians-

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A former pilot, just wondering

 

John--------wonder if John Orphai knew Neil Armstrong growing up in Wapakoneta? Only a year or so apart in age? Jim Skog

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Jimmy Richardson regarding Bennie Maxwell Lee

 

If you have read more than a dozen of my newsletters or Flash Reports and even one of my books the name of Jimmy Richardson appears. When he is mentioned I always tell the readers in was Mickey Mantle’s first cousin on the maternal side of the family. He read the previous Flash Report and had some comments about Bennie Lee and was looking for one of his buddies who documented the book signing for Mantle conducted in Joplin in 2005. The fellow he was searching for had a local TV program in Enid, OK and many of the events of those two days in Joplin, in 2005, got some regional viewer ship.

 

Bennie Lee and the television guy were known for their horseshoe pitching prowess a few years ago. I know that Richardson got hold of the television guy for I read his comments in the condolence section made available through the Wichita Eagle.

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A comment about the 1949 Pittsburg Browns.

 

About the Pittsburg team in 1949. Al Barkus never lasted the season as the manager and the club wound up in last place--39-85 and finished 33 games behind Independence. There is always optimism at the start of every baseball season only to find some teams are actually out of contention by the 4th of July. All the teams in the big leagues have high hopes that will quickly fade. Here is my fearless prediction. The organization for whom I used to be a Class D batboy will not be in the World Series this year. If you want to know who that team happens to be, look up who Carthage, Mo. had a working agreement with in 1951. Yep, it was the “No go Cubbies.”

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Sometimes not much goes right.

 

Early this year I shared the following: “Paul "Hook" Herman Schnieders, 88, of Jefferson City, died Wednesday, January 7, 2015, at the St. James Veterans Home surrounded by his family.” Listening to the radio early this week I heard this news. “http://www.komu.com/news/fire-engulfs-bowling-alley-southeast-of-jefferson-city-66441/ Those who pull up the two URLs can see the blaze. www.connectmidmissouri.com/news/story.aspx?id=1171453

 

The establishment was owned by the late Paul Schnieders. First he passed away and two months and five days later what he worked hard to build went up in flames.

 

OSAGE COUNTY -- Crews are currently on the scene of another blaze that broke out early Monday morning.

Rainbow Lanes and Hooks Sports Bar on Mari Osa Delta Lane in Osage County went up in flames overnight.

At 3:30 a.m. crews from Osage County Fire and Westphalia Fire responded to the blaze, but the flames were so big that Jefferson City had to bring in their aerial ladder truck. Crews initially entered the building, but shortly evacuated before the roof of the structure collapsed.

There was a great mutual aid effort as departments from Osage, Westphalia, Taos, Hartsville, Linn, Argyle, and Jefferson City worked together to fight the fire with over fifty fire fighters present. Osage EMS also came out and supplied food and water for the fire crews.

Since there were no hydrants and the river close by was covered in ice, a dump tank system was used to supply water to the trucks. The fire was so hot that the exit sign above the door melted and fell to the ground.

Crews believe the fire started in the back corner and had been burning long before they arrived. They expect to still be tending to the blaze for the rest of the day and hope to have the fire completely out by midmorning or noon.

Fire Chief Jim Roark of Westphalia said this was one of the biggest fires they had fought in the last 15 to 20 years.

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Carthage got a visit from a name from the past.

 

Hi John: Would you please be able to give me a location of the Carthage ball park where my dad, John La Porta, would have played? My brother and his wife will be driving back through Carthage in a few days from Oklahoma City where they went to see their son in a swim meet...16 hour drive from Michigan.

Thank you very much. Cindy Lange

 

Ed reply:

 

It's in Municipal Park on the west side of town. It is on west Oak Street. That is probably the second best known place in Carthage other than the town square which has the most impressive courthouse in America.

 

Cindy’s reply:

 

John, thank you so much! My brother is calling tonight, so I will let him know. Excellent info you gave, and I'm sure they'll be able to find it.

I will try to let you know what he says after the visit. Thank you very much!

 

Ed reply:

 

Tell him to be sure to look at the guy on the plaque at the front gate to the stadium. John must be representing his Savannah, GA school in the NAIA swimming tournament that begins in Oklahoma City today. (March 5).

 

Cindy’s reply:

 

Yes!! !! You are amazing, Mr. Hall !!! And I am looking forward to learning who it is on that plaque at the stadium gate... love the intrigue!!

 

Ed reply:

 

I will give you ten guesses as to who that is. If you don't guess it I'll give you a site to pull up and you can discover it for yourself. Not need to wait. I think you already knew this but have just forgotten.

komleaguebaseball.blogspot.com/2009_09_01_archive.html

 

Ed comment:

 

Many times the name of Johnny LaPorta has appeared in my rambling reports. He played third base for Carthage for all of the 1949 season and came back for a while in 1950. The LaPorta’s had deep roots in Chicago and lived a short distance from Wrigley Field. His older brother, Vito, was the last Cub batboy to have seen a World Series game when the Cubs were in it and when he gave up the job, Johnny took over for three seasons. The John LaPorta who was in the NAIA swimming tournament in Oklahoma City is John III.

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Dick and Molly McCoy and their medical providers.

 

John: When Dick and I went to our Drs. one day we mentioned we got our snow done this morning and both the nurse and Dr. said if you can’t afford to have your snow done we’ll pay for it don’t you be doing it!!!!!!! I guess they are right but we always like to have it done before we would drive on it but we now don’t do it anymore.

 

Ed comment:

 

The McCoy’s live in Omaha, Nebr. that has seen a bit of snow in its history. But, what I covet most about their story is the willingness of their medical providers to help them with the snow removal. I told them they could give their doctor and nurse my name and address. I don’t mind shoveling off my driveway but the city tells me that I also have to keep my sidewalks clear. That would be fine for most people but I live on the corner lot and the street that runs along the side of my house is a major east/west roadway in town. It is only one of the very few that traverses Columbia in that direction. The snow plows not only shovel the snow off that road on to my sidewalk but when they either get bored or have neophyte drivers they manage to plow what is below the snow over on to my sidewalk. If you don’t know what is below the snow I’ll give you a hint. It’s called sod and dirt. Once that accumulates there is no shoveling possible.

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Synopsis of last report:

 

Wow what a ton of information!! Barbara in St. Louis

 

Ed comment:

 

I suppose after a dozen plus four reports I can enclose the URL for the Tennessee Ernie hit tune from the 1950’s which of course is……..Sure, you know it by heart if you are over 70.

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Thanks for looking:

 

Last week I uploaded the Flash Report to the Flickr site. Wonder of wonders happened. There were more hits on that site than the number of people to whom the report goes out to by e-mail. I have an idea that some of you went to the site more than once. I want you to know that is acceptable. After this report is sent I’m working on a way to get a photo posted on Flickr that shows one of the former KOM leaguers who has passed away this year.

  

. . . the natural make-up of the women is called Thanaka. It is a cream made out of the bark of specific trees. Thanaka cream has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years. It has a fragrant scent somewhat similar to sandalwood. The creamy paste is applied to the face in attractive designs, the most common form being a circular patch on each cheek, nose, sometimes made stripey with the fingers known as thanaka bè gya, or patterned in the shape of a leaf, often also highlighting the bridge of the nose with it at the same time. It may be applied from head to toe (thanaka chi zoun gaung zoun). Apart from cosmetic beauty, thanaka also gives a cooling sensation and provides protection from sunburn. It is believed to help remove acne and promote smooth skin. It is also an anti-fungal. The active ingredients of thanaka are coumarin and marmesin.

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Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Roger Lloyd-Pack (8 February 1944 – 15 January 2014) was an English actor. He was best known for the role of Trigger in Only Fools and Horses from 1981 to 2003. He had a supporting role of Owen Newitt in The Vicar of Dibley from 1994 to 2007, and as Tom in The Old Guys with Clive Swift. He was also well known for his appearance as Barty Crouch, Sr. in the film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and his appearances in Doctor Who as John Lumic in the episodes "Rise of the Cybermen" and "The Age of Steel". He was sometimes credited without the hyphen in his surname. He died in 2014 from pancreatic cancer.

 

Lloyd-Pack was born in Islington, London, the son of Ulrike Elizabeth (née Pulay, 1921-2000), an Austrian Jewish refugee who worked as a travel agent, and Charles Lloyd-Pack (1902-1983), who was also an actor. He attended Bedales School near Petersfield in Hampshire, where he achieved A Level passes in English, French and Latin. He subsequently trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA), where he worked with actors including Kenneth Cranham and Richard Wilson.

 

On British television he was best known for portraying "Trigger" in the BBC sitcom Only Fools and Horses. He was also known for his role in The Vicar of Dibley as Owen Newitt, and to international audiences his greatest fame was as Barty Crouch, Sr. in the film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

 

In 2005, he appeared in the second series of ITV's Doc Martin as a farmer who held a grudge against Doctor Ellingham for what he believed was the malpractice-related death of his wife. In 2006, he played John Lumic and provided the voice of the Cyber-Controller in two episodes of Doctor Who, "Rise of the Cybermen" and "The Age of Steel", opposite David Tennant, who had played his son in the same Harry Potter film. Lloyd-Pack's final TV appearance was in Law & Order: UK as Alex Greene.

 

Lloyd-Pack was married twice: first to Sheila Ball, from whom he was divorced in 1972, and secondly to the poet and dramatist Jehane Markham (the daughter of David Markham), whom he married in 2000. He had one daughter, actress Emily Lloyd, and three sons. He lived most latterly in Kentish Town, North London, but also had a home near Fakenham in Norfolk.

 

Lloyd-Pack supported Tottenham Hotspur. He voiced the pre-match build-up montage video shown ahead of all Tottenham Hotspur's home matches which is still played today.

 

In June 2008, he appeared as a guest on the BBC's The Politics Show, arguing the case for better-integrated public transport (specifically railways). He was an honorary patron of the London children's charity Scene & Heard.

 

Lloyd-Pack supported the Labour Party and campaigned for Ken Livingstone in the London mayoral election, 2012. However, in 2013, he signed a letter in The Guardian stating he had withdrawn his support from the Labour Party, in favour of a new party of the left.

 

In a 2008 interview, when asked what profession he would have chosen aside from acting, Lloyd-Pack said: "Psychiatrist or a psychoanalyst or something in the psycho world because I’ve always been interested in that... or I might have been a photographer... I also would have loved to have been a musician." In that same interview, he listed his favourite directors as Peter Gill, Harold Pinter, Richard Eyre, Thea Sharrock, and Tina Packer, and also listed actor Paul Scofield as both a favourite and influence.

 

In January 2012, he and fellow actor Sarah Parish supported a campaign to raise £1million for The Bridge School in Islington.

  

Highgate Cemetery East, Swain's Lane, London

The Bundaberg Region.

The rich volcanic soils of the plains near Bundaberg and the Burnett River were covered with thick scrub and bush but a few adventurous pastoralists tried to establish sheep grazing there in the 1850s. It was easier away from the Bundaberg site at Gin Gin and Gayndah further inland. More white settlers came in the mid-1860s as timber cutters. In these early years clashes with the local Aboriginal people were often violent. Aboriginal massacres are known to have occurred at Gin Gin in 1850, in North Bundaberg in the early 1860s. The first timber cutters arrived in the Bundaberg area 1867 followed by the first white farmers also in 1867. The first saw mill was erected in 1868. The town site was surveyed and laid in 1870. Experimental sugar cane farms began around 1871 and within a few months the sugar mills was built. As sugar plantations increased Bundaberg ended up with four major sugar mills. The sugar cane plantations were usually owned by the mills, run as large plantations and they employed Kanaka or South Sea Islander indentured labourers. Thus like Maryborough Bundaberg became a main entry point for the South Sea Islanders. The town grew quickly as more farmers took up small selections or acreages often growing maize or small amounts of sugar cane. The local Kolan Shire council was formed in 1873 and Bundaberg was emerging as a town. It became a municipality in 1881 and a city in 1913. The discovery of copper and that start of mining operations at nearby Mt Perry in 1871 really boosted the prospects of Bundaberg. The first bank opened in 1872, the first newspaper began publication in 1875 and a coach service operated to Maryborough until the railway line was completed in 1888. The government wharf in Bundaberg was built in 1875 with the main cargoes being timber and maize. The Primitive Methodists built an early brush and timber church in 1877 and the Anglicans completed their first church in 1876. But the Catholics were the first to build a permanent church which was consecrated in 1875. The town was well established but the big transformation occurred in the early 1880s when the land owners developed the sugar industry to its full extent until sugar eclipsed all other crops. In 1881 the Bundaberg region produced 3% of QLD’s sugar crop. In 1883 it produced 20% of QLD’s sugar crop. This domination of sugar persisted from 1880 through to 1915. New sugar mills started up with the new Millaquin mill in 1882 and mills for the Youngs of Fairymead and the Gibsons of Bingera. Stable prices for sugar assisted with this development of sugar mills and by the mid-1880s more sugar farms were being established reliant on European labour instead of South Sea Islander labour. The 1885 QLD Royal Commission into malpractices with the Kanaka trade meant the government intervened more to control conditions of the indentured labourers and limited the trade. These restrictions were lifted in 1891 to boost the sugar industry again but the emerging labour unions and associations of white labourers opposed the revival of the Kanaka trade as their employment suffered because of the trade. The new Commonwealth government of 1901 made the decision to cease the trade from 1906. As the sugar industry had to restructure itself the QLD government started to build and financially back the sugar mills itself at Gin Gin and Isis. They also tried to control the mills of Fairymead and Bingera and CSR (Colonial Sugar Refining.)The Labour government of QLD established sugar price control in 1915 and set up a board of appeal for complaints from growers against the sugar mills. By 1915 Bundaberg was in fierce competition with sugar cane areas in the Far North QLD and the industry was much regulated. But it has survived well to the present day. This has been assisted by a new port at Burnett Heads which was built in 1962.

 

Apart from the sugar industry the growth of Bundaberg has been assisted by mining, fruit and vegetable growing and the development of side products from sugar – molasses and rum distilling. The first rum was distilled from the Millaquin sugar mill in 1888. The town was boosted greatly by the opening of the railway from North Bundaberg to Mt Perry copper mines in 1884 which in turn encouraged the establishment of foundries and works to support the mines in Bundaberg. By the 1880s Bundaberg has some grand buildings appropriate for a regional city. The commercial and civic heart of the town was in Bourbong Street with the Post Office 157 Bourbong St (1891), the War Memorial 180 Bourbong St (1922), the School of Arts building 184 Bourbong St (1889), the former Commercial Bank 191 Bourbong St (1891) etc.

Fairymead Plantation Homestead.

One of the great plantation homesteads, not quite as grand as the Southern American slave homesteads, is Fairymead in Bundaberg. It was built in 1890 in the Indian bungalow style of the British Raj occupation of India. It was built for Ernest and Margaret Young the owners of the Fairymead sugar mill. Margret Young’s brother was an architect and designed the house for the subtropical Bundaberg climate. It has 16 foot ceilings and a wide veranda encircles the house. The house was near the mill on the plantation and after World War One was used as accommodation for mill workers until Ernest Young’s grandson and his family moved back into the house in 1960. In 1988 it was donated to the City of Bundaberg and it was eventually transported into the Botanic Gardens site. The house is furnished as it was in 1890 and the interior arrangement of rooms has been little altered since then. The Fairymead sugar plantation was established by three Young brothers in 1880 when they bought 3,200 acres near Bundaberg. Their first sugar was sent to the Millaquin sugar mill until they completed their own sugar mill in 1884. They introduced a railway system to bring the cane to the mill and from 1902 they had irrigation water available if needed for the plantation. They pioneered mechanised single row harvesting of the cane in 1938 which was developed after World War Two to cover two rows. In the 1970s several Bundaberg mills and companies merged to form the Bundaberg Sugar Company.

 

Hinkler House and the Aviation Museum.

Also situated in the Botanic Gardens is the transported home of Bert Hinkler and the Aviation Museum. Bert Hinkler flew the first solo flight from England to Australia in 1928 with his landing spot where the Bundaberg Botanic Gardens now exist. Hinkler was born in Bundaberg in 1892. In 1913 he went to England and joined the Royal Naval Air Service just before the outbreak of World War One. After a distinguished aviation career during the War he remained in England working for an aviation manufacturer A.V Row or Avro as they were known. They later became Hawker Siddeley Aviation which manufactured planes until 1963. Bert Hinkler got his own plane and attempted a flight to Australia in 1920 but war in Syria forced his to abandon this attempt. He set out again on 7 February 1928 reaching Darwin on 22 February and Bundaberg on 27 February. He valiantly flew other record breaking solo flights until his death in Italy in 1933. In 1925 he built a typical two storey detached house in Southampton for his residence. After his death in 1933 it became the property of the City of Southampton and after much negotiation the house was sent brick by brick to Bundaberg in 1983. It was rebuilt as it was in the Botanic Gardens and opened as a museum in 2008. The Commonwealth electorate around Bundaberg is named Hinkler in his honour.

 

The Hinkler Hall of Aviation has six aircraft, paintings, static displays and interactive displays. It contains much memorabilia about Bert Hinkler and his various record breaking flights, and the Arvo airplane manufactory.

 

Lavaur : Festival Rock'&'Cars

[Leo Frank Museum and Gallery Curator: Commentary submitted by anonymous audience member who examined a major section of Roy Barnes' speech at Mercer Law School. Tuesday, November 12, 2019. End of curator commentary.]

 

A polite open letter to Former Governor of Georgia, Roy Barnes:

 

Dear Roy Barnes,

 

Please consider this a polite request for you Roy Barnes to please step down as the senior advisor of Atlanta Georgia's Conviction Integrity Unit (CIU)

 

Please understand there is No pressure, No obligations, and No Rush but, Roy Barnes, many students of the Leo Frank case are asking that you please mull an option in the name of fairness and justice, to deeply meditate on stepping down from the Conviction Integrity Unit.

 

As the CIU's senior most advisor to DA Paul Howard, you have shown yourself publicly to not be fit for the position. You have been pushing hoaxes to the public of jury tampering, even if you pawn them off as reports from the time, you don't seem to have the temperament for this position as an impartial counselor. The things you are asserting at public meeting are beyond the pale and don't reflect someone with the calm disposition to look at the Leo Frank legal records with new eyes, nor dispassionate eyes.

 

Roy Barnes, with a smidgen of self-reflection, you might see with personal reflection that you don't, in numerous senses, have the curious scientist's spirit which looks at the facts first and then comes to the conclusions. You seem to be presenting only evidence of Leo Frank supposed innocence, and never seem to share the evidence that was against him. It's clear you have a biased agenda.

 

Roy Barnes, you don't seem to have the soul of a conscientious judge-- an arbiter who goes into a trial without preconceived determinations. A fair-minded jurist, does not take side at the beginning of an inquiry, he allows the facts, testimony, exhibits and evidence to lead him to the truth. Those kinds of mental architectures of a person with logical outlooks are needed to fairly evaluate, first the Case of Mary Phagan, especially the investigation and interviews, and the series of events which lead to the indictment, trial and appeals of Leo M. Frank.

 

Roy Barnes, you don't have the majestic symbolic mind posed by the beautiful women, lady justice, blind folded from illusions, with the scales of justice being held high with impartiality.

 

Question: Roy Barnes are you a thoughtful judge-minded modern day man who tries to be truly impartial in the 21st-century, or are you fighting for Leo Frank's defense team from the early 20th century? This question is asked of you, because, Roy Barnes, you have made your position clear that you think Leo Frank--who was convicted--is innocent and Jim Conley--who was not convicted of murder--is guilty of the murder.

 

Rhetorical question: With that position hard wired in your brain, how can their ever be prudence applied to reviewing the facts of Leo Frank's legal saga?

 

Roy Barnes, the citizens of Georgia are beginning to believe that you might possibly think that because Leo Frank was not protected while he was incarcerated in the penitentiary and therefore, wantonly assassinated, this some how causes a time travelers loop, where the lynching of Frank, creates an H.G. Wells time machine that goes back and stops Leo Frank from committing aggravated battery, sodomy-rape and slaying Mary Phagan.

 

Roy Barnes, the lynching of Leo Frank was ILLEGAL.

 

Roy Barnes the lynching of Leo Frank was IMMORAL.

 

Roy Barnes the lynching of Leo Frank was UNETHICAL IN THE EXTREME.

 

Roy Barnes the lynching of Leo Frank was EXTRAJUDICIAL.

 

but the lynching of Leo Frank is not a time machine, it doesn't cause a UFO to appear, that goes back in time and prevents Mary Phagan from going to the factory that day.

 

In other words Roy Barnes, the lynching of Leo Frank in 1915, does not put you outside the office of Leo Frank on April 26, 1913, with an envelope filled with $1.20 in period coinage, for you to hand it to Mary Phagan, and tell her to never come back to the factory again.

 

Do you get that Roy? Do you get that prisoner's being killed outside the law is not ever justice? But that it also doesn't magically undue the heinous crimes convicted criminals had committed?

 

Are you getting this Roy? That we all agree with you that Leo Frank's lynching was a perversion of justice, but that it doesn't magically go back in time, and prevent the former Pencil manufacturing superintendent from beating the shit out of Mary Phagan in the National Pencil Company's second-floor machine department on April 26, 1913, during its noon hour?

 

Does that make sense, Roy Barnes? It's an honest question.

 

Do you get it Roy Barnes, that the lynching of Leo Frank in 1915 doesn't go backward in time and prevent the former Pencil manufacturing superintendent from defiling Mary Phagan while she was unconscious, after he knocked her out cold, by slamming the young child's head onto the steel handle of a large drill press in the machine department?

 

Do you get it Roy Barnes, that the lynching of Leo Frank in 1915, doesn't park H.G. Wells time machine in a parking space at your office, where you can go back in time at the last moment, and have a police conversation with Leo Frank to please kindly remove the garrote from Mary Phagan's throat, and lets think this through?

 

Do you get it Roy Barnes, that the lynching of Leo Frank in 1915, doesn't let you go back to 1913, and rent a penthouse hotel room at the piedmont, where you can leisurely go down to the National Pencil Company at 11:30pm on April 26, 1913, and show Leo Frank a print out of the Wikipedia article on him, and all the con-artist books written on him, so that he changes his mind from raping and strangling Mary Phagan?

 

Do you get that Roy Barnes?

 

Do we Mercer Law Students and You Roy Barnes, have an agreed understanding and meeting of the minds that the lynching of Leo Frank was, pure and simple, was an act of murder?

 

Forget about the fact that the 60th Governor of Georgia Jack Slaton was the most prominent owner-partner of the law firm which represented Leo Frank up until his trial, defending him through his trial and state appeals. Lets forget that fact Jack Slaton was a corrupt Governor who should have recused himself and that it was unconstitutional that he commuted the capital punishment sentence of his law client. Lets put that aside for a minute, Roy Barnes.

 

The Lynching was still wrong.

 

But it doesn't make him innocent.

 

Convicted murderers don't get their murder convictions thrown out because they were vilely killed during their life of incarceration.

 

Do you get that Roy Barnes? Does that sink in?

 

Can you marinate on that Roy?

 

Do you see why you're not fit to be the highest ranking advisor on a committee whose job it is to look at the Leo Frank case without emotion, but logic? without emotion but empiricism? without hate crime hoaxes and shams about the shit in the shaft magically exonerating Leo Frank? Without the wishful thinking of the Alonzo Mann's 1980s perjury?

 

Roy Barnes, we Mercer students don't think you have what it takes in you to be honest, honorable and serve with integrity on the Conviction Integrity Unit.

 

Please do the right thing, and give it your best mulling, to step down from the conviction integrity unit, you're just doing more harm than good.

 

You're literally poisoning any chance of a fair hearing with repeated accusations about "reports at the time" of the jury being threatened with anti-Semitic terrorism on a daily (how many days does that total, Roy Barnes if it was everyday) basis during that 4 week trial (July 28- August 26, 1913).

 

Roy Barnes, Please we don't need that bullshit being flicked and flung around on TV. Everyone in Georgia saw you on 11Alive news, we saw you mouth those words.

 

Roy Barnes, How can you be the senior advisor of the Conviction Integrity Unit when you go around promoting the so-called reports at the time of jury tampering which have mutated over the years, when you have access to the courtroom records, newspaper reports from the time and the full appellate reviews of the Ga court of appeals, which never mention mobs terrorizing the jury on a morningly basis?

 

Roy Barnes, How can the case of Leo Frank be fairly evaluated when you were shown on TV via 11Alive saying that EVERY MORNING during the month long trial crowds shouted anti-Semitic terrorist threats at the jury, "HANG THE JEW OR WE'LL HANG YOU" as they walked to court?

 

Roy Barnes, We got you on film saying that. You repeated it at our Mercer Law School discussion, but this time you qualified it as something like "reports from the era"

 

Roy Barnes, If you decide you are a passionate member in Leo Frank's defense team, we ask you to present the full brief of evidence to every practicing attorney in Georgia and those retired too. While we're at it, lets have the whole bar study the trial transcript, published day by day, in the Atlanta daily newspapers (Constitution, Journal and Georgian) during the end of July to the end of August, and have them all closely review the Frank appeals with the highest and best in all of us.

 

If that's possible, Roy Barnes, we should at least try, we would like some checks and balances here, because you Roy Barnes, have lost your mind.

 

Roy Barnes, lets have a state-wide discussion of the full case of LMK with all law students and law professors in the borders of Georgia--is that unreasonable (?), that the full state of Georgia, and every citizen of the state of Georgia, is asked to read the original newspaper reports from the capitol's presses, published in the Atlanta constitution, Atlanta journal and Atlanta Georgian, and the questions and answers of the trial transcript in those newspapers?

 

Roy Barnes, How do these said recordings on antique type writers compare to the Georgia Supreme Court's majority responses? Where they too prejudiced and part of the grand conspiracy to conspire against Leo M. Frank?

 

And does District Attorney Hugh Dorsey's side of the state's case, the one presented in that very same Ga Supreme Court report filing, sift him as a man seeking: justice for the child sweatshop assembly line attendant OR unscrupulous injustice of framing an innocent man with a commitment to judicial murder?

 

Several sections of Roy Barnes's November 12, 2019 monologue at Mercer Law School, stands out. The most prominent being, what Journalist-Author Steve Oney, called, "The Shyte in the Shaft":

 

Roy Barnes during his speech at Mercer Law School on Tuesday, November 12th, 2019, in his monologue acts as if it's axiomatically a hard-fact that the primitive freight elevator in Atlanta's National Pencil Company of 1913, could NOT have been used during the noontime hour of Saturday, April 26, 1913, to transport Mary Phagan's dead and defiled body, down from the second floor of the factory, down two flights to the factory's cellar. The supposition of his reason why it didn't happen that way, is because the police took the freight elevator down to the said basement on Sunday morning, April 27th, 1913, it crushed some feces in the ground tray of the elevator shaft. At face value, and with limited information about the incident, it could easily be believable for those unfamiliar with the reports provided by investigators.

 

To summarize, Barnes touches briefly upon The elevator's maneuverability with dramatics, "Boom", referring to the "the shit in the shaft" (as journalist-author Steve Oney labeled it), and the smooshing of Conley's feces at the said base tray at the hard dirt floor ground in the elevator shaft at the front section of the basement, below the street entry of the National Pencil Company. Roy Barnes hints at this as something which tends to impeach Conley's testimony about how he and Leo Frank moved the cadaver of Mary Phagan and his series of evolving affidavits eludes to how the events took place. The undercurrent of Barnes' statements are this provides more exonerating evidence for Leo Frank, as part of a larger suite of perceived opinions on evidence absolving Frank of the rape-murder for which he was duly convicted.

 

Roy Barnes, presenting limited information, tries to make it out like the elevator was automated and that it would go all the way to the bottom on its own, after presumably pushing a button? But that's not how the elevator worked based on the descriptions of it. There was actually a rudimentary pull cord to pause the elevator's descent or ascent (not modern computerize numeric floor buttons like we have today), it wasn't just that the elevator cut off on its own presumably flipping a power switch when it reached the basement, the driver of the vertical elevator car had control.

 

Jim Conley in his testimony at the Leo Frank trial and his affidavits finally talks about how Leo Frank was so nervous with the elevator control cord that he hints it might have stopped the elevator before it hit the bottom on their descent, and again too soon before they ascended to the above floors, going back up toward the second floor. Leo Frank was said in Conley's testimony to have stopped the freight elevator too short, and upon exiting it, he tripped inside the elevator car catching the floor as he was trying to get out of it and thus fell backward right onto Jim Conley.

 

Surprise, Surprise, Roy Barnes never mentions these above-detailed descriptions in his 2019 monologue on that particular incident, of using the elevator to move Mary Phagan's body away from the metal room, located opposite Leo Frank's business office, to the rear corner of the basement where it was intended to be burned in a furnace--which Barnes essentially cites as a reason among others, why Leo Frank is innocent, and supposedly proof that in the noon hour of Saturday, April 26, 1913, they didn't use the means to transport the battered and bruised corpse of the 13-year-old girl to the basement.

 

James "Jim" Conley's meticulous details in several evolving affidavits and his trial testimony no August 4, 5, and 6th, 1913, at the Mary Phagan murder trial, about these said events, tend to show Leo Frank's nervous-erratic demeanor immediately post-murder and his mishandling of the elevator brake cord.

 

The freight elevator likely would not go all the way down to the cellar tray by a matter of some inches, because police initially described during their initial investigation at 3:40 o'clock a.m. that there was lots of trash in that bottom-most tray, and also found Mary Phagan's parasol right smack in the middle of it (there is even a contemporary diagram sketch of it). The police described the contents of the tray and moved that trash around, in search of clews, they might have moved the trash enough or removed some of it, so that later when they took the elevator down, it could actually go down all the way completely to the bottom. Later that morning in the presence of Leo Frank, they took the freight elevator down on April 27, 1913, in the daytime morning, when they had done so, it smooshed Conley's natural deposit he left there in the said tray.

 

What Roy Barnes also fails to also mention is those first-responder police officers who investigated the crime scene that morning on April 27, 1913, specifically reported they saw drag marks from the elevator shaft entryway, 140 feet across the hard dirt floor to the rear of the basement, where garbage was normally staged before being burned in the furnace, a furnace that provided heat and hot water to the factory. He uses the excuse that he has limited time, to give the audience the information they need to make an informed decision, to instead focus on the then-present and then-former government officials and prominent citizenry who organized to hang Leo Frank on August 17th, 1915, in fulfillment of the Mary Phagan murder trial jury's unanimous decision to recommend "no mercy" for Leo Frank on August 25th 1913, to therefore have the defendant be sentenced to capital punishment, and Judge Roan's ratification the next day of that verdict and sentencing decision on August 26, 1913.

 

[End of their response on the "Shit in the Shaft Hoax" being used to Exonerate Leo Frank]

 

Further Research:

 

Article: Former Governor Roy Barnes Discusses Leo Frank Case at Mercer Law School

41nbc.com/2019/11/13/former-georgia-gov-roy-barnes-discus...

 

VIDEO: Former Governor Roy Barnes at Mercer Law School, November 2019

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIviA9GXGQI

 

Please download this video before it gets intentionally censored or deleted to erase the evidence. VIDEO (Recommended): 11Alive Roy Barnes, May 7th 2019

youtu.be/4tgKcqOXyhc

 

Further Reading:

 

Mary Phagan Case Website by Phagan-Kean Family

www.littlemaryphagan.com

 

The Leo Frank Case Scholarly Research Library

www.leofrank.info

 

The Leo Frank Archive

www.LeoFrank.org

 

The American Mercury

www.theamericanmercury.org

 

APPENDIX

 

The Roy Barnes & Mercer Law School Flier Transcription

 

The Leo Frank Case With Former GA Governor Roy Barnes, Tuesday November 12, 2019, Noon to 1:00 o'clock P.M. in Bell-Jones Courtroom "Hear from one of Georgia's best trial lawyers about one of the State's most notorious lynchings and the renewed investigation into the evidence from the controversial trial."

 

Lunch Provided.

 

Mercer Law School

Macon GA 31207

 

Tuesday, November 12, 2019

Noon-1 P.M.

Bell-Jones Courtroom

 

MORE EVIDENCE of Roy Barnes promoting anti-White, anti-Southern and anti-Gentile hate crime hoaxes.

 

1. Roy Barnes on Georgia Public Broad Casting (GPB), promoting the anti-Gentile hate crime hoax, Source: www.gpbnews.org/post/former-gov-roy-barnes-reexamining-ce...

 

2. 11Alive Georgia News, March 7th, 2019, Roy Barnes claims crowds of people were making death threats at the trial jury every morning, Source: www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tgKcqOXyhc

 

3. Mercer Law School, November 12, 2019, Roy Barnes cowardly weasels-out because Mary Phagan Kean is present at the monologue and instead of him regularly saying the hate crime hoax was definitive (He speaks assertively), he promotes it here at Mercer Law College as "reports at the time." When Mary Phagan Kean isn't present he claims it "authoritatively" as if it's a definitive fact. Source: youtu.be/TIviA9GXGQI

 

TRANSCRIPT OF THE EVENT

  

[Jack Saw Speaks] Alright, good afternoon!

 

Thank you, everybody, for joining us despite the rain and the cold. I'm Jack Saw, I'm the president of Historians in Law School, it's a student organization here at school, and we're excited, together with the school, and with the help of our Dean Kathy Cox, to be sponsoring this event. And we're excited to see such a good turnout, including my fellow students and alumni. Welcome back, and welcome home. And current attorneys here in town. So I'll turn it over to Dean Kathy Cox to introduce our speaker.

 

[Dean Kathy Cox Speaks] Thank you, Jack, and good afternoon to all of you. I want to say a special word of welcome to Judge Hugh Lawson. We are always glad to have you here judge and to my friend, and fellow public servant former state representative, Larry Walker, from Perry, who served in the Georgia legislature with Governor Barnes and me, we're glad that both of you could be here along with so many other friends, alumni and students today. It's a real pleasure to introduce you to former governor Roy Barnes.

 

Governor Barnes is a lifelong resident of Cobb County, Georgia. He is a “double dog,” having earned his history degree and his law degree from the University of Georgia and the Georgia law school. He first went to work as a prosecutor in the Cobb County District Attorney's office after graduating from law school, before opening his own law firm in Marietta, where he continues to practice today.

 

The political bug bit him really early. He was elected to the Georgia Senate at age 26, becoming the youngest member of the state senate at the time. He served eight terms in the Georgia State Senate, rising into numerous leadership positions, and also being appointed as chairman of the Select Commission on Constitutional Revision, which rewrote the Georgia Constitution in 1983. So if any of you students want to know any interpretation about the Georgia Constitution, he's your guy! (At least my view! – Roy Barnes interjects) He and Larry Walker, both, wrote the Georgia Constitution that exists today.

 

He made his first bid for the governorship in 1990 and was unsuccessful in a primary Zell Miller who went on to win. But Roy Barnes came back two years later and was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives where I got the chance to serve with him in the House and as a member of the House Judiciary Committee along with state representative, Walker.

In 1998 Governor Barnes was elected as the 80th governor of Georgia. He made education reform and improvements to education, public education, in Georgia a hallmark of his administration with efforts to reduce class sizes all over the state, raise accountability standards, require more discipline in classrooms, and other reforms.

 

He also concentrated on health care reform and remedies for urban growth and sprawl. He took on the very controversial issue of removing the Confederate Battle Flag from the Georgia state flag and he won that battle, changing the Georgia flag, but many believe that battle played a big role in his defeat for reelection in 2002. Nevertheless, he was awarded in 2003 the John F. Kennedy Profiles in Courage award, for his leadership in that effort.

 

Upon his defeat in 2002 Governor Barnes did something that really surprised the legal community, he did not go back to Marietta to start making money. He instead went to work for the Atlanta Legal Aid office as a full-time volunteer, for the next 6 months, committing his efforts and providing one of the strongest signals possible about what lawyers really owe their profession and the community.

 

He did eventually return to private practice of law, where he has continued to work as one of the most successful trial lawyers in Georgia and the southeast. He's known for successfully handling personal injury, wrongful death, and medical malpractice cases, along with mass tort cases, and complex business disputes.

 

There's a pretty well-known saying in Georgia that if you're in trouble, you want Roy Barnes on your side and you don't want to have to fight against him.

 

Governor Barnes, in my opinion, is one of the wisest and most astute political leaders Georgia has ever known, along with being one of the smartest trial lawyers ever to see a Georgia courtroom. It has been my honor to serve with him, and Georgia government. nd a special privilege to have him here as our guest today to talk about one of his most recent endeavors in the historic Leo Frank case. Please join me in welcoming former governor, Roy Barnes.

 

[Roy Barnes Speaks] Kathy read that just like I wrote it, so, I've got to tell you just one little side note. We had a lot of controversy is the judges know about Georgia's voting machines and I had this lady that came out to interview me. She says, “did you know they stole the election from you in 2002, with those voting machines?” I said, “No ma'am. I think I lost that all on my own.” so...

 

Van Pearlberg, who's here, used to be an assistant district attorney and is now in the Attorney General's office. Van and I are longtime friends. He's probably a better expert on Leo Frank than I am. So we're glad to have him. Now you're one of the Phagan's descendants. “I am, I'm Mary Phagan-Kean, the great niece.” [Mary Phagan Kean comments, Barnes continues] The great niece – this is Mary Phagan-Kean, who's the great niece of Mary Phagan.

 

I want to turn you back for over a hundred years in Georgia.

Really back to the time of 1913. Georgia was a lot different. It had just come out, about 25 or 30 years before, out of the Civil War and a good part of the state was still recovering. In fact, if you look at the tax digest in 1860, it was 1960 until the tax digest recovered at the same amount that it was in 1860.

 

Georgia was also torn. It was torn between the Henry Grady, New South and the Old South, that had been brought down in the Civil War. Grady and governors, were trying to attract to Georgia any industry they could because most of the people we're desperately poor.

 

Now, into all of that comes Leo Frank. Leo Frank, was born in Texas, but he grew up in Brooklyn and he went to Cornell where he studied mechanical engineering. He married Lucille Selig. The Selig family is still one of the greatest and most well-known families in Atlanta – Selig properties, Steve Selig, Slick Selig as his father was known.

 

Well, the Frank's uncle [Moses Frank] owned a majority of what was the National Pencil Factory which was on Whitehall but now is called Peachtree and they divided it up.

 

He was a member of the temple [Formerly the Hebrew Benevolent Society] which is now on Peachtree. And they were mostly reform – the temple was reform Jewish faith and it was led by a fellow that was considered a radical in many aspects and that is Rabbi David Marx.

 

They were mostly German Jews that were members of that community and they were assimilationist and not isolationist.

 

The Orthodox, and some conservative but mostly Orthodox, believe in living in communities separated from other Jewish or Gentile communities, but the reform, and particularly at this time, with a German influence were assimilationists.

 

Those of you who have seen Driving Miss Daisy – Miss Daisy, her son was a member of the temple. The temple was bombed, by the way, in the 1950s [circa 1958] because they were very pro-civil rights [that was never proved] and another lawyer the time, Ada Garland's father, Reuben Garland, defended the fellow that was charged. Who, by the way, was acquitted and this was in the 1950s.

 

Mary Phagan was a teenage girl. She was raised in Marietta, she was buried in Marietta, where I'm from. And child labor was very common at the time. The first industry was really the manual type industry in textile mills, and children were the ones that generally worked there. It was accepted in society, at the time. She was owed a dollar and twenty cents for past wages. Now back then we had the first rapid transit, even though Cobb has none today, but we had the first rapid transit in Cobb County. It was called the trolley line and it was run by the Atlanta Northern Line. So there was a line, a street car that ran every hour going to Atlanta and another one that was returning to Atlanta. She rode the street line, the streetcar down to Atlanta, because the plant was closed, because we were having Memorial Day. Not Yankee Memorial Day as they called it at the time – Confederate Memorial Day, April 26th, [1913].

 

And she knew the plant was closed, but she also knew that Mr. Frank worked there and she wanted to get her dollar and twenty cents because her family needed it.

 

So the plant was closed and she went. There's no question she went there. No question she saw Leo Frank, in my view, but her body was found the next morning in the basement where the incinerator was. Now this is going to become important a little bit later.

 

There was two ways to get downstairs: one was with an elevator, but it was a very rudimentary elevator. It didn't have any brakes on it [False it did have breaks, by a hand cord]. It stopped when it hit the ground and you would jump and ran, then have a break. It just went up a couple of floors.

 

And then there was a ladder that went into the basement. Mary Phagan was found in the basement and there was soot all over her face. Her dress was hiked up and she was found early the next morning by a fella named Newt Lee who worked there. He was a janitor [He was the nightwatchman not the janitor], or you know, worked around the plant.

 

Of course, Frank and the police were called and all of that and Newt Lee was the first suspect. Now remember this was before the time of Miranda. It was before the time of anything that had any essence of being a due process, particularly if you were an African-American in the South.

 

And in fact, both as to Newt Lee and to Conley, Jim Conley, who we'll talk about it in just a moment, who became the star witness. The newspapers would have stories that I've read “Conley, & Lee, Being Sweated by the Police.” Now we can only imagine what “being sweated” was, but it was not uncommon even when I started practicing law. I hate to say this, for police officers to get carried away with rubber hoses and everything else.

 

The police pretty well ruled Newt Lee out and then the idea, the focus turned to Jim Conley. Now Conley was a janitor, a gopher, or whatever ,in the office. He gave three different statements, three different affidavits, which all changed through time. He became the star witness, and what he said was that Frank wanted to have sex with Mary [Phagan], and that he had taken her into the lady's room.

 

His office was on the same floor as the manufacturing and a wood lathe was there [in the machine department aka metal room[. And that he had hit her too hard. This was his final story. And that he called Conley up to take her down to the elevator. She was dead.

 

Now this is going to become critical later. Conley also said that they had mattress tick, which is that striped cloth that was around mattresses and then wrapped her in it to take her down there [to the basement of the national pencil company].

 

Conley also said that he took he and Frank together – took her down the elevator, you know the one that bump! [Roy Barnes is falsifying the story, Leo Frank controlled the elevator with a hand cord] And this became critical later, particularly to Governor [John] Slaton.

 

Frank was indicted based on that testimony and put on trial pretty well. The trial took about a month. Frank was represented by what probably was the best lawyer in Georgia at the time. His name was Luther Rosser.

 

The prosecution was represented by, up to that time, a lackluster prosecutor by the name of Hugh Dorsey. By the way, just as a footnote Hugh Dorsey and his wife's daughter would later marry Luther Rosser's son. Everything is connected. You know there's only seven degrees of separation.

 

Judge [Leonard] Roan was the [presiding] judge and was considered a very good judge and was. The difference in the trials were greatly different [then] than they are today. The Fulton County Courthouse was on Marietta Street at the time. There was no air conditioning, as you might imagine, so the windows were open during the day, and this is one of the things that Oliver Wendell Holmes and Charles Evans Hughes wrote about in the sense, in the case, was the mob outside. And somebody would sit in the window [not true], so is reported in the case, and holler out what the testimony was [not true], and there would be a roar of approval or a boo of disapproval [fake news, this was not the case].

 

There are some that say, and I've read some of these reports, that the jury was sequestered and was kept at the old Kimball house. And I have read some reports of, as the jury would come up from the Kimball house to go to the courthouse every day, parts of the mob would say, “hang the Jew or we'll hang you,” [This is the jury tampering hoax, Leo Frank's defenders promote to trick the public into thinking Leo Frank didn't have a fair trial] whatever it was, and all of them and I don't think there's a lot of dispute about this, there was a mob presence there [There was no misbehaving mob outside the courthouse, Barnes is misrepresenting the case]. The effect they had is open to dispute.

 

Well, to make a long story short, because I only have a little time and I want to get to John Slaton and the lynching. To make a long story short, Frank was convicted and sentenced to hang. Georgia let every sheriff hang his own folks at the time. Fulton County had what was called the Tower and he was to be hung there.

 

The case went to the Supreme Court of the United States, twice. There were two dissents -- Charles Evan Hughes and Oliver Wendell Holmes. And Hughes wrote, and I won't get into it, I read it last night again, about the influence of the mob.

 

John Slaton was governor of Georgia. He was called Jack. He was a rising star in Georgia politics and everybody said that he was going to be the next United States Senator. He was married to the wealthiest woman in Georgia. Her name was Grant, Sarah Frances Grant. She was called Sally. In fact, John Slaton is buried in the Grant Mausoleum at Oakland Cemetery, not his own. He was buried in his wife's mausoleum.

 

The case finally came up to him in June of 2015 [actually 1915]. Now, he had been watching the case and he had started his own investigation in the case.

 

We had crazy times of governors taking office back then. He was going out of office and Governor Nat Harris was coming in and Nat Harris was the governor who signed a bill allowing women to practice law in Georgia. And Nat Harris was the governor coming in and I'm sure, like every other governor, he'd say, “maybe it won't get there before I leave.” But he had been governor twice. We didn't have a lieutenant governor then. He'd been president of the Senate in 1911 when Hoke Smith died and he became acting governor for about 18 months and then Joseph Mackey Brown, the son of Joseph E. Brown, the Civil War governor, served one term in between and then Slaton came back and served the second term – when he caught the Leo Frank case.

 

He [Governor Slaton, part-owner of the law firm which represented Leo Frank at his trial and state appeals] read the entire month-long transcript. He did his own investigation. He took detectives and Hugh Dorsey to the scene and he came to the conclusion that there was not certainty as to the death penalty. He middled around as to whether he was actually guilty. He said there was not certainty. He wrote – and I'll leave it here with Kathy in case anyone wants to see it they can – he wrote a commutation order; Twenty-nine pages where he set out the evidence in detail.

 

He talked about all of the witnesses and things that had arisen since that time.

 

One of the things that he depended on was – remember Conley said that he and Frank had taken Mary Phagan down the elevator – and so the police, when they came down – and remember that elevator hit the bottom [not true, it had a hand cord break, Conley reported Frank controlled the cord and stopped it too soon] -- the police reports coming the next morning to investigate said that they found (I know this is indelicate) human excrement when someone had had a bowel movement under the elevator.

 

Well now, that is when they came to investigate and that was a turning point, as you'll see with him, one of the turning points, because he said, that if they had gone down on the elevator, it would have smooshed the excrement and they would have been smelling it. In fact, it was not until the next day that it occurred.

 

Another thing that he relied upon was this: Judge Roan, who had presided over the trial, had talked with Slaton and had written him a letter [It was a forgery], in which Judge Roan said, I have doubt, I have doubt. And if I had the power, he didn't think he had the power at the time, he was wrong and Governor Slaton tells him, yeah, he could have done it, I probably would have granted a new trial [Judge Roan did have the power].

 

There's a lot of litigation that's going on right now for a Georgia Supreme Court on the power of a trial judge sitting as a 13th juror. That is, the right to set aside and put their own judgment in.

 

And so, based upon that and the other facts – there was some hair on the lathe – and somebody testified (remember we didn't have scientific things like we do now), well, that looks like Mary Phagan's hair. After the trial there was somebody that found a microscope and looked at it and a doctor gave an opinion, “this is not the same hair.” That happened after the trial [The examining scientist was likely bribed according to other people stating they were bribed in the Leo Frank Georgia Supreme Court Records].

 

At the trial there had been women that had been brought up, “well, Frank tried to sexually harass me” and another group that says, “Oh, I've worked with him for years and had no problem whatsoever.”

 

Well, and in fact, Slaton received over a hundred thousand letters. He talks about it in his commutation order. He decided he was going to commute the sentence. And he wrote this order.

 

He went home and told his wife, Sally, and she said, “I would” and he said, “I don't know what's going to happen here to us.” And she said “I would rather be the widow of a brave man than the wife of a coward.” And he signed the commutation.

 

Let me read to you part of it:

 

“The performance of my duty under the Constitution is a matter of my conscience. The responsibility rests where the power is reposed. Judge Roan, with that awful sense of responsibility, which probably came over him as he thought of that judge before he would shortly appear..” Judge Roan had died in the interim. “...calls to me from another world to request that I do that which he should have done.

 

I can endure misconstruction, abuse and condemnation, but I cannot stand the constant companionship of an accusing conscience. Which would remind me in every thought that I, as governor of Georgia, failed to do what I thought to be right.

 

There is a territory between a reasonable doubt and an absolute certainty for which the law provides and allowing life imprisonment instead of execution. This case has been marked by such doubt.”

 

He was interviewed a little bit later after that and this is what he said:

 

“Two thousand years ago, another governor washed his hands and turned over a Jew to a mob. For 2,000 years that governor's name has been cursed. If today another Jew” [Leo Frank] “were lying in his grave because I had failed to do my duty, I would all through life find his blood on my hands, and would consider myself an assassin through cowardice.”

 

Now, he went out of office within four or five days, Slaton did.

 

What was the reaction?

 

Well, he had to have the state militia escort him to the train station to leave. He slipped back in from time to time but he stayed gone ten years, before he came back to start back practicing law. He was successful. He went on and was one of the, before a unified bar, he was president of the State Bar.

 

But he never, of course, held political office again.

 

What happened to Leo Frank?

 

Well, Leo Frank was in the Tower, the Fulton Tower, ready to be hung by the sheriff. And so Governor Slaton, before he released the commutation, had the sheriff take him to the state prison, which was not at Reidsville at the time. It was in Milledgeville, because Milledgeville had been the capitol of Georgia until 1868, when it was moved to Atlanta.

 

He was not there for long, until his neck was slit [July 17th, 1915] and he had a big gash in it by an attempt on his life. And then, remember the commutation was on June 21st, 1915.

 

By the way, Frank was scheduled to be hung the next morning [June 22nd, 1915]. So it was right upon...Slaton put it off as long as he could.

 

Well on August the 17th of 1915 [Actually it was the 16th] a group from Marietta got into the state prison in Milledgeville, brought Frank to Frey's Gin road, which is right off 75 and Roswell road in Marietta, and hung him.

 

This was not the first great stain on all of us, in the South. Is that is estimated there were more than 4,000 African-Americans lynched after the Civil War until the 1960s [60% of that number were African Americans, the other 40% were Whites and a small percentage were other]. The last one in Georgia was in the late 1940s at [name unintelligible] bridge, Walton county.

 

But this was the first case of a Jew being lynched. But remember this was a tough time in Georgia. The Ku Klux was not risen yet. But it soon did after this with some of the same folks that were lynchers. And they hated three folks: Jews, Blacks and Catholics, and in fact that's one of the reasons, even as a kid I can remember, prejudice against Catholics.

 

There's a great story that says Richard Russell, he was a great United States senator from Georgia, and his daddy was the Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court. There's a story that Dick Russell fell in love with a Catholic girl and was going to marry her and he went to his daddy and told him that he was going to marry her and he said, “Well, son.” He said, “You could marry her but your days in politics are over in Georgia.” And he never married. That's a whole 'nother story. Because there's a provision in his will that says he wants a gift to go to a certain person that is exactly [unintelligible] things like that.

 

But these were the leaders of the community.

 

There's a famous photograph of the lynching with Frank hanging there and to the right is the superior court judge, standing there. His name was Newt Morris.

 

If you get interested in this case, this case will drive you crazy, but if you get interested, the book you should read is 'The Dead Shall Rise' [2003] by Steve Oney.

 

Steve Oney came to see us in the eighties. I was always enthralled with the case and Tom Watson – one of the things I hadn't mentioned – Tom Watson, who was one of the great political leaders – Hugh Dorsey went on to become governor from this. Tom Watson went on to become a United States Senator.

 

Tom Watson had a newspaper called The Jeffersonian and he printed headlines in red [Not true, we have all the copies of his newspapers and magazines]. And it was scandalous, the reporting on the trial that occurred every day. “Jew pervert,” he used words like that in the headlines instead of being factual. [Barnes is wrong, Tom Watson did not comment on the 1913 Leo Frank Trial, until 1914. "Jew Pervert" wasn't published until the late summer of 1915 in Watson's Magazine.]

 

Here's some of the ones that were involved – Steve Oney has devised it up:

 

Joseph M. Brown. Well, he was governor from 1909 to 1911, 1912 to 1913, right before Jack Slaton. He was from Marietta. Charlie Brown, his grandson, just died last year. These folks are still around.

 

Newton Augustus Morris. He was the superior court judge and his great nephew is on the city council of Marietta. I once said, I said, “You can't be an old Mariettan unless you had an ancestor that was at the lynching of Leo Frank and it's just about the truth.

 

Eugene Herbert Clay. He was the son of the United States Senator. He was mayor of Marietta, but at the time that this occurred he was, what we called him then, the solicitor-general, the district attorney today. I always loved the old name, solicitor-general. I wish they hadn't changed it. They still call him solicitor today.

 

He is the one that presided and called the grand jury in to listen to evidence about who had taken Leo Frank and lynched him. Surprise, surprise, the grand jury returned a finding that it was “persons unknown” in the community.

 

John Tucker Dorsey. His son later, Jasper Dorsey, would be president of Bell South or Southern Belle as we called it back then. John Tucker Dorsey, he was one of the best trial lawyers there was. He was a member of the general assembly. He was chairman of the prison committee and that's probably how they got in so easily down in Milledgeville.

 

He served as district attorney for two years, John Tucker did. He had been twice convicted of manslaughter. I mean, folks were a little bit different back then, you know. And had served in imprisonment on the chain-gang and then was later pardoned by the governor so he could go to law school and become district attorney. He was a distant cousin of Hugh Dorsey, who was the prosecutor.

 

Fred Morris, he was a Marietta lawyer. He served his first term in the general assembly. He organized the Boy Scouts in Marietta and then went off to the lynching of Leo Frank.

 

Bowlin Glovitt Glover Brumby. Like I said, had every prominent family in Marietta. He owned the Marietta Chair Company, you know, the Brumby Rocker? This is where it comes from. Oney describes Brumby as the very image of an arrogant Southern Aristocrat and that nothing angered him more than Yankees.

 

The field commanders, those were kind of the planners, the field commanders was a fella named George Daniels. He ran a jewelry shop on the Marietta Square and was one of the founding members of the Rotary Club.

 

These folks were not riff-raff.

 

Gordon Baxter Gann. He was from Mableton, by the way, but he was ordinary and was former mayor of Marietta.

 

Newt Mays Morris. They called him “Black Newt.” Now Black Newt would whip 'ya. He ran the chain gang in Cobb County and they called him “Whippin' Newt” or “Black Newt.”

 

William J. Frey. He had been the sheriff of Cobb County from 1903 to 1909. He prepared the noose used to hang Frank and may have actually looped it around Frank's neck. Frey's Gin, Frey's Gin road, the location of where they hung him, was his property.

 

E.P. Dick Dobbs. He later became very prominent. His family moved north and he was the mayor of Marietta at the time.

 

L. B. Robeson was a railroad freight agent. He lent his car to the lynch party.

 

Jim Brumby, Grover Glovitt Brumby's brother – he owned a garage and serviced the automobiles before they went. It was a big affair to go from Marietta to Milledgeville at the time.

 

Robert A. Hill was a banker. He helped fund the lynching – made sure they had money for gas and other things.

 

George Swanson, who was the current Sheriff of Cobb County in 1915, and two of his deputies, William McKinney and George Hicks.

 

Cicero Holton Dobbs. He was a taxi driver and operated a grocery store. He was also my wife's grandfather, who knew nothing about this before Steve Oney wrote the book and was very upset about it.

 

This case had been whispered about for years and years and years and even among the Jewish community, Steve Selig, told me, he says, “We never mentioned the case, never mentioned it in the Jewish community.”

 

D. R. Benton was a farmer and an uncle of Mary Phagan's.

 

Horace Handy was a farmer.

 

Kuhn Shaw, that's J. F. Shaw's, who died about five years ago, father. He was a mule trader.

 

Emmett and Luther Burton. We had an Emmett Burton serve, this was the great uncle and grandfather of Emmett Burton who was on our county commission for several years. These were two brothers who were believed to have sat on either side of Leo Frank in the automobile that took him from prison to death. Emmett is said to have been a police officer and Luther, a coal-yard operator.

 

Yellow Jacket Brown. You know, everyone had a nickname. An electrician who rode his motorcycle to Milledgeville and cut the telephone lines before they got there, so that nobody could call out.

 

Lawrence Haney, a farmer.

 

What has amazed me about this case was: how could the best folks in town, the best and leading citizens of the county and of the city – how could they have gone crazy? I ask myself that in our national politics every once in awhile now. How could everybody have gone crazy?

 

What happened to Rudy Juliani?

 

I don't know. We could always have a discussion of that.

 

But what was it?

 

Now I know there's two or three things on the other side that everybody tries to bring up. One is, well, they just felt that they were carrying out the lawful sentence that was handed down to Leo Frank. That is what Newt Morris is reported to have said later.

 

And then, the other thing is, Luther Rosser and Jack Slaton had practiced law before [not before they were law partners during Leo Frank's trial and his appeals], and that Luther Rosser paid Jack Slaton off to commute the sentence.

 

Now let me tell you something. Jack Slaton had the wealthiest wife in Georgia and at that time, husbands, as you all know from studying law, managed the affairs of the wife. Why in the world, to destroy his political career which was very bright, would he have taken any money? And you cannot read this commutation order without seeing that it is a man that was greatly troubled about it.

 

So the last thing I'll talk about a little bit: was Leo Frank guilty?

 

I don't think there's any doubt, and there are few that I think that argue with this today is, he did not get a fair trial [False, the Supreme Court in their majority decisions ruled he had a fair trial]. Not under the circumstances that we would consider today – coerced statements, no scientific, all circumstantial [False, the witnesses later provided affidavits that Leo Frank's defense team tried to bribe them to retract their trial testimony].

 

The testimony of an accomplice.

 

There is a reason the common law and the law of Georgia says that, the testimony of an accomplice must be corroborated and a confession must be corroborated and the reason is because of how both of them might have been obtained.

 

I don't think he was guilty. I think Conley killed her. There's not any doubt in my mind that Conley killed her [Barnes opinion defies the evidence and testimony, and majority decisions of the judges at the time]. But at least there is substantial reasonable doubt as to whether Frank killed her [false statements]. There's two little things and then I'll try to answer some questions. I know we got started late and I know ya'll got other places to go.

 

There's two things that are happening. One is, the district attorney Paul Howard of Fulton County has created a commission to look into several cases.

 

One of them is this case [Leo Frank case] and another one is the Child Murders case. And they've got about a dozen, half a dozen to a dozen cases they're looking into to see, to make sure, that there's guilt. Now Wayne Williams is still alive and in the prison.

 

The other thing that has happened in all of these matters and I think is the import: what is the role of lawyers and judges?

 

Listen, we are trained to look at facts. There is only a little thin line that separates us from lynchers and a mob and it is lawyers and judges that are trained to not let passion and prejudice overcome us all.

 

And it is difficult. It is very, very difficult. And it is not an easy path. It is a tough path.

 

You know, we believe as lawyers, that everybody is entitled to representation. That was our theory all along, but not our practice. Read about the Scottsboro boys, read about through the history and the cases that you stay.

 

But it is required even more now than ever. That even though everybody cusses us as lawyers, and they do, you know, all the time. Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be lawyers. You know, it's the story instead of cowboys.

 

But it is the lawyers that have to protect the rights of the individual. And if we ever lose that, that we're not willing to sacrifice ourselves and our reputation and our prosperity, for the rights of those that we represent or what we know is right, then I want to tell you, we're lost, we're lost. It's a very thin line.

 

Always be the guardians against prejudice, hatred and passion. Sit back and use the skills that you're being trained in and they will be honed much more as you start to practice, to analyze critically, everything that you're presented with.

Thank you, and God bless you and I'll be glad to answer a few questions.

 

I know we don't have much time but I'd be glad to answer any questions. Yes, ma'am.

 

Audience Member Question: Was anyone from that long list of lynchers ever prosecuted?

 

No, nobody was ever tried. And what happened was, Luther Haines, who was [?] judge, good friend of Hugh, Luther Haines practiced law with John Tucker Dorsey, when he was a young lawyer.

 

And, of course, I was assigned to Luther's courtroom when I was a prosecutor and he and I were great friends until the day he died.

 

But he knew I was interested in the case and he showed me, one time, a file that John Tucker Dorsey had in his office and had a list of the names of those who were involved and that's the way Oney finally broke it. He broke it through two people. Through Luther Haines and through Bill Kent.

 

TRANSCRIPTION CONTINUED....

 

Continued Here.... www.flickr.com/photos/leofrankcase/49815166453/in/datepos...

 

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush was visiting the Granite State on Wednesday.

  

Bush took questions at a town hall event in Hudson on Wednesday evening after making an unannounced stop at Harvey's Bakery and Coffee Shop in Dover earlier in the day.

 

Bush spoke, surrounded by veterans, at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post in Hudson -- a popular stop on the primary trail.

 

Bush spoke about New Hampshire's twin energy controversies -- the proposed Kinder Morgan natural gas pipeline in the state's southern tier, as well as the Northern Pass project.

 

"I mean, you guys are struggling to build pipelines and transmission lines, best I can tell," said Bush.

 

One attendee followed up, asking Bush what he knew about the pipeline.

 

"It promises to cut through a number of people's homes and [environmentally protected] land," the questioner said.

 

"There's a trade-off in this, which is how public policy works. The trade-off is how do you balance the economic interests of working-class families with environmental considerations? And those are best sorted out at the state level, not in Washington, DC," said Bush.

 

After the town hall, Bush told News 9 that he won't be taking sides.

 

"I think this should be locally driven," said Bush.

 

Bush also provided additional context to comments he made to the Union Leader editorial board earlier in the day.

 

Controversy began brewing on social media after Bush said that "people need to work longer hours."

 

Bush clarified that he was referring to new overtime rules, which he believes will force people into part-time jobs.

 

"I think people want to work harder, to be able to have more money in their own pockets -- not to be dependent upon government. You can take it out of context all you want, but high, sustained growth means people work 40 hours rather than 30 hours, and that by our success they have money -- disposable income for their families to decide how they want to spend it rather than getting in line," said Bush.

 

Bush also dismissed Donald Trump's criticism of his immigration position, when Trump essentially said that Bush is biased by the fact that his wife is Mexican.

 

"You can love your Mexican-American wife and also believe we need to control the border," said Bush.

 

Bush also had coffee and breakfast with a small crowd at Harvey's Bakery and Coffee Shop earlier in the day, where he said he'll use his leadership skills from his experience in office to change the roles within our government.

 

Bush said that one of the first things he would do in office is reduce federal overreach.

 

"Under this administration, there's been broad overreach in the regulatory powers. We need to bring powers back to states and local communities and that's something the president can do almost immediately,” said Bush.

 

Bush also said he would create a better energy plan for America and re-establish America's leadership internationally.

 

www.wmur.com/politics/jeb-bush-makes-unannounced-stop-at-...

 

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John Ellis "Jeb" Bush (born February 11, 1953) is an American businessman and politician who served as the 43rd Governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007. He is the second son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush, and the younger brother of former President George W. Bush.

 

Bush grew up in Houston, Texas. He graduated from the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts and attended the University of Texas, where he earned a degree in Latin American affairs. Following his father's successful run for Vice President in 1980, he moved to Florida and pursued a career in real estate development. In 1986, Bush was named Florida's Secretary of Commerce, a position he held until his resignation in 1988 to help his father's successful campaign for the Presidency.

 

In 1994, Bush made his first run for office, narrowly losing the election for governor by less than two percentage points to the incumbent Lawton Chiles. Bush ran again in 1998 and defeated Lieutenant Governor Buddy MacKay with 55 percent of the vote. He ran for reelection in 2002 and won with 56 percent to become Florida's first two-term Republican governor. During his eight years as governor, Bush was credited with initiating environmental improvements, such as conservation in the Everglades, supporting caps for medical malpractice litigation, moving Medicaid recipients to private systems, and instituting reforms to the state education system, including the issuance of vouchers and promoting school choice.

 

Frequently cited by the media as a possible candidate for president in the 2016 election, Bush announced in mid-December 2014 that he would explore the possibility of running for President. Bush subsequently launched his presidential campaign on June 15, 2015 in Miami, Florida.

. . . the natural make-up of the women is called Thanaka. It is a cream made out of the bark of specific trees. Thanaka cream has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years. It has a fragrant scent somewhat similar to sandalwood. The creamy paste is applied to the face in attractive designs, the most common form being a circular patch on each cheek, nose, sometimes made stripey with the fingers known as thanaka bè gya, or patterned in the shape of a leaf, often also highlighting the bridge of the nose with it at the same time. It may be applied from head to toe (thanaka chi zoun gaung zoun). Apart from cosmetic beauty, thanaka also gives a cooling sensation and provides protection from sunburn. It is believed to help remove acne and promote smooth skin. It is also an anti-fungal. The active ingredients of thanaka are coumarin and marmesin.

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Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

. . . the natural make-up of the women is called Thanaka. It is a cream made out of the bark of specific trees. Thanaka cream has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years. It has a fragrant scent somewhat similar to sandalwood. The creamy paste is applied to the face in attractive designs, the most common form being a circular patch on each cheek, nose, sometimes made stripey with the fingers known as thanaka bè gya, or patterned in the shape of a leaf, often also highlighting the bridge of the nose with it at the same time. It may be applied from head to toe (thanaka chi zoun gaung zoun). Apart from cosmetic beauty, thanaka also gives a cooling sensation and provides protection from sunburn. It is believed to help remove acne and promote smooth skin. It is also an anti-fungal. The active ingredients of thanaka are coumarin and marmesin.

______________________________________

 

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

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Personal Injury Due To Accidents Negligence Medical Malpractice

Plant City FL | Valrico FL | Brandon FL | Hillsborough County FL

Truck Accident and Injuries Attorneys

Semi and Tractor Trailer Related Accidents and Claims

 

What You Should Do First

 

To best represent you, we will need to ask you a number of questions about you, the trucking company, your vehicle, how the accident occurred, and your injuries. It is always helpful to gather as much information as possible in preparation for your initial consultation. You should focus on obtaining the following five types of information before your meeting, which will help in evaluating and preparing your truck accident case.

 

1. Details About the Trucking Company and Driver

 

What is the name of the trucking company involved (if any)?

What is the truck driver’s name?

What is the truck’s license plate number?

Do you have any other license numbers or identifying details about the truck?

Do you have the truck driver’s Commercial Driver’s License number?

Are any other companies or business entities associated with this truck or driver?

Have you done any research on the driver or trucking company involved?

2. Specific Details About the Truck Accident

 

How did the accident occur?

Was a police report filed?

What traffic violations, if any, were drivers charged with?

Were any photographs or videos taken at the scene?

Were TV or other news media at the scene?

Do you have names, contact info of witnesses or others involved in the accident?

When and where exactly did the truck accident occur?

What was the roadway like (wet, dry, smooth, pot-holed, etc.)?

Were other cars or people involved?

Was an ambulance called to the scene?

3. Medical Records After a Truck Accident

 

What normal activities are you unable to do because of your injuries?

What was your immediate diagnosis after the truck accident?

Were you taken to a hospital? If so, how long were you hospitalized?

What initial treatments did you receive?

Did you have x-rays or other scans taken?

Any follow-up or additional treatment?

What are your present symptoms and diagnosis?

Have you ever had similar injuries in the past?

4. Your Vehicle After a Truck Accident

 

Year, make and model of your vehicle?

Is there a lien-holder or bank interest in the vehicle?

How long have you owned the car?

What is the working condition of the car?

What damages were sustained to your car during the accident?

Have you received an estimate for the damages?

Did your car have any damages, dings, or dents prior to the accident?

Do you have photographs of your car both before and after the accident?

5. Personal, Financial Details About You

 

Your present employment, if any?

Your wages or salary?

Have you missed time from work as a result of the accident?

Do you have a valid drivers’ license? Do you have automobile insurance?

Who is your insurer?

Have you previously been involved in any car accidents?

Have you ever been convicted of a crime?

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[Leo Frank Flickr Gallery Curator: E-mails sent in by angry students and citizens of Georgia, who have been following around Former Governor Roy Barnes at his open lectures and public meetings (which are often filmed. The Tues., Nov. 12th, 2019 monologue at Mercer was filmed and posted on YouTube) where he is advocating for Leo Frank's exoneration, rather than presenting the case dispassionately and factually.

 

Listeners appear to be incensed by the fact that he is propagandizing the true-crime in a seemingly "fraudulent way", when he has a law degree and is a practicing attorney, acting as if he is a "corrupt lawyer" mendaciously defending Leo Frank in a courtroom of old-lived political fashion trends, and politically correct racism.

 

The students present at the event, believed, he shouldn't be asserting things about the trial, appeals and commutation hearing, which are not supported by the primary sources of this case's legal files. Students say "Let us have an open forum about this case every year on April 26th, and make it a yearly conversation." That sounds like a great idea.

 

As a curator it is necessary to present this information submitted by college students and citizenry of Georgia, because there is growing outrage at the renewed efforts -- seemingly lacking impartiality -- to get absolution for Leo Frank. Worse these nefarious efforts include placing the guilt of the Mary Phagan murder on Jim Conley, who was never tried for the sex-murder and is not alive to speak for himself or defend himself. Conley as a confessed accomplice in the aftermath, Conley admitted to being an accessory-after-the-fact. Conley, according to former-Governor Jack Slaton in a 1955 memorandum, it is believed the "Negro" (the parlance used by the former Governor at the time) passed away in the early 1950s. A full lifetime later he is unable to defend himself, at present from the false charges against him by Frank partisans. This is certainly a salient question of justice vs. injustice, to accuse someone who can not defend themselves. Whereas, Leo Frank exhausted all his appeals and the Supreme Court of the American Union did not disturb the verdict of his duly obtained conviction.

 

As curator of Leo Frank Flickr Gallery, I believe Roy Barnes has the right to freedom of speech when he holds public meetings about the Leo Frank case, even if he is fibbing about certain aspects of those contemporary events. He has the first amendment right to do so and express his opinion freely. I really wish there was more calm dialogue between Leo Frank's promoters and detractors, instead of just monologues.

 

The photo is from the event held Tuesday, November 12th, 2019. --End of curator commentary,]

 

Location:

 

Bell-Jones Courtroom

Mercer Law School

Macon GA 31207

 

Time: Tuesday, November 12, 2019, Noon -- 1:00 P.M.

 

-+- -+- -+-

 

Student Commentary

 

Roy Barnes has been Caught "RED-HANDED" on several occasion in 2019, promoting a hate crime hoax, just like other Leo Frank's activist-defenders of past decades, and prior generations, have, during this last century (the 20th), when this 1900s case began during its teen years, in 1913. The first appearance of this racist hate crime hoax first appeared in the 1914 propaganda book, The Truth About the Leo Frank Case, and in Slaton's commutation hearings.

 

Roy Barnes is giving a lecture on the Leo Frank case and part of that lecture is pushing the false narrative and racist hoodwink that people were shouting anti-Semitic death threats at the trial jury, GET THIS, each and every day. We have incontrovertible video proof from '11Alive' news he went on public TV to promote that vicious hate crime bamboozle. In this episode at Mercer Law School (November 12, 2019), he tries to pawn it off as a report from some other source at the time, something he fails to mention at other times when he presents the hate crime hoax as if it's a taken-for-granted fact.

 

There are no actual reports in the 1913 newspapers of crowds shouting anti-Semitic death threats at the jury, judge, witnesses or spectators at the Mary Phagan murder trial, that to paraphrase, "if the jury didn't convict Leo Frank they themselves would be lynched."

 

Anonymous Mercer Law Student Satire: The 100 Year Movement to Posthumously Disbar Roy Barnes

 

"We are starting a 100-year movement to have Roy Barnes disbarred posthumously. We are willing to wait 37 years before we start this movement. We the citizens of Georgia are outraged by the lies this man is promoting."

 

"We are calling on our fellow citizens of Georgia to petition their State government and assembly representatives to create the Roy Barnes Hate Crime Hoax bill or Roy Barnes Hate Crime act, to make it a felony, to promote hate crime hoaxes against juries, and thereby posthumously disbar lawyers who promote hate crime hoaxes. But we aren't starting this movement until Roy Barnes passes away of old age, at the ripe old age of 122, quietly in his sleep, with a smile on his face, and a tummy full of sweets."

 

"We thought up this 100-year movement in the year 2020, but are waiting untill 2060, to put the new committee together, and hopefully sometime before the year 2160, we can get these laws passed in the assembly, to give the people or government the ability to posthumously disbar people.

 

It's time to call for these kinds of laws!"

 

"We apologize to the people born with the genetic disease where they are color blind or tone-deaf to sarcasm, satire, or tong-in-cheekiness, as one Mercer student and reader put in correspondence to us."

 

"We also are seeking to file posthumous ethics charges against Roy Barnes after the year 2060, when he passes away at age 122 from a belly full of candy, for waddling around from podium to podium, promoting all his flim-flams on the Leo Frank case (we fact check em in details throughout his lecture talks!)."

 

"We the Mercer Law Students demand an open genealogy research project done on that repeated anti-Semitic Jury tampering hornswoggle. We are tired of hearing about this lie from Leo Frank toadies."

 

So far we have found sources for the swindle.

 

Leo M. Frank and the American Jewish Community by Leonard Dinnerstein, November 1968, American Jewish Archives Journal, Volume 20, Number 2.

 

Night Fell on Georgia, 1956, by the Samuels, page 39

 

CP Connolly, The Truth About the Leo Frank Case, page 20

 

The 1915 John Slaton, Governor of Georgia, Commutation hearings for Leo M. Frank.

 

Regarding the Terrorized Jury (Tampering) Snake Oil:

 

We have two public videos of him so far mountebanking this snake oil. We will make those videos available on public video hosting websites in case they get censored (11Alive, May 7th, 2019, and Mercer Law College, November 12, 2019.)

 

By the Way, Lots of Tongue-in-cheek, included.

 

Because let us face it we have posthumous pardons for people who have passed away, or posthumous pardons without exoneration/absolution, that's pretty unique, which was meant to be what???

 

. . . …. Be a stepping stone to a dead man getting a new trial with an extraordinary motion for a new trial? Then setting aside his guilty verdict? Do you think we are stupid and we don't know how you are gaming the system?

 

Shall we also give Conley an extraordinary murder trial in 2020 and give him a posthumous verdict of guilt, some 70 years after he was likely made to disappear in the 1950s?

 

Shall we today, convict a dead man who died in the circa 1950s, and thereby convict the falsely blamed black guy, Jim Conley of Phagan's 1913 murder, since we are supposed to be giving a dead man, Leo Frank, a new extraordinary motion for a second trial, and then announce an artificial mistrial, so he can be posthumously innocent?

 

That's not injustice?

 

That's constitutional?

 

or is that unconstitutional and a gross injustice? What do you think Roy Barnes? What do you think Atlanta district attorney Paul Howard?

 

Is this the "new Fatwahs" or "Papal Bulls" or Grand Poohbah style Georgian electric Kool-aid justice now? Posthumous exonerations without new evidence or manufactured modern hoaxes mutated based on past hoaxes?

 

You don't see how demented this all is, leading up to the wrongful exoneration of a bi-sexual pervert with a predilection for young boys and girls? 100-odd years after the fact!!

 

This is the legacy you want, Roy, getting a guilty man recognized under the law as innocent of a hideous crime he extremely likely had done?

 

#MeToo #BlackLivesMatter

 

Further Research:

 

VIDEO: Former Governor Roy Barnes at Mercer Law School, November 2019

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIviA9GXGQI

 

Please download this video before it gets intentionally censored or deleted to erase the evidence. VIDEO (Recommended): 11Alive Roy Barnes, May 7th 2019

youtu.be/4tgKcqOXyhc

 

Article: Former Governor Roy Barnes Discusses Leo Frank Case at Mercer Law School

41nbc.com/2019/11/13/former-georgia-gov-roy-barnes-discus...

 

Further Reading:

 

Mary Phagan Case Website by Phagan-Kean Family

www.littlemaryphagan.com

 

The Leo Frank Case Scholarly Research Library

www.leofrank.info

 

The Leo Frank Archive

www.LeoFrank.org

 

The American Mercury

www.theamericanmercury.org

 

Geo-Location

 

Bell-Jones Courtroom

Mercer Law School

Macon GA 31207

 

Time: Tuesday, November 12, 2019, Noon to 1:00 P.M.

 

-+- -+- -+- -+-

 

[Leo Frank Museum and Gallery Curator: The commentary herewithin was submitted by a history student of the Phagan-Frank murder case, who is an anonymous insider in the government of Georgia. The Phagan-Frank case--she reports--was a pivotal and unspeakable crime which took place during the early teen years of the 1900s. This "incognito" will be updating us on developments regarding the corrupt Atlanta Georgia "Conviction Integrity Unit" (CIU hereafter) which is presently reviewing Leo Frank's 1913 conviction and planning on issuing a pre-ordained statement that his guilty verdict should be overturned.]

 

Leo Frank's High Profile Advocate: Roy Barnes and Conviction Integrity Unit Leading Advisor

 

Roy Barnes, since its Spring of 2019, inception, has been serving as senior adviser for CIU and has been serving in an ongoing effort as a zealous public relations tour mouthpiece for exceedingly biased Leo Frank advocacy, immediately after CIU's formation. Barnes' Leo Frank activism has at times veered into the territory of extremist Frankite* propaganda, unbecoming of a man who we would presume to be fair and honest.

 

Frankite* is a specific term to accurately describe individuals or clusters of people who typically are college educated and fanatically willing to go to the furthest efforts to trick people into thinking Leo Frank was wrongfully convicted. This behavior requires an extraordinary amount of self-deception, flagrant dishonesty, lack of self-reflection, and unwillingness to dispassionately examine the trial evidence of the case appeals. For the Frankite, their partisan emotions and tribalist feelings, not facts, are what they believe should decide whether Leo Frank is determined to be innocent or guilty. They often invoke the term "anti-Semitism" when they are unable to form arguments to defend their opinions on the Leo Frank trial.

 

Conviction Integrity Unit's Auspicious Beginnings, Dateline 2019

 

The CIU was formed under GA State mandate through the Atlanta District Attorney Paul Howard's office, who during its nascent beginnings, started building a committee of social justice warrior (SJW) activists to review controversial criminal cases. When he announced who would be part of his tribunal, it read like a handcrafted A-list of "woke" biased, race-based activists.

 

The Real Agenda, Under the Facade of a Noble Cause

 

While it might agreeably and fairmindedly seem like a noble cause to review true-crimes with new eyes, CIU's carefully selected team members, apparently, have very specific agendas other than being impartial and dispassionate advocates for justice.

 

Surprisingly, no attempt was made to conceal the underlying core reason why the CIU intentionally came to being. It was revealed early-on to the media that the CIU would review many controversial cases, but that its central creation was initially inspired by the Leo Frank case, which would be given its most careful consideration. They brazenly admitted as much with no thoughts of reservation as if only one outcome was self-evident.

 

The Paparazzi

 

When the CIU's formation was pre-announced to the press, the media was front and center when the official announcements were made from the pulpit of jurisprudence at the District Attorney's office.

 

At its inaugural event, April 26, 2019 (hideously the 106th anniversary of Mary Phagan's sex-murder), press snapshooters took photographs of those in attendance, and there was not a single person present on behalf of the victim Mary Phagan. At that event and forthcoming meetings, numerous prominent pro-Leo Frank activists, where present, from Rabbi Steven Lebow to ADL executive Shelley Rose. They can be seen sitting together, giggling in anticipation, like a bunch of highschool girls huddling together over gossip (captured in media photos and included among this collection herewithin).

 

The People of Georgia, Exhausted and Reticent

 

The people of Georgia see the Conviction Integrity Unit as injustice personified in the making; undoing the original two years of judicial review from 1913-1915, in this 21st-century modern age of political correctness and virtue-signaling.

 

It is important to restate, no efforts are being made to hide the pre-ordained recommendations the CIU plans to formally make on the Leo Frank case at the conclusion of its review. Paul Howard's righthand man, Roy Barnes, is admittedly biased on the lynching victim's behalf, but is supposedly expected to be unbiased when reviewing the associated 1913 Mary Phagan murder trial and ensuing Leo Frank appeals (1913-1915) in the immediate aftermath of his post-conviction.

 

Though it pretended to be evenhanded for appearances from its inception, it was understood the CIU was not meant to be a fair-minded tribunal seeking the impartial truth, but one with a baked-in agenda. The clandestine plan of CIU became decidedly crystal-clear as to its specific intentions, when its leading spokesman, Roy Barnes, started a fresh public relations campaign of going around at continuing education forums, promoting bona fide jury tampering hoaxes to sway public opinion with manufactured evidence and provide justification for the eventual decision of the CIU in favor of Leo Frank's vindication. In reality, this amounts to one of the most egregious violations of human rights for children, who were sexually assaulted and murdered by rapist-pedophile sex killers, like Leo Frank.

 

Media Interviews Ongoing

 

The exoneration of the homicidal serial pedophile, Leo Frank, convicted for the sodomy and strangulation of Mary Phagan, has become the glib supposition and foregone conclusion for Roy Barnes in his hammy media interviews (GPB, Mercer Law School, 11Alive). Barnes' ongoing missionary work to educate the masses about the Frank-Phagan case is giving the appearance to mainstream Americans, that he is trying to plant false ideas in the minds of Georgians who will be directly impacted by the erroneous forthcoming exoneration of the B'nai B'rith molester. Because that's what this is about. B'nai B'rith created the ADL Anti-Defamation League to engineer a long game to get their civil rights icon exculpated of his filthy deeds.

 

The Callous Disregard

 

For people outside the state of Georgia, it's obvious what Roy Barnes is trying to do with his repeated false statements, which is to justify support for the clandestine recommendation at the conclusion of Leo Frank's criminal case review. There can not be a mustard seed of doubt, Leo Frank is going to be absolved, and to make it palatable, Barnes is tricking people into thinking the jury was tampered with during the full length of the trial by throngs of loud-mouthed terrorists.

 

Roy Barnes is using the oldest and dirtiest trick in the history of propaganda, which is to recursively create imagery in the minds of those willing to hear his descriptions and see it third-hand in their mind's eye. Roy Barnes is conjuring up visions that will become, undoubtedly, plausible false illusions and therefore easily repeatable by those who willingly imbibe the artificial projections in their consciousness.

 

The best propagandists in the world, project their illusions into the minds of the gullible.

 

The Backstory

 

Roy Barnes is a former alt-left Governor of Georgia, and a long-time Marietta attorney who caters predominantly a select clientele. Barnes is fond of virtue-signaling that his wife is a familial descendant to one of Leo Frank's lynchers, and so in an ingratiating fashion he prostrates himself, he regresses to the mean (in statistical terms) to let everyone know in the supposition that he intends to seek official vindication for Leo Frank, and that Mary Phagan the victim is just an afterthought, a throw-away-detail or irrelevant plot device. The impression Roy Barnes gives the people of Georgia is that little Mary Phagan seems like a frustrating inconvenience.

 

The Barnes Hate Crime Hoax Caught on Film

 

Barnes made himself infamous May 7th, 2019, when he was shown during a segment on the mainstream TV channel 11-Alive, to be promoting White Liberal self-hating racist propaganda, falsely accusing crowds of European-American Southerners with terrorizing the Leo Frank trial jury panel with direct threats of mass murder (watch the video, you have to see it to believe it). In case the video gets deleted as an action to cover-up for Roy Barnes' nefarious activities, we are calling on people to make backups of the segment.

 

11Alive, May 7th, 2019: www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tgKcqOXyhc

 

Mercer Law School, November 12, 2019: www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIviA9GXGQI&t=152s

 

Power Behind the Throne

 

Roy Barnes, and ADL Attorney Dale Schwartz are regularly credited with helping found the CIU behind the scenes, launching itself hideously on the molestation-murder anniversary of Mary Phagan's untimely disappearance. Her rape-murder occurred where the dystopian-looking Sam Nunn government building complex stands today in the capitol.

 

Before being demolished in the 1950s, the former National Pencil Company building (1908-1916) was standing at 80 feet wide and 200 feet deep. It was a 4-story old pile of bricks, formerly called the "Old Venable" building. It had been at the time of the sex-murder, occupied by National Pencil Company (1908-1916). The building had at one time been a horse carriage storage facility and another time a rooming house.

 

Because of the stigma associated with Leo Frank's sex crimes and lynching, the executive leadership of National Pencil Company decided in 1916 it was best if it sold itself off to be absorbed into another company with a different name which was in appearance unrelated to the old scandalous NPCo. This way any lingering negative reputation would be wiped clean.

 

Roy Barnes' 2019 bully pulpit for the movement to set aside Leo Frank's 1913 conviction.

 

While standing at a podium during a conviction integrity unit public meeting in the capitol of Georgia, he disgracefully told the audience -- while being filmed -- some of the most hideously racist lies, to paraphrase:

 

that mobs of people outside the Fulton county courthouse were threatening the Mary Phagan murder trial jury with being strangled to death (lynched) by essentially a dozen hangman's nooses, if they didn't convict the defendant Leo Frank by the end of his trial.

 

These terrorist threats supposedly happened, not just once, but literally, each and every single morning (July 29th - August 25th, 1913), during their public service as peers deciding the defendant's fate. This supposedly happened as they walked to the courtroom from the well known, New Kimball House Hotel to the temporary Fulton County Superior Courthouse (Formerly the Old City Hall and postal mail center for Atlanta).

 

Scholars of Jurisprudence Debunk Roy Barnes' False Statements Via 1913-1915 Legal Records of Case

 

Research scholars have scoured the 2,500 pages of official Leo Frank appeals records to the State, District and Federal Courts, and found not a single mention of any throngs of people outside the courthouse each and every morning making collective death threats at the jury, of the racially tinged variety, as Barnes asserted. We fact-checked the genealogy on Roy Barnes' racist fairy tale. By falsely convincing people Leo Frank was innocent, it makes it easy to falsely accuse a black man who helped the police solve the case.

 

Historian Researchers Debunk Roy Barnes' False Statements Via Newspaper Accounts From 1913

 

Historian scholars scoured the Atlanta newspaper daily reports of the Mary Phagan murder trial, as there were many journalists outside the courthouse and inside the courtroom, documenting the trial events in meticulous details. There are no press reports extant from July through August 1913 of crowds of people shouting terroristic murder threats at the jury each and every morning, nor are there any reports at such shouting at the presiding judge Leonard Roan, or the 200+ people sitting in the courtroom (At the Slaton Commutation hearing, Frank's defenders claimed people were shouting death threats inside the court at the jury).

 

The ADL website claims these threats were shouted audibly through the open windows of the courthouse, where the trial proceedings were taking place. We have the screen captures. They deleted the article, without informing the public, but still, have a number of articles on their website claiming there was no evidence presented against Leo Frank.

 

Roy Barnes has been caught red-handed making false statements, to justify the CIU having been, from its very inception, a kangaroo activist committee, whose intention is to dishonorably corrupt the judicial system, regarding the molestation-murder of Mary Phagan.

 

Genealogy of Barnes' Hate Crime Hoax

 

We live in an age where it is safe to dehumanize Christians and especially White people. Barnes' vile racist defamation levied against European-American and Christian Southerners seems to have earlier origins. Barnes' anti-Gentile canard of hatred was not born with him, if we look into the matters historicity. It appears the anti-Gentile canard was scholarly-popularized by Jewish activist professor Leonard Dinnerstein (1934-2019), in the American Jewish Archive Journal of November 1968, the article in question was titled -- Leo M. Frank and The American Jewish Community. Vol. 20, No 2. archive.org/details/american-jewish-archive-journal-volum...

 

Regarding the root source of this issue, there are thought to be even earlier origins and that it was first started by Jewish-American activist authors the Samueles who wrote the 1956 dell book, "Night Fell on Georgia", page 39 (?)

 

The hoax goes back even further to CP Connoley's book, "The Truth About the Leo Frank Case", from 1914/1915. Then Georgia Governor, Jack Slaton's commutation hearing, records, June, 1915.

 

Dates of the 21st-Century Leo Frank Carnival Sideshow, On Tour

 

Roy Barnes as of 2019 has been going around speaking at law schools to promote his efforts for getting Leo Frank exonerated 106 years after he was convicted (1913, 2019), 104 years (1915, 2019) after the Supreme Court of the United States rejected Leo Frank's final frivolous appeal and put an end to his game of estoppel.

 

Violence Directed Against Convicted Criminals, Does Not Retroactively Invalidate Their Jury Convictions

 

The lynching of Leo Frank was immoral, illegal, unacceptable, and unethical, but crimes committed against convicted homicidal child molesters, do not retroactively, nullify their jury rendered convictions, for their unlawful actions of sexually assaulting and murdering children. FACT.

 

The Shame-Inducing "Pardoned Without Exoneration"

 

In 1986, Leo Frank was pardoned posthumously on a technicality, but not because of any new credible or compelling evidence for his innocents. In a strange turn of events, his conviction was not overturned and his guilty status was acknowledged inadvertently and remained in force. This 1986 turn of events was frustrating for ADL of B'nai B'rith, Atlanta Jewish Federation and American Jewish Committee who had invested enormous financial resources and manpower over 4-years (1982-1986) in a monumental effort to have Leo Frank's criminal conviction rendered no-longer valid. In 1987, one year later, the ADL dropped B'nai B'rith from its name to distance itself from the embarrassment of the no-pardon-pseudo-pardon of Leo Frank

 

The unintended setback was so embarrassing that later Jewish groups set up a number of historical marker plaques to re-write the history of the case with anti-Gentilism and falsely claim anti-Semitism was rampant at the time to invalidate the trial. The accusation of rampant anti-Semitism, or because of the anti-Semitism prevalent at the time is a vicious racist hoax (Mount Carmel Cemetery, Queens, NY, and Leo Frank Memorial Park, Marietta, Georgia). We are calling on the State of Georgia, to ban the ADL, and the Federal Government to shut down the ADL for good. We are asking Americans to start a movement to have the ADL shut down for promoting hate hoaxes about Leo Frank's trial.

 

One of these propaganda historical markers was hideously set up at the Old Marietta Cemetery where Mary Phagan is buried, the first version of the historical marker announced that Leo Frank was pardoned but also mentioned it was without exoneration, but then shortly thereafter the Jewish members of the Marietta city council had the plaque changed, removing the textual part where it mentions he wasn't exonerated. Members of the Jewish community did not want the public learning from a high traffic tourist landmark that Leo Frank was no exonerated, not absolved, not exculpated.

 

Let that sink in, they changed the history sign in 1995 to socially and politically sanitize it as agitprop.

 

The obvious intention in 1995 was based on the common sense understanding that most people would not look any deeper into the matter if it only said "he was pardoned" and thus they would likely presume if it only said he was pardoned, they would just think he simply wasn't guilty of the crime anymore.

 

And in fact, the people who changed the marker turned out to be correct, when they took away the fact from the sign that he wasn't exonerated, people who read the text of it presumed that the convicted killer simply wasn't guilty anymore, even though officially the state still recognizes Leo Frank as guilty.

 

The fact of the matter is 99% of the people who read the sanitized sign will never investigate any further, that is of course until the Internet became so widespread people could learn about the case from their smartphones. People are just now 25 years later learning about how the Jewish community in a secret meeting agreed to have the sign changed, and in the dead of night, changed the historical marker without telling anyone. These are the dirty tricks being done on Leo Frank's behalf.

 

Despite the setback, the Jewish activist groups privately vowed to never give up and we know this because these groups continue to fund media and school teaching materials to mainstream the aborted-apotheosis of Leo Frank's martyrdom.

 

Articles on Leo Frank published on ADL's website continue to promote the hate crime hoaxes that Leonard Dinnerstein popularized, which are fabricated to invalidate the belief his trial was fair. ADL also created a teaching guide to the Leo Frank case (partly written by Leonard Dinnerstein), and ADL partially funded the 2009 docudrama on the case called The People versus Leo Frank (directed by Ben Loeterman, and Steve Oney).

 

The Jewish leaders who secured this 1986 pardon through political pressure have been bitter over the mixed results and decided instead of it being interpreted with negativity, as a half-measure, they would redouble their efforts and interpret it as a stepping stone for bringing them closer to the exoneration goal. They have also recommitted themselves to continue their multigenerational agitation until their grandee is vindicated in full, no more half-measures they have sworn.

 

Leo Frank is still officially recognized by the Georgia Supreme Court, the Fulton County Superior Court, and the United States Supreme Court as having been duly convicted, because his guilty verdict was never disturbed, even as of 2019, while the CIU works behind the scenes to subvert justice for Mary Phagan. We asking the Georgia Bar to disbar Roy Barnes. We are asking the state of Georgia, to ban the ADL from within its borders.

 

Georgia's Coming Kangaroo Court

 

Barnes' disinformation war meant to rehabilitate Leo Frank makes sense in light of media reports of CIU associates who are stating they intend to get the guilty verdict nullified at a court somewhere in present-day Georgia. Read that last sentence again. You read that right, Dale Schwartz actually admitted on Facebook, he is going to try and find a judge in Georgia who will give Leo Frank a new trial and then declare him innocent, because he is unable to attend the proceedings. They literally intend to set aside his verdict, because he is not present for his new trial. Yeah, it's literally stranger than fiction and pure evil. They will stop at nothing, even violating the constitution.

 

If there weren't media reports to back this up, I wouldn't even believe it myself, but associates and supporters of the CIU have hinted publicly, they intend to take the final pre-decided statement of the CIU on the Leo Frank case and hand-deliver it to a Georgia Judge who is going to overturn his conviction, but first, calling for a new unconstitutional trial of this strangler-pedophile, who has been deceased for more than 100 years ago.

 

A new trial for a convicted killer child molester where all the witnesses and the former defendant himself are all long dead.

 

The Kangaroo Judge of Georgia

 

Who is this Kangaroo Judge who will grant a new trial to a dead man in the year 2020 or thereafter on behalf of potentially the District Attorney's CIU, ADL, Roy Barnes and Jewish Groups?

 

We call on the Government of Georgia to have him or her removed from his or her post as a Judge and we call on the Georgia bar to revoke his or her law license.

 

To grant a new trial to a dead man is unconstitutional.

 

Efforts to subvert justice for Mary Phagan continues today full speed ahead, by credentialed activists with a variety of university degrees and membership in powerful organizations. These are people who are willing to engage in academic dishonesty and disgrace their honor in the virtue-signaling game of political expediency, and willing to put religion in some cases and political correctness in other cases above justice.

 

#MeToo Movement Fight Back

 

Seen in the picture at the front row with platinum and dark ash blonde hair, is Mary Phagan Kean (born June 5th, 1954) the namesake of the 1913 victim, she was present to observe the canned meeting at Mercer College November 12, 2019, and listen to Roy Barnes counterfeit the evidence of the case. The Phagan family is naturally furious that Roy Barnes is using his social gravitas as an attorney and former Governor to fallaciously manufacture new evidence about the early 20th-century true crime, in an effort to bamboozle the public into accepting an unjustified exculpation of Leo Frank the Toilet Strangler.

 

See the Phagan family response on Facebook: www.facebook.com/leofrankandlittlemaryphagan given the censorship prevalent on FB there is a risk that page could be deleted.

 

We believe Barnes must have his law license revoked. A committee of Georgian's is getting ready to file ethics complaints against Roy Barnes, to the State Bar, seeking to have his license to practice law revoked for promoting racist hate crime hoaxes in 2019.

 

We also intend to start a 100 year movement to have the posthumous pardon of Leo Frank nullified.

 

+ + + + +

 

FORMER GEORGIA GOV. ROY BARNES DISCUSSES LEO FRANK CASE AT MERCER LAW SCHOOL By Rashaad Vann -November 13, 2019 MACON, Georgia (41NBC/WMGT) -

 

Former Georgia Governor. Roy Barnes visited Mercer Law students on Tuesday. He discussed his efforts to reopen one of Georgia’s most notorious lynchings. Barnes works as a consultant to the Fulton County District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Unit to review old cases. THE CASE The cases of Leo Frank, a factory superintendent who was lynched in Marietta in the early 1900s. This followed the commutation of his death sentence, for killing a 13-year-old female employee in the factory he managed. Barnes also discussed the evidence and process of the case for the possible exoneration of Frank.

 

SOURCES

 

Article: Former Governor Roy Barnes Discusses Leo Frank Case at Mercer Law School 41nbc.com/2019/11/13/former-georgia-gov-roy-barnes-discus...

 

VIDEO: Former Governor Roy Barnes at Mercer Law School, November 2019 www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIviA9GXGQI

 

VIDEO (Recommended): 11Alive Roy Barnes, May 7th 2019 youtu.be/4tgKcqOXyhc

 

Mercer University Law School law.mercer.edu/

 

One of the original sources of the hate-crime hoax Roy Barnes is promulgating was by quack-historian and Jewish activist Leonard Dinnerstein in the American Jewish Archive Journal, of Nov. 68, V. 20. No. 2., found here: archive.org/details/american-jewish-archive-journal-volum.... If the link provided is censored you can also find the item elsewhere on the Internet.

 

More related research:

 

Leo Frank Scholarly Research Library www.leofrank.info

 

Leo Frank Archive: www.leofrank.org

 

Further Information about Mary Phagan (1899 - 1913) by the modern-day Phagan Family:

 

The Little Mary Phagan Memorial and Research Website (Founded in 2019) www.littlemaryphagan.com/

 

Lecture Event Location:

 

Bell-Jones Courtroom

Mercer Law School

Macon GA 31207

 

Event Time: Tuesday, November 12, 2019, Noon -- 1:00 P.M.

 

APPENDIX

 

Another source of the hate crime hoax about people suborning perjury of witnesses in the courtroom through anti-Semitic terrorist threats come from, "Night Fell on Georgia, 1956, page 39" written by two Jewish activists, by the Samuels.

 

Direct source of the hoax framed as Jury tampering: American Jewish Archives Journal, November 1968, Leo M. Frank and the Jewish Community by Leonard Dinnerstein

 

URL: americanjewisharchives.org/publications/journal/PDF/1968_...

 

Transcription of the Mercer Monologue on Leo Frank will be forthcoming:

 

Video of the Mercer Monologue on the Leo Frank case and the efforts to exonerate him:

youtu.be/TIviA9GXGQI

 

APPENDIX

 

FORMER GEORGIA GOV. ROY BARNES TO DISCUSS LEO FRANK CASE AT MERCER LAW SCHOOL

 

By Kyle Sears

 

MACON – Former Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes will describe to Mercer Law students his efforts to reopen one of Georgia’s most notorious lynching cases on Nov. 12, from 12-1 p.m., in Mercer Law School’s Bell-Jones Courtroom.

 

Barnes, founding partner of the Barnes Law Group in Marietta, is working as a consultant to the Fulton County District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Unit to review old cases. One of these is the case of Leo Frank, a factory superintendent who was killed by a lynch mob in Marietta in the early 1900s following the commutation of his death sentence for killing a 13-year-old female employee in the factory he managed.

 

Barnes will discuss the details of the case, its evidence and the process of reviewing the case now for possible exoneration of Frank.

 

Online registration is $50 until Nov. 11 and $70 after Nov. 11 for attorneys who wish to obtain one hour of continuing legal education (CLE) credit; lunch is included. The presentation is free to Mercer Law students.

 

A lifelong resident of Cobb County, Barnes earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Georgia and graduated with honors from the Lumpkin School of Law at UGA in 1972. Upon graduation, he went to work as a prosecutor in the Cobb County District Attorney’s office, where he stayed until opening his first law firm in 1975.

 

For more than 40 years, Barnes has tried civil and criminal cases throughout Georgia and in neighboring states. His practice has concentrated primarily on civil litigation, where he has developed an expertise in consumer class action cases, medical malpractice matters, products liability law, general tort matters and commercial litigation. He has appeared in more than 250 cases in the state and federal appellate courts.

 

At age 26, Barnes was elected the youngest member of the Georgia State Senate. He went on to serve a total of eight terms and was a member of the Appropriations, Rules and Transportation committees. In addition, he was chairman of the Select Committee on Constitutional Revision, which rewrote the state’s constitution, as well as chairman of the powerful Judiciary Committee.

 

He also served as a floor leader to Gov. Joe Frank Harris from 1983-1989. After an unsuccessful bid for the Governor’s Office in 1990, he was elected to the State House of Representatives, where he served for six years and was vice chairman of the Judiciary Committee and chair of the Subcommittee on General Law.

 

In 1998, Barnes was elected to serve as the 80th governor of Georgia. During his term, he concentrated on education reform, healthcare reform and remedies for urban growth and sprawl.

 

Read the original by Kyle Sears, here: news.mercer.edu/former-georgia-gov-roy-barnes-to-discuss-...

 

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

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Governor of Florida Jeb Bush at TurboCam, Barrington, New Hampshire on August 7th by Michael Vadon Part 1 of 4

  

CONCORD, N.H. —Less than a day after the first debate of the GOP primary, former Florida governor Jeb Bush is back in New Hampshire campaigning.

 

Less than a day after the first debate of the GOP primary, former Florida governor Jeb Bush is back in New Hampshire campaigning.

 

At a town hall Friday night in Barrington, Bush spoke about how he won't campaign with anger and instead spoke a lot about policy.

 

He started his day at Brown's Lobster Pound in Seabrook. After greeting voters -- trying a lobster roll -- Bush told reporters he plans to campaign hard on and off the debate stage between now and the primaries.

 

"I think I did fine (in the debate). I am who I am," Bush said.

 

He's declining to criticize his Republican rivals, including Donald Trump, who refused to pledge support to the party's eventual nominee. Instead, Bush says he's focused on sharing his record as governor with voters and letting people get to know who he is.

 

"So you take advantage of opportunities when you have them, speak from your heart," Bush said. "I don't view this debating as question of winning or losing. It's the cumulative effect of shaping peoples opinion of who you are over the long haul."

 

Bush said Democrats' attacks against him show he is the candidate they fear most.

 

"Let me think why they would be. Because maybe it's because they consider me the biggest threat," Bush said.

 

Jeb Bush – Town Hall Barrington

 

August 7 @ 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

 

Jeb Bush Town Hall in Barrington

 

Friday August 7th, 6:00 PM

 

Turbocam, 863 Franklin Pierce Highway

 

Barrington, NH

 

John Ellis "Jeb" Bush (born February 11, 1953) is an American businessman and politician who served as the 43rd Governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007.

 

Bush is the second son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush, and the younger brother of former President George W. Bush, grandson of the late Prescott Sheldon Bush, American Banker and United States Senator from Connecticut. He grew up in Houston, Texas. He graduated from the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts and attended the University of Texas, where he earned a degree in Latin American affairs. Following his father's successful run for Vice President in 1980, he moved to Florida and pursued a career in real estate development. In 1986, Bush was named Florida's Secretary of Commerce, a position he held until his resignation in 1988 to help his father's successful campaign for the Presidency.

 

In 1994, Bush made his first run for office, narrowly losing the election for governor by less than two percentage points to the incumbent Lawton Chiles. Bush ran again in 1998 and defeated Lieutenant Governor Buddy MacKay with 55 percent of the vote. He ran for reelection in 2002 and won with 56 percent to become Florida's first two-term Republican governor. During his eight years as governor, Bush was credited with initiating environmental improvements, such as conservation in the Everglades, supporting caps for medical malpractice litigation, moving Medicaid recipients to private systems, and instituting reforms to the state education system, including the issuance of vouchers and promoting school choice.

 

Bush is a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2016 presidential election.

  

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

. . . the natural make-up of the women is called Thanaka. It is a cream made out of the bark of specific trees. Thanaka cream has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years. It has a fragrant scent somewhat similar to sandalwood. The creamy paste is applied to the face in attractive designs, the most common form being a circular patch on each cheek, nose, sometimes made stripey with the fingers known as thanaka bè gya, or patterned in the shape of a leaf, often also highlighting the bridge of the nose with it at the same time. It may be applied from head to toe (thanaka chi zoun gaung zoun). Apart from cosmetic beauty, thanaka also gives a cooling sensation and provides protection from sunburn. It is believed to help remove acne and promote smooth skin. It is also an anti-fungal. The active ingredients of thanaka are coumarin and marmesin.

______________________________________

 

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

. . . the natural make-up of the women is called Thanaka. It is a cream made out of the bark of specific trees. Thanaka cream has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years. It has a fragrant scent somewhat similar to sandalwood. The creamy paste is applied to the face in attractive designs, the most common form being a circular patch on each cheek, nose, sometimes made stripey with the fingers known as thanaka bè gya, or patterned in the shape of a leaf, often also highlighting the bridge of the nose with it at the same time. It may be applied from head to toe (thanaka chi zoun gaung zoun). Apart from cosmetic beauty, thanaka also gives a cooling sensation and provides protection from sunburn. It is believed to help remove acne and promote smooth skin. It is also an anti-fungal. The active ingredients of thanaka are coumarin and marmesin.

______________________________________

 

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

. . . the natural make-up of the women is called Thanaka. It is a cream made out of the bark of specific trees. Thanaka cream has been used by Burmese women for over 2000 years. It has a fragrant scent somewhat similar to sandalwood. The creamy paste is applied to the face in attractive designs, the most common form being a circular patch on each cheek, nose, sometimes made stripey with the fingers known as thanaka bè gya, or patterned in the shape of a leaf, often also highlighting the bridge of the nose with it at the same time. It may be applied from head to toe (thanaka chi zoun gaung zoun). Apart from cosmetic beauty, thanaka also gives a cooling sensation and provides protection from sunburn. It is believed to help remove acne and promote smooth skin. It is also an anti-fungal. The active ingredients of thanaka are coumarin and marmesin.

______________________________________

 

Yangon (Burmese: ရန်ကုန်, MLCTS rankun mrui, pronounced: [jàɴɡòʊɴ mjo̰]; formerly known as Rangoon, literally: "End of Strife") is the capital of the Yangon Region of Myanmar, also known as Burma. Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government relocated the capital to the purpose-built city of Naypyidaw in central Myanmar. With over 7 million people, Yangon is Myanmar's largest city and is its most important commercial centre.

 

Yangon boasts the largest number of colonial-era buildings in the region, and has a unique colonial-era urban core that is remarkably intact. The colonial-era commercial core is centred around the Sule Pagoda, which reputed to be over 2,000 years old. The city is also home to the gilded Shwedagon Pagoda — Myanmar's most sacred Buddhist pagoda. The mausoleum of the last Mughal Emperor is located in Yangon, where he had been exiled following the Indian Mutiny of 1857.

 

Yangon suffers from deeply inadequate infrastructure, especially compared to other major cities in Southeast Asia. Though many historic residential and commercial buildings have been renovated throughout central Yangon, most satellite towns that ring the city continue to be profoundly impoverished and lack basic infrastructure.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Yangon (ရန်ကုန်) is a combination of the two words yan (ရန်) and koun (ကုန်), which mean "enemies" and "run out of", respectively. It is also translated as "End of Strife". "Rangoon" most likely comes from the British imitation of the pronunciation of "Yangon" in the Arakanese language, which is [rɔ̀ɴɡʊ́ɴ].

 

HISTORY

EARLY HISTORY

Yangon was founded as Dagon in the early 11th century (c. 1028–1043) by the Mon, who dominated Lower Burma at that time. Dagon was a small fishing village centred about the Shwedagon Pagoda. In 1755, King Alaungpaya conquered Dagon, renamed it "Yangon", and added settlements around Dagon. The British captured Yangon during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–26), but returned it to Burmese administration after the war. The city was destroyed by a fire in 1841.

 

COLONIAL RANGOON

The British seized Yangon and all of Lower Burma in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, and subsequently transformed Yangon into the commercial and political hub of British Burma. Yangon is also the place where the British sent Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor, to live after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Based on the design by army engineer Lt. Alexander Fraser, the British constructed a new city on a grid plan on delta land, bounded to the east by the Pazundaung Creek and to the south and west by the Yangon River. Yangon became the capital of all British-ruled Burma after the British had captured Upper Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War of 1885. By the 1890s Yangon's increasing population and commerce gave birth to prosperous residential suburbs to the north of Royal Lake (Kandawgyi) and Inya Lake. The British also established hospitals including Rangoon General Hospital and colleges including Rangoon University.

 

Colonial Yangon, with its spacious parks and lakes and mix of modern buildings and traditional wooden architecture, was known as "the garden city of the East." By the early 20th century, Yangon had public services and infrastructure on par with London.

 

Before World War II, about 55% of Yangon's population of 500,000 was Indian or South Asian, and only about a third was Bamar (Burman). Karens, the Chinese, the Anglo-Burmese and others made up the rest.

 

After World War I, Yangon became the epicentre of Burmese independence movement, with leftist Rangoon University students leading the way. Three nationwide strikes against the British Empire in 1920, 1936 and 1938 all began in Yangon. Yangon was under Japanese occupation (1942–45), and incurred heavy damage during World War II. The city was retaken by the Allies in May 1945.

 

Yangon became the capital of Union of Burma on 4 January 1948 when the country regained independence from the British Empire.

 

CONTEMPORARY YANGON

Soon after Burma's independence in 1948, many colonial names of streets and parks were changed to more nationalistic Burmese names. In 1989, the current military junta changed the city's English name to "Yangon", along with many other changes in English transliteration of Burmese names. (The changes have not been accepted by many Burmese who consider the junta unfit to make such changes, nor by many publications, news bureaus including, most notably, the BBC and foreign nations including the United Kingdom and United States.)

 

Since independence, Yangon has expanded outwards. Successive governments have built satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa in the 1950s to Hlaingthaya,

 

Shwepyitha and South Dagon in the 1980s. Today, Greater Yangon encompasses an area covering nearly 600 square kilometres.

 

During Ne Win's isolationist rule (1962–88), Yangon's infrastructure deteriorated through poor maintenance and did not keep up with its increasing population. In the 1990s, the current military government's more open market policies attracted domestic and foreign investment, bringing a modicum of modernity to the city's infrastructure. Some inner city residents were forcibly relocated to new satellite towns. Many colonial-period buildings were demolished to make way for high-rise hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls, leading the city government to place about 200 notable colonial-period buildings under the Yangon City Heritage List in 1996. Major building programs have resulted in six new bridges and five new highways linking the city to its industrial back country. Still, much of Yangon remains without basic municipal services such as 24-hour electricity and regular garbage collection.

 

Yangon has become much more indigenous Burmese in its ethnic make-up since independence. After independence, many South Asians and Anglo-Burmese left. Many more South Asians were forced to leave during the 1960s by Ne Win's xenophobic government. Nevertheless, sizable South Asian and Chinese communities still exist in Yangon. The Anglo-Burmese have effectively disappeared, having left the country or intermarried with other Burmese groups.

 

Yangon was the centre of major anti-government protests in 1974, 1988 and 2007. The 1988 People Power Uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds, if not thousands of Burmese civilians, many in Yangoon where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into the streets of the then capital city. The Saffron Revolution saw mass shootings and the use of crematoria in Yangoon by the Burmese government to erase evidence of their crimes against monks, unarmed protesters, journalists and students.

 

The city's streets saw bloodshed each time as protesters were gunned down by the government.

 

In May 2008, Cyclone Nargis hit Yangon. While the city had few human casualties, three quarters of Yangon's industrial infrastructure was destroyed or damaged, with losses estimated at US$800 million.

 

In November 2005, the military government designated Naypyidaw, 320 kilometres north of Yangon, as the new administrative capital, and subsequently moved much of the government to the newly developed city. At any rate, Yangon remains the largest city, and the most important commercial centre of Myanmar.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Yangon is located in Lower Burma (Myanmar) at the convergence of the Yangon and Bago Rivers about 30 km away from the Gulf of Martaban at 16°48' North, 96°09' East (16.8, 96.15). Its standard time zone is UTC/GMT +6:30 hours.

 

CLIMATE

Yangon has a tropical monsoon climate under the Köppen climate classification system. The city features a lengthy wet season from May through October where a substantial amount of rainfall is received; and a dry season from November through April, where little rainfall is seen. It is primarily due to the heavy rainfall received during the rainy season that Yangon falls under the tropical monsoon climate category. During the course of the year 1961 to 1990s, average temperatures show little variance, with average highs ranging from 29 to 36 °C and average lows ranging from 18 to 25 °C.

 

CITYSCAPE

Until the mid-1990s, Yangon remained largely constrained to its traditional peninsula setting between the Bago, Yangon and Hlaing rivers. People moved in, but little of the city moved out. Maps from 1944 show little development north of Inya Lake and areas that are now layered in cement and stacked with houses were then virtual backwaters. Since the late 1980s, however, the city began a rapid spread north to where Yangon International airport now stands. But the result is a stretching tail on the city, with the downtown area well removed from its geographic centre. The city's area has steadily increased from 72.52 square kilometres in 1901 to 86.2 square kilometres in 1940 to 208.51 square kilometres in 1974, to 346.13 square kilometres in 1985, and to 598.75 square kilometres in 2008.

 

ARCHITECTURE

Downtown Yangon is known for its leafy avenues and fin-de-siècle architecture. The former British colonial capital has the highest number of colonial period buildings in south-east Asia. Downtown Yangon is still mainly made up of decaying colonial buildings. The former High Court, the former Secretariat buildings, the former St. Paul's English High School and the Strand Hotel are excellent examples of the bygone era. Most downtown buildings from this era are four-story mix-use (residential and commercial) buildings with 4.3 m ceilings, allowing for the construction of mezzanines. Despite their less-than-perfect conditions, the buildings remain highly sought after and most expensive in the city's property market.

 

In 1996, the Yangon City Development Committee created a Yangon City Heritage List of old buildings and structures in the city that cannot be modified or torn down without approval. In 2012, the city of Yangon imposed a 50-year moratorium on demolition of buildings older than 50 years. The Yangon Heritage Trust, an NGO started by Thant Myint-U, aims to create heritage areas in Downtown, and attract investors to renovate buildings for commercial use.

 

A latter day hallmark of Yangon is the eight-story apartment building. (In Yangon parlance, a building with no elevators (lifts) is called an apartment building and one with elevators is called a condominium. Condos which have to invest in a local power generator to ensure 24-hour electricity for the elevators are beyond the reach of most Yangonites.) Found throughout the city in various forms, eight-story apartment buildings provide relatively inexpensive housing for many Yangonites. The apartments are usually eight stories high (including the ground floor) mainly because city regulations, until February 2008, required that all buildings higher than 23 m or eight stories to install lifts. The current code calls for elevators in buildings higher than 19 m or six stories, likely ushering in the era of the six-story apartment building. Although most apartment buildings were built only within the last 20 years, they look much older and rundown due to shoddy construction and lack of proper maintenance.

 

Unlike other major Asian cities, Yangon does not have any skyscrapers. Aside from a few high-rise hotels and office towers, most high-rise buildings (usually 10 stories and up) are "condos" scattered across prosperous neighbourhoods north of downtown such as Bahan, Dagon, Kamayut and Mayangon. The tallest building in Yangon, Pyay Gardens, is a 25-story condo in the city's north.

 

Older satellite towns such as Thaketa, North Okkalapa and South Okkalapa are lined mostly with one to two story detached houses with access to the city's electricity grid. Newer satellite towns such as North Dagon and South Dagon are still essentially slums in a grid layout. The satellite towns - old or new - receive little or no municipal services.

 

ROAD LAYOUT

Downtown Yangon's road layout follows a grid pattern, based on four types of roads:

 

Broad 49-m wide roads running west to east

Broad 30-m wide roads running south to north

Two narrow 9.1-m wide streets running south to north

Mid-size 15-m wide streets running south to north

 

The east-west grid of central was laid out by British military engineers Fraser and Montgomerie after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The city was later developed by the Public Works Department and Bengal Corps of Engineers. The pattern of south to north roads is as follows: one broad 30 m wide broad road, two narrow streets, one mid-size street, two more narrow streets, and then another 30 m wide broad road. This order is repeated from west to east. The narrow streets are numbered; the medium and broad roads are named.

 

For example, the 30 m Lanmadaw Road is followed by 9.1 m-wide 17th and 18th streets then the medium 15 m Sint-Oh-Dan Road, the 30-foot 19th and 20th streets, followed by another 30 m wide Latha Road, followed again by the two numbered small roads 21st and 22nd streets, and so on.

 

The roads running parallel west to east were the Strand Road, Merchant Road, Maha Bandula (née Dalhousie) Road, Anawrahta (Fraser) Road, and Bogyoke Aung San (Montgomerie) Road.

 

PARKS AND GARDENS

The largest and best maintained parks in Yangon are located around Shwedagon Pagoda. To the south-east of the gilded stupa is the most popular recreational area in the city – Kandawgyi Lake. The 61-ha lake is surrounded by the 45-ha Kandawgyi Nature Park, and the 28-ha Yangon Zoological Gardens, which consists of a zoo, an aquarium and an amusement park. West of the pagoda towards the former Hluttaw (Parliament) complex is the 53-ha People's Square and Park, (the former parading ground on important national days when Yangon was the capital.) A few miles north of the pagoda lies the 15-ha Inya Lake Park – a favorite hangout place of Yangon University students, and a well-known place of romance in Burmese popular culture.

 

Hlawga National Park and Allied War Memorial at the outskirts of the city are popular day-trip destinations with the well-to-do and tourists.

 

Yangon Book Plaza, the first and biggest book shop in Myanmar was opened on February 26, 2017 on the fifth floor of Than Zay Market in Lanmadaw Township, Yangon.

 

ADMINISTRATION

Yangon is administered by the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC). YCDC also coordinates urban planning. The city is divided into four districts. The districts combined have a total of 33 townships. The current mayor of Yangon is Maung Maung Soe. Each township is administered by a committee of township leaders, who make decisions regarding city beautification and infrastructure. Myo-thit (lit. "New Towns", or satellite towns) are not within such jurisdictions.

 

TRANSPORT

Yangon is Burma's main domestic and international hub for air, rail, and ground transportation.

 

AIR

Yangon International Airport, located 19 km from the centre, is the country's main gateway for domestic and international air travel. The airport has three terminals, known as T1, T2 and T3 which is also known as Domestic. It has direct flights to regional cities in Asia – mainly, Doha, Dubai, Dhaka, Kolkata, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul, Guangzhou, Taipei, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Kunming and Singapore. Although domestic airlines offer service to about twenty domestic locations, most flights are to tourist destinations such as Bagan, Mandalay, Heho and Ngapali, and to the capital Naypyidaw.

 

RAILWAYS

Yangon Central Railway Station is the main terminus of Myanmar Railways' 5,403-kilometre rail network whose reach covers Upper Myanmar (Naypyidaw, Mandalay, Shwebo), upcountry (Myitkyina), Shan hills (Taunggyi, Lashio) and the Taninthayi coast (Mawlamyaing, Dawei).

 

Yangon Circular Railway operates a 45.9-kilometre 39-station commuter rail network that connects Yangon's satellite towns. The system is heavily utilized by the local populace, selling about 150,000 tickets daily. The popularity of the commuter line has jumped since the government reduced petrol subsidies in August 2007.

 

BUSES AND CARS

Yangon has a 4,456-kilometre road network of all types (tar, concrete and dirt) in March 2011. Many of the roads are in poor condition and not wide enough to accommodate an increasing number of cars. The vast majority of Yangon residents cannot afford a car and rely on an extensive network of buses to get around. Over 300 public and private bus lines operate about 6,300 crowded buses around the city, carrying over 4.4 million passengers a day. All buses and 80% of the taxis in Yangon run on compressed natural gas (CNG), following the 2005 government decree to save money on imported petroleum. Highway buses to other cities depart from Dagon Ayeyar Highway Bus Terminal for Irrawaddy delta region and Aung Mingala Highway Bus Terminal for other parts of the country.

 

Motor transportation in Yangon is highly expensive for most of its citizens. As the government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported each year in a country with over 50 million people, car prices in Yangon (and in Burma) are among the highest in the world. In July 2008, the two most popular cars in Yangon, 1986/87 Nissan Sunny Super Saloon and 1988 Toyota Corolla SE Limited, cost the equivalent of about US$20,000 and US$29,000 respectively. A sports utility vehicle, imported for the equivalent of around US$50,000, goes for US$250,000. Illegally imported unregistered cars are cheaper – typically about half the price of registered cars. Nonetheless, car usage in Yangon is on the rise, a sign of rising incomes for some, and already causes much traffic congestion in highway-less Yangon's streets. In 2011, Yangon had about 300,000 registered motor vehicles in addition to an unknown number of unregistered ones.

 

Since 1970, cars have been driven on the right side of the road in Burma, as part of a military decree. However, as the government has not required left hand drive (LHD) cars to accompany the right side road rules, many cars on the road are still right hand drive (RHD) made for driving on the left side. Japanese used cars, which make up most of the country's imports, still arrive with RHD and are never converted to LHD. As a result, Burmese drivers have to rely on their passengers when passing other cars.

 

Within Yangon city limits, it is illegal to drive trishaws, bicycles, and motorcycles. Since February 2010, pickup truck bus lines have been forbidden to run in 6 townships of central Yangon, namely Latha, Lanmadaw, Pabedan, Kyauktada, Botahtaung and Pazundaung Townships. In May 2003, a ban on using car horns was implemented in six townships of Downtown Yangon to reduce noise pollution. In April 2004, the car horn ban was expanded to cover the entire city.

 

RIVER

Yangon's four main passenger jetties, all located on or near downtown waterfront, mainly serve local ferries across the river to Dala and Thanlyin, and regional ferries to the Irrawaddy delta. The 35-km Twante Canal was the quickest route from Yangon to the Irrawaddy delta until the 1990s when roads between Yangon and the Irrawaddy Division became usable year-round. While passenger ferries to the delta are still used, those to Upper Burma via the Irrawaddy river are now limited mostly to tourist river cruises.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

Yangon is the most populous city by far in Burma although estimates of the size of its population vary widely. All population figures are estimates since no official census has been conducted in Burma since 1983. A UN estimate puts the population as 4.35 million in 2010 but a 2009 U.S. State Department estimate puts it at 5.5 million. The U.S. State Department's estimate is probably closer to the real number since the UN number is a straight-line projection, and does not appear to take the expansion of city limits in the past two decades into account. The city's population grew sharply after 1948 as many people (mainly, the indigenous Burmese) from other parts of the country moved into the newly built satellite towns of North Okkalapa, South Okkalapa, and Thaketa in the 1950s and East Dagon, North Dagon and South Dagon in the 1990s. Immigrants have founded their regional associations (such as Mandalay Association, Mawlamyaing Association, etc.) in Yangon for networking purposes. The government's decision to move the nation's administrative capital to Naypyidaw has drained an unknown number of civil servants away from Yangon.

 

Yangon is the most ethnically diverse city in the country. While Indians formed the slight majority prior to World War II, today, the majority of the population is of indigenous Bamar (Burman) descent. Large communities of Indians/South Asian Burmese and the Chinese Burmese exist especially in the traditional downtown neighborhoods. A large number of Rakhine and Karen also live in the city.

 

Burmese is the principal language of the city. English is by far the preferred second language of the educated class. In recent years, however, the prospect of overseas job opportunities has enticed

 

some to study other languages: Mandarin Chinese is most popular, followed by Japanese, and French.

 

RELIGIONS

The primary religions practiced in Yangon are Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam. Shwedagon Pagoda is a famous religious landmark in the city.

 

MEDIA

Yangon is the country's hub for the movie, music, advertising, newspaper and book publishing industries. All media is heavily regulated by the military government. Television broadcasting is off limits to the private sector. All media content must first be approved by the government's media censor board, Press Scrutiny and Registration Division.

 

Most television channels in the country are broadcast from Yangon. TV Myanmar and Myawaddy TV are the two main channels, providing Burmese-language programming in news and entertainment. Other special interest channels are MWD-1 and MWD-2, MRTV-3, the English-language channel that targets overseas audiences via satellite and via Internet, MRTV-4 and Channel 7 are with a focus on non-formal education programs and movies, and Movie 5, a pay-TV channel specializing in broadcasting foreign movies.

 

Yangon has three radio stations. Myanmar Radio National Service is the national radio service and broadcasts mostly in Burmese (and in English during specific times.) Pop culture oriented Yangon City FM and Mandalay City FM radio stations specialize in Burmese and English pop music, entertainment programs, live celebrity interviews, etc. New radio channels such as Shwe FM and Pyinsawaddy FM can also be tuned with the city area.

 

Nearly all print media and industries are based out of Yangon. All three national newspapers – two Burmese language dailies Myanma Alin (မြန်မာ့အလင်း) and Kyemon (ကြေးမုံ), and the English language The New Light of Myanmar — are published by the government. Semi-governmental The Myanmar Times weekly, published in Burmese and in English, is mainly geared for Yangon's expatriate community. Over twenty special interest journals and magazines covering sports, fashion, finance, crime, literature (but never politics) vie for the readership of the general populace.

 

Access to foreign media is extremely difficult. Satellite television in Yangon, and in Burma, is very expensive as the government imposes an annual registration fee of one million kyats. Certain foreign newspapers and periodicals such as the International Herald Tribune and the Straits Times can be found only in a few (mostly downtown) bookstores. Internet access in Yangon, which has the best telecommunication infrastructure in the country, is slow and erratic at best, and the Burmese government implements one of the world's most restrictive regimes of Internet control. International text messaging and voice messaging was permitted only in August 2008.

 

COMMUNICATION

Common facilities taken for granted elsewhere are luxury prized items in Yangon and Burma. The price of a GSM mobile phone was about K1.1 million in August 2008. In 2007, the country of 55 million had only 775,000 phone lines (including 275,000 mobile phones), and 400,000 computers. Even in Yangon, which has the best infrastructure, the estimated telephone penetration rate was only 6% at the end of 2004, and the official waiting time for a telephone line was 3.6 years. Most people cannot afford a computer and have to use the city's numerous Internet cafes to access a heavily restricted Internet, and a heavily censored local intranet. According to official statistics, in July 2010, the country had over 400,000 Internet users, with the vast majority hailing from just two cities, Yangon and Mandalay. Although Internet access was available in 42 cities across the country, the number of users outside the two main cities was just over 10,000.

 

LIFESTYLE

Yangon's property market is the most expensive in the country and beyond the reach of most Yangonites. Most rent outside the centre and few can afford to rent such apartments. (In 2008, rents for a typical 60 to 70 m2 apartments in the centre and vicinity range between K70,000 and K150,000 and those for high end condos between K200,000 and K500,000.)

 

Most men of all ages (and some women) spend their time at ubiquitous tea-shops, found in any corner or street of the city. Watching European football (mostly English Premier League with occasional La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga) matches while sipping tea is a popular pastime among many Yangonites. The average person stays close to his or her residential neighbourhood. The well-to-do tend to visit shopping malls and parks on weekends. Some leave the city on weekends for Chaungtha and Ngwesaung beach resorts in Ayeyarwady Division.

 

Yangon is also home to many pagoda festivals (paya pwe), held during dry-season months (November – March). The most famous of all, the Shwedagon Pagoda Festival in March, attracts thousands of pilgrims from around the country.

 

Yangon's museums are the domain of tourists and rarely visited by the locals.

 

Most of Yangon's larger hotels offer some kind of nightlife entertainment, geared towards tourists and the well-to-do Burmese. Some hotels offer traditional Burmese performing arts shows complete with a traditional Burmese orchestra. The pub scene in larger hotels is more or less the same as elsewhere in Asia. Other options include karaoke bars and pub restaurants in Yangon Chinatown.

 

Due to the problems of high inflation, the lack of high denomination notes, and the fact that many of the population do not have access to checks, or credit or debit cards, it is common to see citizens carrying a considerable amount of cash. (The highest denomination of Burmese currency kyat is 10 000 (~US$10.)) Credit cards are only rarely used in the city, chiefly in the more lavish hotels. Credit cards are also accepted in the major supermarket and convenience store chains.

 

SPORTS

As the city has the best sporting facilities in the country, most national-level annual sporting tournaments such as track and field, football, volleyball, tennis and swimming are held in Yangon. The 40,000-seat Aung San Stadium and the 32,000-seat Thuwunna Stadium are the main venues for the highly popular annual State and Division football tournament. Until April 2009, the now defunct Myanmar Premier League, consisted of 16 Yangon-based clubs, played all its matches in Yangon stadiums, and attracted little interest from the general public or commercial success despite the enormous popularity of football in Burma. Most Yangonites prefer watching European football on satellite TV. Teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Manchester City are among the favorite European teams among the Yangonites. It remains to be seen whether the Myanmar National League, the country's first professional football league, and its Yangon-based club Yangon United FC will attract a sufficient following in the country's most important media market.

 

Yangon is also home to annual the Myanmar Open golf tournament, and the Myanmar Open tennis tournament. The city hosted the 1961 and 1969 South East Asian Games. During colonial times, cricket was played mostly by British officials in the city. First-class cricket was played in the city in January 1927 when the touring Marylebone Cricket Club played Burma and the Rangoon Gymkhana. Two grounds were used to host these matches, the BAA Ground and the Gymkhana Ground. These matches mark the only time Burma and Rangoon Gymkhana have appeared in first-class cricket, and the only time first-class cricket has been played in Burma. After independence cricket all but died out in the country.

 

Yangon has a growing population of skateboarders, as documented in the films Altered Focus: Burma and Youth of Yangon. German non-profit organization Make Life Skate Life has received permission from the Yangon City Development Committee to construct a concrete skatepark at Thakin Mya park in downtown, and plans to complete the park in November 2015.

 

ECONOMY

Yangon is the country's main centre for trade, industry, real estate, media, entertainment and tourism. The city represents about one fifth of the national economy. According to official statistics for FY 2010–2011, the size of the economy of Yangon Region was 8.93 trillion kyats, or 23% of the national GDP.

 

The city is Lower Burma's main trading hub for all kinds of merchandise – from basic food stuffs to used cars although commerce continues to be hampered by the city's severely underdeveloped banking industry and communication infrastructure. Bayinnaung Market is the largest wholesale centre in the country for rice, beans and pulses, and other agricultural commodities. Much of the country's legal imports and exports go through Thilawa Port, the largest and busiest port in Burma. There is also a great deal of informal trade, especially in street markets that exist alongside street platforms of Downtown Yangon's townships. However, on 17 June 2011, the YCDC announced that street vendors, who had previously been allowed to legally open shop at 3 pm, would be prohibited from selling on the streets, and permitted to sell only in their townships of residence, presumably to clean up the city's image. Since 1 December 2009, high-density polyethylene plastic bags have been banned by city authorities.

 

Manufacturing accounts for a sizable share of employment. At least 14 light industrial zones ring Yangon, directly employing over 150,000 workers in 4,300 factories in early 2010. The city is the centre of country's garment industry which exported US$292 million in 2008/9 fiscal year. More than 80 percent of factory workers in Yangon work on a day-to-day basis. Most are young women between 15 and 27 years of age who come from the countryside in search of a better life. The manufacturing sector suffers from both structural problems (e.g. chronic power shortages) and political.

 

problems (e.g. economic sanctions). In 2008, Yangon's 2500 factories alone needed about 120 MW of power; yet, the entire city received only about 250 MW of the 530 MW needed. Chronic power shortages limit the factories' operating hours between 8 am and 6 pm.

 

Construction is a major source of employment. The construction industry has been negatively affected by the move of state apparatus and civil servants to Naypyidaw, new regulations introduced in August 2009 requiring builders to provide at least 12 parking spaces in every new high-rise building, and the general poor business climate. As of January 2010, the number of new high-rise building starts approved in 2009–2010 was only 334, compared to 582 in 2008–2009.

 

Tourism represents a major source of foreign currency for the city although by south-east Asian standards the number of foreign visitors to Yangon has always been quite low - about 250,000 before the Saffron Revolution in September 2007. The number of visitors dipped even further following the Saffron Revolution and Cyclone Nargis. The recent improvement in the country's political climate has attracted an increasing number of businessmen and tourists. Between 300,000 and 400,000 visitors that went through Yangon International in 2011. However, after years of underinvestment, Yangon's modest hotel infrastructure - only 3000 of the total 8000 hotel rooms in Yangon are "suitable for tourists" - is already bursting at seams, and will need to be expanded to handle additional visitors. As part of an urban development strategy, a hotel zone has been planned in Yangon's outskirts, encompassing government- and military-owned land in Mingaladon, Hlegu and Htaukkyant Townships.

 

EDUCATION

Yangon educational facilities has a very high number of qualified teachers but the state spending on education is among the lowest of the world. Around 2007 estimate by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies puts the spending for education at 0.5% of the national budget. The disparity in educational opportunities and achievement between rich and poor schools is quite stark even within the city. With little or no state support forthcoming, schools have to rely on forced "donations" and various fees from parents for nearly everything – school maintenance to teachers' salaries, forcing many poor students to drop out.

 

While many students in poor districts fail to reach high school, a handful of Yangon high schools in wealthier districts such as Dagon 1, Sanchaung 2, Kamayut 2, Bahan 2, Latha 2, and TTC provide the majority of students admitted to the most selective universities in the country, highlighting the extreme shallowness of talent pool in the country. The wealthy bypass the state education system altogether, sending their children to private English language instruction schools such as YIEC or more widely known as ISM, or abroad (typically Singapore or Australia) for university education. In 2014, international schools in Yangon cost at least US$8,000 a year.

 

There are over 20 universities and colleges in the city. While Yangon University remains the best known (its main campus is a part of popular Burmese culture e.g. literature, music, film, etc.), the nation's oldest university is now mostly a graduate school, deprived of undergraduate studies. Following the 1988 nationwide uprising, the military government has repeatedly closed universities, and has dispersed most of undergraduate student population to new universities in the suburbs such as Dagon University, the University of East Yangon and the University of West Yangon. Nonetheless many of the country's most selective universities are still in Yangon. Students from around the country still have to come to study in Yangon as some subjects are offered only at its universities. The University of Medicine 1, University of Medicine 2, Yangon Technological University, University of Computer Studies and Myanmar Maritime University are the most selective in the country.

 

HEALTH CARE

The general state of health care in Yangon is poor. According to a 2007 estimate, the military government spends 0.4% of the national budget on health care, and 40% to 60% on defense. By the government's own figures, it spends 849 kyats (US$0.85) per person. Although health care is nominally free, in reality, patients have to pay for medicine and treatment, even in public clinics and hospitals. Public hospitals including the flagship Yangon General Hospital lack many of the basic facilities and equipment.

 

Wealthier Yangonites still have access to country's best medical facilities and internationally qualified doctors. Only Yangon and Mandalay have any sizable number of doctors left as many Burmese doctors have emigrated. The well-to-do go to private clinics or hospitals like Pun Hlaing International Hospital and Bahosi Medical Clinic. Medical malpractice is widespread, even in private clinics and hospitals that serve the well-to-do. In 2009 and 2010, a spate of high-profile deaths brought out the severity of the problem, even for the relatively well off Yangonites. The wealthy do not rely on domestic hospitals and travel abroad, usually Bangkok or Singapore, for treatment.

 

WIKIPEDIA

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Hazare

 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Kisan Bapat Baburao Hazare (Marathi: किसन बापट बाबुराव हजारे) (born 15 January 1940), popularly known as Anna Hazare (Marathi: अण्णा हजारे), is an Indian social activist who is especially recognized for his contribution to the development of Ralegan Siddhi, a village in Parner taluka of Ahmednagar district, Maharashtra, India and his efforts for establishing it as a model village, for which he was awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India in 1992.

 

On 5 April 2011, Hazare started a 'fast unto death' to exert pressure on the Government of India to enact a strong anti-corruption act as envisaged in the Jan Lokpal Bill, a law that will establish a Lokpal (ombudsman) that will have the power to deal with corruption in public offices. The fast led to nation wide protests in support of Hazare. The fast ended on 9 April 2011. All of his demands of the movement are agreed by the Government of India and Government issued a gazette notification on formation of a joint committee headed by senior minister Pranab Mukherjee to draft an effective Lokpal Bill.[

 

Anna Hazare was born on 15 January 1940 in a small village, Bhingar, near Ahmednagar city in India. Anna's father Baburao Hazare worked as an unskilled labourer in Ayurveda Ashram Pharmacy. Anna's grandfather was in the army and was posted at Bhingar when Anna was born. He died in 1945 but Anna's father continued to stay at Bhingar. In 1952 Anna's father resigned from his job and returned to his own village, Ralegan Siddhi. At that time Anna had completed his education upto 4th standard and had six younger siblings. It was with great difficulty that Anna's father could make two ends meet. Anna's aunt (father's sister) took Anna to Mumbai. She was childless and she offered to look after him and his education.

 

Anna studied upto the 7th standard in Mumbai. He took up a job after the 7th standard in consideration of the economic situation back home. Anna's father at Ralegan had to work as a daily wage labourer and found it difficult to sustain his family. He was slipping deeper and deeper into debt. He had to sell off one part of his land and mortgage the other. Anna started selling flowers at Dadar in order to make his living. But Anna's working at somebody's shop for Indian Rupee symbol.svg 40 a month was not enough. After gaining some experience, he started his own shop and even brought two of his brothers to Mumbai. Gradually Anna's income went up to Indian Rupee symbol.svg 700 to Indian Rupee symbol.svg 800 per month.

 

In a couple of years Anna fell into bad company and started wasting his time and money on vices. He also started getting involved in brawls and fights, especially when he found some simple person being harassed by goondas. He became irregular in sending money to his family. The word went around in Ralegan that he had become a bad character himself. In one such fight, Anna bashed up a person rather badly. Fearing arrest, he avoided coming to his regular work and residence for some time. During this period (in April 1960) he appeared in Army recruitment interviews and was selected to join the Indian Army.[3][4]

In the Indian Army

 

Anna Hazare started his career as a driver in the Indian Army. He spent his spare time reading the books of Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Acharya Vinoba Bhave that inspired him to become a social worker and activist.[4] During the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, he was the only survivor in a border exchange of fire, while driving a truck.[5] During the mid-1970s he was again involved in a road accident while driving.[6]

In Ralegan Siddhi

 

The dream of India as a strong nation will not be realised without self-reliant,

self-sufficient villages, this can be achieved only through social commitment

& involvement of the common man." - Anna Hazare

“

”

annahazare.org

 

After voluntary retirement from the army, Hazare came to Ralegan Siddhi village in 1975. Initially, he organized the youth of the village into an organization named the Tarun Mandal (Youth Association). He also helped to form the Pani Puravatha Mandals (Water Supply Associations) to ensure proper distribution of water.[7]

Uprooting alcoholism

 

As the next step towards social and economic change, Anna Hazare and the youth group decided to take up the issue of Alcoholism. It was very clear that there could be no progress and happiness in the village unless the curse of alcoholism was completely removed from their lives. At a meeting conducted in the temple, the villagers resolved to close down the liquor dens and ban the drinking of alcohol in the village. Since these resolutions were made in the temple, they became in a sense religious commitments. Over thirty liquor brewing units were closed by their owners voluntarily. Those who did not succumb to social pressure were forced to close down their businesses, when the youth group smashed up their liquor dens. The owners could not complain as their business was illegal.[8]

 

Though the closure of liquor brewing reduced alcoholism in Ralegan Siddhi, some villagers continued to drink. They obtained their liquor from neighboring villages. The villagers decided that those men would be given three warnings, after which they would be physically punished. Twelve men who were found in a drunken state even after initial warnings were tied to a pole with help from the youth group and flogged. Anna Hazare says, “Doesn’t a mother administer bitter medicines to a sick child when she knows that the medicine can cure her child? The child may not like the medicine, but the mother does it only because she cares for the child. The alcoholics were punished so that their families would not be destroyed.”[citation needed]

 

Anna Hazare appealed to the government of Maharashtra to bring in a law whereby prohibition would come into force in a village if 25% of the women in the village demanded it. In July 2009, the state government issued a government resolution amending the Bombay Prohibition Act, 1949. As per the amendments, if at least 25% of women voters demand liquor prohibition through a written application to the state excise department, voting should be conducted through a secret ballot. If 50% of the voters vote against the sale of liquor prohibition should be imposed in the village and the sale of liquor should be stopped. Similar action can be taken at the ward level in municipal areas. Thereafter, another circular was issued, making it mandatory to get the sanction of gram the sabha for issuing new permits for sale of liquor. In some instances, when women agitated against the sale of liquor, cases were filed against them. Anna took up the issue again and in August 2009 the government issued another circular that sought withdrawal of cases against women who sought prohibition of liquor in their villages.[9]

 

Along with the removal of alcohol from the village, it was decided to ban the sale of tobacco, cigarettes and beedies. In order to implement this resolution, the youth group performed a unique "Holi" twenty two years ago. The festival of Holi is celebrated as symbolic burning of evil. The youth group brought all the tobacco, cigarettes and beedies from the shops in the village and burnt them in ‘Holi’ fire. From that day, no tobacco, cigarettes, or beedies are sold in any shop at Ralegan Siddhi. Today there is not a single shop in Ralegaon Siddhi selling cigarettes or bidis. [10][11][12]

The Watershed Development programme

 

Anna Hazare realized that the only way to increase agricultural production in a sustainable manner was to build a better irrigation system. Taking into account the geographical location of Ralegan , located in the foothills, Anna Hazare persuaded villagers to construct a watershed embankment to stop water and allow it to percolate and increase the ground water level. He motivated the residents of the village into shramdan (voluntary labour) to build canals, small-scale check-dams and percolation tanks in the nearby hills for watershed development; efforts that solved the problem of scarcity of water in the village that also made irrigation possible.[4][6] The first embankment that was built using volunteer efforts developed a leak and had to be reconstructed this time with government funding.

 

Hazare also took steps to stop the second big problem, soil erosion. In order to conserve soil and water by checking the run off, contour trenches and gully plugs were constructed along the hill slopes. Grass, shrubs and about 3 lakh ( 300,000) trees were planted along the hillside and the village. This process was supplemented by afforestation, nullah bunds, underground check dams and cemented bandhras at strategic locations. The Watershed Development programme became a huge success and helped increase the fortunes of many farmers as they now had a reliable source of water. Ralegan has also experimented with drip and bi-valve irrigation in a big way. Papaya, lemon and chillies have been planted on a plot of 80 acres (320,000 m2) entirely irrigated by the drip irrigation system. Cultivation of water-intensive crops like sugar cane was banned. Crops such as pulses, oilseeds and certain cash crops with low water requirements were grown. The farmers started growing high yield varieties of crop and the cropping pattern of the village also changed. He has helped farmers of more than 70 villages in drought-prone regions in the state of Maharashtra since 1975.[13]

 

The Government of India plans to start a training centre here to understand and implement Hazare's watershed development model in other villages in the country.[14]

Milk production

 

As a secondary occupation, milk production was promoted in Ralegan Siddhi. Purchase of new cattle and improvement of the existing breed with the help of artificial insemination and timely guidance and assistance by the veterinary doctor has resulted in an improvement in the cattle stock. The milk production has also increased. Crossbred cows are replacing the local ones which give a low milk yield. The number of milk cattle has also been growing, which resulted in growth from one hundred liters (before 1975) to Around 2500 litres per day which is sent to a co-operative dairy (Malganga Dairy) in Ahmednagar. Some milk is also given to Balwadi (kindergarten) children & neighboring village under the child nutrition program sponsored by the Zilla Parishad.[15]

 

From the surplus generated, the milk society bought a mini-truck and a thresher. Besides transporting milk to Ahmednagar, the mini-truck is also used for taking vegetables and other produce directly to the market, thus eliminating intermediate agents. The thresher is rented out to the farmers during the harvesting season.[citation needed]

Education

 

In 1932 Ralegan Siddhi got its first formal school, a single class room primary school. In 1962, the villagers added more classrooms through community volunteer efforts. By 1971 out of an estimated population of 1209, only 30.43% were literate (72 women and 290 men). Boys moved to the nearby towns of Shirur and Parner to pursue higher education, but due to socioeconomic conditions, girls could not do the same and were limited to primary education. Anna Hazare along with the youth of Ralegan siddhi worked to increase literacy rates and education levels. In 1976 they started a pre school for the primary school and a high school in 1979. The villagers started taking active interest in the village school and formed the Sant Yadav Baba Shikshan Prasarak Mandal (Charitable trust), which was registered in 1979.[16] The trust decided to take over the function of the village school which was in a bad state due to government neglect and also lack of interest on behalf of teachers who were moonlighting.

 

The trust obtained a government grant of 4 lakhs (400,000 rupees) for the school building using the National rural education program (NREP). A new school building was built in the next 2 months with volunteer efforts and the money obtained via the grant. A new hostel was also constructed to house 200 students from poorer sections of society. After the opening of the school in the village, a girl from Ralegan Siddhi became the first female in the village to complete her SSC in 1982.[10] Since then the school has been instrumental in bringing in many of changes to the village. This school has a hostel for 150 boarders. Traditional farming practices are tought in this school in addition to the government curriculum.[6]

Removal of untouchability

 

The social barriers that existed due to the caste system have been broken down by Ralegan Siddhi villagers and people of all castes come together to celebrate social events. The people of Ralegan have largely succeeded in eradicating social discrimination on the basis of caste. The dalits have been integrated into the social and economic life of the village. The villagers have built houses for the Harijans and Dalits, and helped to repay their loans to free them from their indebtedness.[16]

Collective marriages

 

Most rural poor get into a debt-trap as they have to incur heavy expenses at the time of marriage of their son or daughter. It is an undesirable practice but has almost become a social obligation in India. Ralegan's people have started celebrating marriages collectively. The feast is held together where the expenses are further reduced by the Tarun Mandal taking the responsibility for cooking and serving the food. The vessels, the Loudspeaker system, the mandap and the decorations have also been bought by the Tarun Mandal members belonging to the oppressed castes. From 1976 to 1986, 424 marriages have been held under this system.[16]

Gram Sabha

 

The Gram sabha is an important forum for collective decision making in the villages in India. If villagers are involved in the planning and decision making process, they are more open to any changes taking place in the village. Anna campaigned between 1998 and 2006 for amending the Gram Sabha Act, so that the people (meaning the the villagers) have a say in the development works in their village. While the state government refused to bend to his demand, it had to give in due to public pressure. As per the amendments, seeking sanction of the gram sabha (collective of villagers, and not just the few elected representatives in the gram panchayat) for expenditure on development works in the village, is mandatory. In case of expenditure without the sanction of the gram sabha, 20% of gram sabha members can lodge a complaint to the chief executive officer of the zilla parishad with their signatures. The chief executive officer is required to visit the village and conduct an inquiry within 30 days and submit the report to the divisional commissioner, who has powers to remove the sarpanch or deputy sarpanch and dismiss the gram sevak involved. Anna was not satisfied, as the amended Act did not include "the right to recall a sarpanch". He insisted that this should be included and the state government relented.[9]

 

In Ralegan Siddhi, the Gram Sabha meetings are held periodically to discuss issues relating to the welfare of the village. Projects like Watershed development activities are undertaken only after they are discussed in the Gram Sabha. All decisions like Nasbandi, Nasabandi(bans on alcohol), Kurhadbandi (bans on tree felling), Charai bandi(bans on grazing), and Shramdan were taken in the Gram Sabha. Decisions are taken in a simple majority consensus. In case of a difference of opinion the majority consensus becomes acceptable. The decision of the Gram Sabha is accepted as final.

 

In addition to panchayat, there are several registered societies that take care of various projects and activities of the village. Each society presents its annual report and statement of accounts in the Gram Sabha every year. The Sant Yadavbaba Shikshan Prasarak Mandali monitors the educational activities. The Vivid karyakari society gives assistance and provides guidance to farmers regarding fertilizers, seeds, organic farming, financial assistance, etc. Sri Sant Yadavbaba Doodh Utpadhak Sahakari sansta gives guidance regarding the dairy business. Seven Co-operative irrigation society provides water to the farmers from cooperative wells. Mahila Sarvage Utkarsh Mandal attends the welfare needs of the women.

Anti-corruption protests in Maharashtra

 

In 1991, Hazare launched the Bhrashtachar Virodhi Jan Aandolan (BVJA) (People's Movement against Corruption), a popular movement to fight against corruption[17] in Ralegan Siddhi. In the same year he protested against the collusion between 40 forest officials and the timber merchants, which resulted in transfer and suspension of these officials.[18]

 

In May 1997, Hazare protested against the alleged malpractices in the purchase of powerlooms by the Vasantrao Naik Bhathya Vimukt Jamati Vikas Manch and the Mahatma Phule Magasvargiya Vikas Mandal. These institutions were directly under the charge of then Maharashtra Social Welfare minister Babanrao Gholap of the Shiv Sena, since their managing committees were dissolved after the Shiv Sena-BJP government came to power in the state in 1995. Hazare also raised the issue of alleged massive land purchase by Gholap's wife Shashikala in Nashik between April to September 1996. He forwarded the available documentary evidences in support of his allegations to then Maharashtra Governor P. C. Alexander.[19] On 4 November 1997, Gholap filed a defamation suit against Hazare for accusing him of corruption. He was initially arrested in April 1998 and was released on a personal bond of Rs 5,000.[20] On 9 September 1998, Anna Hazare was imprisoned in the Yerawada Jail after being sentenced to simple imprisonment for three months by the Mumbai Metropolitan Court.[5][21] The sentencing came as a huge shock at that time to all social activists. Leaders of all political parties except the BJP and the Shiv Sena came in support of him [22][23] Later due to public protests, the Government of Maharashtra ordered his release from the jail.[24]

 

In 2003, the corruption charges were raised by Hazare against 4 ministers of the Congress-NCP government belonging to the NCP.[25] He started his 'fast unto death' on 9 August 2003. He ended his fast on 17 August 2003 after then chief minister Sushil Kumar Shinde formed a one man commission, headed by the retired justice P. B. Sawant to probe his charges.[26] The P. B. Sawant commission report, submitted on 23 February 2005, indicted Suresh Jain, Nawab Malik and Padmasinh Patil. The report exonerated Vijaykumar Gavit.[27][28] Suresh Jain and Nawab Malik resigned from the cabinet in March 2005.[29]

Right to Information movement

 

In the early 2000s, Anna Hazare led a movement in Maharashtra state, which forced the Government of Maharashtra to repeal the earlier weak act and pass a stronger Maharashtra Right to Information Act. Law professor Alasdair Scott Roberts mentions,

“ The state of Maharashtra - home to one of the world's largest cities, Mumbai, adopted a Right to Information Act in 2003, prodded by the hunger strike of prominent activist, Anna Hazare. ("All corruption can end only if there is freedom of information," said Hazare, who resumed his strike in February 2004 to push for better enforcement of the Act).[30] ”

 

This Act was later considered as the base document for the Right to Information Act 2005 (RTI), enacted by the Union Government. It also ensured that the President of India assented to this new Act.[31]

 

On 5 April 2011, Anna Hazare initiated a movement for passing a stronger anti-corruption Lokpal (ombudsman) bill in the Indian Parliament. As a part of this movement, N. Santosh Hegde, a former justice of the Supreme Court of India and Lokayukta of Karnataka, Prashant Bhushan, a senior lawyer in the Supreme Court along with the members of the India Against Corruption movement drafted an alternate bill, named as the Jan Lokpal Bill (People's Ombudsman Bill) with more stringent provisions and wider power to the Lokpal (Ombudsman).[32] Hazare began a fast unto death from 5 April 2011 at Jantar Mantar in Delhi, to press for the demand to form a joint committee of the representatives of the Government and the civil society to draft a new bill with stronger penal actions and more independence to the Lokpal and Lokayuktas (Ombudsmen in the states), after his demand was rejected by the Prime Minister of India Manmohan Singh [33] Before commencing his 'fast unto death' he stated, "I will fast until Jan Lokpal Bill is passed".[34]

 

The movement attracted attention very quickly through various media. It has been reported that thousands of people joined to support Hazare's effort. Almost 150 people reportedly joined Hazare in his fast.[35] He said that he would not allow any politician to sit with him in this movement. Politicians like Uma Bharti and Om Prakash Chautala were shooed away by protesters when they came to visit the site where the protest was taking place.[36] A number of social activists including Medha Patkar, Arvind Kejriwal and former IPS officer Kiran Bedi, Jayaprakash Narayan of the Lok Satta have lent their support to Hazare's hunger strike and anti-corruption campaign. This movement has also been joined by many people providing their support in Internet social media such as twitter and facebook. In addition to spiritual leaders Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Swami Ramdev, Swami Agnivesh and former Indian cricketer Kapil Dev,[37] many celebrities showed their public support through micro-blogging site Twitter.[38] As a result of this movement, on 6 April 2011 Sharad Pawar resigned from the group of ministers formed for reviewing the draft Lokpal bill 2010.[39]

Wikinews has related news: Indian activist begins "fast-unto-death" hunger strike to end corruption

 

The movement gathered significant support from India's youth visible through the local support and on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter.[40] There have also been protests in Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Guwahati, Shillong, Aizawl among other cities of India.[41]

 

On 8 April 2011, the Government of India accepted all demands of the movement. On 9 April 2011 it issued a notification in the Gazette of India on formation of a joint committee. It accepted the formula that there be a politician chairman and an activist, non-politician Co-Chairman. According to the notification, Pranab Mukherjee will be the Chairman of the draft committee while Shanti Bhushan will be the co-chairman. “The Joint Drafting Committee shall consist of five nominee ministers of the Government of India and five nominees of the civil society. The five nominee Ministers of the Government of India are Pranab Mukherjee, Union Minister of Finance, P. Chidambaram, Union Minister of Home Affairs, M. Veerappa Moily, Union Minister of Law and Justice, Kapil Sibal, Union Minister of Human Resource and Development and Minister of Communication and Information Technology and Salman Khursheed, Union Minister of Water Resources and Minister of Minority Affairs. The five nominees of the civil society are Anna Hazare, N. Santosh Hegde, Shanti Bhushan Senior Advocate, Prashant Bhushan, Advocate and Arvind Kejriwal.[42][43]

 

On the morning of 9 April 2011 Anna Hazare ended his 97-hour hunger strike by first offering water to some of his supporters who had gone on a hunger strike in his support. The social activist then broke his fast by consuming some water. He addressed the people and set a deadline of 15 August 2011 to pass the Lokpal Bill in the Indian Parliament.

“ Real fight begins now. We have a lot of struggle ahead of us in drafting the new legislation, We have shown the world in just five days that we are united for the cause of the nation. The youth power in this movement is a sign of hope.[44] ”

 

Anna Hazare also said that if the bill was not passed, then he will call a mass nation-wide agitation.[45][44] He called his movement as "second struggle for independence" and he will continue the fight.[46]

HELP ME ! MY LIFE IS IN PERICOLE ! NO ASISTENCE SOCIALY,MEDICALY,FINANCIARY ! I AM VICTIM,COBAY,AUTORITY CRIMINALY FROM ROMANIAN

" CAUSE UMANITY FOR FAMILY NISTOR IONEL"

------------------------------------------

Emergency aid

 

killer doctor has forgotten in my column in the vertebral vertebrae stuck a scalpel!

<Iframe src = ' www.stirileprotv.ro/lbin/video_embed.php?media_id=6040874...

E-MAIL: nistorionel58@yahoo.com nistorionel58nistordivinity.wordpress.com

youtu.be/or6Hvd06rxY

www.metacafe.com/watch/562622/3_ani_cu_bisturiul_linga_co...

youtu.be/MJGHY81dtno

FAM:

NISTOR IONEL

STR,SUCEVEI,NR.69,AP.5,

CITY,ORADEA

,STATE,BIHOR,

COD,CITY,410087,

COUNTRY,ROMANIA

MY GOD BLESS YOU !

RESPECT FAM,NISTOR

SCALPEL IN THE SPINE !

3 years scalpel next column

MY DEAR

Dear friends I ask for you help.Considering my dramatic medical and social situation,I was also a victim of the Romanian medical and judiciary sistem,I am sending you this video file about myself ,my page facebook,the victim (patient),the moment where the scalpel blade was extracted from my spine,between the vertebrae.

 

I am sorry Ihave to tell you this ,but in 2004 I had a neurosurgery and then septicemia.The neurosurgery took place in Cluj and during the wound he forgot another scalpel blade between my vertebrae.Ihad it for 3 years inside without knowing it.

 

During the surgery ,I also got hepatitis B and C during the surgery.

 

I spent a lot of money to save and retrieve my life,becoming broke.I have 4 kind to maintain and I have credits at several banks.

 

My life it not normal anymore,I live with drugs,teas ,I'm on a diet,I go through many investigations,which are expensive.....

 

-Starting December 2010 ,I sit in front of a computer with a sick spine and I struggle to make some money,but cannot do it !...." All I did so far, I clicked links and others took the money.I am sorry to say this."

 

I am a very religious man,together with my family and I think that God will help me though you and your colleagues.

 

I will pray for you to save me financially,and my life,and my familly......

Hello, my dear I are NISTOR iONEL from Oradea romania.I are married and have four children.atit wife how I come from very poor families, and many brothers in the family! in 1979 we married and God gave us 4 children.we I did not once a house for our children! In 2004, we had sepsis, and septic focal liver and lung, and was on the brink of the neurosurgical spine .intervened, but after neurosurgical intervention, we were three years for the death-like spinal neurosurgeon forgot the knife stuck in my column, and was contaminated with hepatitis type 2 "b" and "c"! in 2004, are bedridden, with no healthcare, and social.! with the passage of time I had other sequelae, such as:-1-cataract left eye, right eye cataracts, retinal detachment left eye , liver treatment with chemotherapy (interferon), severe heart painful, and many other medical diagnoses! I'm 27 in total-are patologiii. eu sunt cobay victim, the Romanian authorities, and the ECHR, Strasbourg, its high level of influence and corruption, which has shown strength in processes occurring in romania and the ECHR, where I gave to life, health, money for justice, and family-to-please step in my life is in danger without money and drugs! if you have a big heart and faith in God, please save me from hell and they are now..

With all the faith in Jesus Christ,

 

"He spent three years with a scalpel blade into the column!"

------------------------------------------------------

Unbelievable! A Oradea spent more than three years with a piece of broken knife, which pierced his spine. Ionel Nistor (52) could die in the effort, without knowing that after a work Þ ii, Cluj doctor has forgotten a piece of medical instrument between the vertebrae.

Boots had become his wife and always complain of back pain, although apparently not had reasons. On a radiograph, Ionel Nistor, Oradea, discovered the cause of his suffering: a scalpel tip Dr. Stephen Florian Ion forgotten during an operation conducted three years before.

With evidence in hand, Nistor went to ask the doctor accountable. "When he saw what I came for, neurosurgeon turned red in the face and told me that it's not only a clear fragment can be removed, and if not satisfied to sue," recalls the man.

Distrustful of medical services in Cluj-Napoca, Oradea was operated Elias Hospital in the capital, where the blade was removed from the column. "I was amazed by its size: about four inches long," May 3770-94279-bisturiu.jpgsays Nistor. Back home, he tried to do right. While professionals from Cluj took him away with Dr. Florian, College in Romania gave him a reprimand.

3770-94280-radiografie.jpg"After extracting fragments was performed immediately, intraoperative fluoroscopy wound to detect any loose debris from the surgical knife, but was not identified any foreign body," says Dr Florian in a notice to the Court Cluj. There, a man suffering from several diseases received handicap verdict. "I want compensation for the three years of torment in which I wore back death" Ionel Nistor's desire.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Unbelievable! A Oradea spent more than three years with a piece of broken knife, which pierced his spine. Ionel Nistor (52) could die in the effort, not knowing that, after the operation, a doctor Cluj has forgotten a portion of medical instruments between the vertebrae. Boots had become his wife and always complain of back pain, although apparently not had reasons. On a radiograph, Ionel Nistor in Oradea

 

"Oradea: For three years he lived with a scalpel by doctors looked column

A man in Oradea lived for three years with a scalpel in his spine doctors looked after surgery. Now the man wants to seek justice in the Hague for the country doctor was found guilty. Now man claim damages of 1 million euros. man, aged 54, was operated in 2004 at a clinic in Cluj because he had an infection in the column, but after surgery and was in great pain, and after three years found out why: a fragment of scalpel looked column, reports Reality TV. Ionel Nistor demanded a compensation of 400,000 euros, but the doctor was found guilty. At the same time the doctor said blade four inches and a half has not stayed in a vital area. "fragment was discovered at a distance from any structure or nervous and vital local inflammatory aspect not present," said Stefan Florin phone, surgeon . Nistor can not work and can barely move, but hopes to find justice. "In my country I was treated like an animal, the last solution is to look for drepatea the International Court of Justice in The Hague," said Ionel Nistor. more"

 

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News - News JUSTICE: Dr. Stephen Florian not have to pay any money for forgotten scalpel cuts into the patient

 

Ionel Nistor, Oradea who sued Neurosurgeons Cluj Stephen Florian because he had forgotten the knife cuts in the muscles of the spine, which had lost its claim for damages for malpractice. Friday, Cluj Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal, holding verdicts before judges and the Court of Cluj.

-Ionel Nistor, Oradea who sued Neurosurgeons Cluj Stephen Florian because he had forgotten the knife cuts in the muscles of the spine, which had lost its claim for damages for malpractice. Friday, Cluj Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal, holding verdicts before judges and the Court of Cluj.

  

Ionel Nistor, Oradea who sued Neurosurgeons Cluj Stephen Florian because he had forgotten the knife cuts in the muscles of the spine, has lost the in seeking compensation for malpractice.

Nistor, now aged 54, came in 2004 in Cluj with agonizing pain in the column. Initially, he was admitted to the Medical Clinic III, the diagnosis of infection in the column. Antibiotic treatment did not work, so he was transferred to the Infectious Diseases Clinic. Because neither here could not stop the spread of infection, the doctor Dumitru Cârstina transferred to neurosurgery, where Dr. Stephen Florian and bag of pus extracted from the column. During surgery, the surgeon's knife broke even while being inserted into the cavity in which perform the operation.

After two months of surgery Oradea has taken a retirement sickness due contracted hepatitis B and C the hospital because of neurological problems. "When I came from Oradea to Cluj hospitals did not have hepatitis. When I returned home, I had both. " The court rejected the possibility that he may have infected with hepatitis during surgery.

After a few months, feeling bad, Nistor has x-rayed. Just discovered metal splinter remaining spinal muscles. Florian would be told later that it is a tiny piece and called to retrieve him. Nistor refused to longer operate in Cluj and went to Elias Hospital in Bucharest, where "chip" was removed. "I took it home as a souvenir," he said.

process where Nistor surgeon accused of malpractice Stephen Florian was held behind closed doors at all three courts (Court, Court, Court of Appeal) as defenders claimed that a public trial would prejudice their client's image, writes Time Cluj.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Oradea Ionel Nistor asks a famous surgeon Cluj 200,000 euros and payment of an annuity, accusing him of malpractice because the doctor forgot a piece of scalpel in the body. The trial began Tuesday in Cluj Tribunal

 

II.

Ionel Nistor, who is representing himself in court, said Tuesday that he was operated on 7 February 2004 and the head of the clinic backbone of Neurosurgery in Cluj-Napoca , Stephen Florian , who left a scalpel blade body, extracted three years after doctors at Bucharest Elias Hospital.

"Because of this problem, I was retired and need to borrow from banks to support my family. Lama could seriously affect my health, being in the column vertebrale.Daca will not win in the courts of Romania, I appeal to the international, "said Nistor.

Lawyers doctor argued in court that the team that operated on Ionel Nistor can not be accused of malpractice because, under the law, doctors are not guilty of patients suffering products because of hidden defects of medical devices.

For now, Ionel Nistor did not say whether it will turn against a knife manufacturing company in question.

Next term trial was set for February 5, 2008.

Broken scalpel surgery

Ionel Nistor was operated in February 2004 at the Clinic for Neurosurgery in Cluj-Napoca, after column vetebrala lumbar area was infected with Staphylococcus "aureus".

During the intervention, scalpel blade, 4 inches long and 0.5 cm wide, broke, actually recorded in the incident report operator. Trying to recover lama, Dr. Claudiu Matei was stung on finger and was rushed to the Infectious Diseases Clinic of Cluj since Oradea was suspect and hepatitis.

At the first hearing of the trial, Nistor accused Stephen Florian that after the incident with the surgeon Matthew has continued to seek fragment broken scalpel. For three years, accused Nistor back pain, and earlier this year made ??an X-ray at a clinic in Oradea, doctors discovered the tip of the spine surgery.

In late March, Ionel Nistor was operated again at Elias Emergency Hospital of Bucharest , doctors extracting the knife.

"Very heavy operation"

Surgeon Stephen Florian, former head of the Department of Public Health (DSP) Cluj , explained that immediately after breaking scalpel blade, made ??a fluoroscopy inside the operation, but because of other instruments medicalefolosite the operation, broken knife was not observed .

"You must understand that the knife is very thin and carbon. I do not think I can be accused of malpractice as a scalpel blade fracture, because this is due to a defect in the instrument. On the other hand, we have acted in good faith in an emergency situation, given the condition of the septic patient. I worked in an incision 20 inches long and 12-15 cm depth in a magma of muscle destroyed much blood and pus. In these circumstances, it is impossible to identify a fragment sent. "Said neurosurgeon Stefan Florian . The doctor said Nistor tried to "fall to the peace", asking for money before trial.

Ruled on the case and the College of Physicians Cluj. He decided not to proceed as requested by Ionel Nistor is not a malpractice case. Ionel Nistor appealed the decision, but Cluj Medical College remained in position.

 

III.

  

A Oradea which took three years a scalpel into the body wants to sue several institutions Hague !

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  

A Oradea 54-year-old wants to sue, The Hague, several institutions of State as saying that the country was not made ??right after he complained that he spent three years looking for doctors scalpel in body, following an operation on the spine, says Mediafax .

Ionel Nistor stuck with the knife in the spinal column, after a surgery done by a doctor who operated Cluj in 2004 for an infection in column Clinic for Neurosurgery in Cluj-Napoca.

 

"The operation was successful, in quotation marks, had two cataracts, retinal detachment, and two hepatitis A, B and C, which took them from surgery. All put him in bed, and he had terrible neck pain . was only after three years with hard, we did an X-ray Clinic Mary in Oradea, and, surprise, I discovered that he had a knife blade in the column, "said the man's wife, Angelica Nistor.

 

"We found that, during surgery, a scalpel blade was broken in several fragments which were scattered among nerve structures and vertebrae, which they removed it, but the doctor Florian Stefan has left a 4 blade , 5 inches inside. three years I spent with her body without knowing. ridge, the doctor said he saw the incident but did not say a word, nor I, as a patient or family, nor his superiors, "the Ionel Nistor completed.

Oradea Elias was admitted to hospital in Bucharest, in 2007, where he underwent surgery again and where the knife was removed from the column on the pieces.

 

"We have made complaints against doctors everywhere Stefan Florian, and Basescu, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Health ... Medical College of Cluj said the doctor was correct in terms of professional conduct, Medical College of Romania to found guilty of negligence in service and gave a simple reprimand, "accused Nistor.

 

The couple have sued the doctor, opening a civil lawsuit where asked damages of 400,000 euros, the process is still ongoing at the Court of Cluj-Napoca.

 

"I filed a complaint for malpractice for negligence, for false statements and injury aggravated form. Was for the blade spine, lumbar and any impact could be dead or paralyzed instantly. But given criminal prosecution, "said Nistor, who appealed this decision, but the Cluj Tribunal rejected by a decision on 4 November 2009.

 

Ionel Nistor coroners say that if not treated properly and no prosecutors or judges or have not heard in order to be able to support their views.

 

Since the Romanian justice gave him prevailed, Nistor is committed to seek justice in international courts.

 

"We have a term of six months to open the ECHR and the International Criminal Court in The Hague - who is to rule on whether the law was applied by the courts or the state - a lawsuit against those who investigated this case: against doctors Forensic against prosecutors, judges, and not least against Dr. Florian, that left me disabled. want to answer for what they did to me, "said Nistor, adding that he would ask a million euro compensation.

 

After surgery the column, Ionel Nistor, now aged 54, can no longer work and lives of a disability pension is less than £ 400. He is forced to wear a special corset because of the problems we have yet to spine.

 

Oh Stefan Florian could not be contacted till the news of passing to express their views.

 

In the lawsuit against doctor Stefan Florian from Cluj-Napoca Court, lawyers doctor argued in court that the team that operated on Ionel Nistor can not be accused of malpractice because, according to law, doctors are not guilty of patients suffering due to product defects hidden medical devices.

 

At the time of October 2009, the doctor was questioned for nearly three hours of court behind closed doors. Doctor lawyer argued this request claiming to be defended his client's reputation.

 

Judicial sources stated then that Florian judges described as a place such as surgery and told the judge that does not explain how a piece knife stuck into the patient.

 

IV.

 

Oradea who spent three years with a scalpel among vertebrae lost the lawsuit against doctor

   

Oradea Ioan Nistor accuses chief of neurosurgery clinic in Cluj Napoca, the surgeon Stephen Florian, malpractice, because he looked through the vertebrae blade of a scalpel during an operation on the spine. The operation took place in 2004, and because the blade was extracted three years after doctors Bucharest.

  

Cluj Napoca Court rejected, however, Oradea action, arguing that the team who operated can not be accused of malpractice because, under the law, doctors are not guilty of patients suffering products because of hidden defects of medical devices.

 

"During the intervention, a scalpel blade was broken into several pieces, which were scattered among nerve structures and vertebrae, which they removed it, but the doctor Stephen Florian has left a blade 4.5 centimeters in . three years I spent with her body without knowing. ridge, the doctor said he saw the incident but did not say a word, nor I, as a patient or family or his superiors, "said Ionel Nistor.

 

Following the operation the column, Ioan Nistor, now aged 54, can not work and live on a disability pension is less than £ 400. He is forced to wear a special corset because of the problems they are still the backbone.

 

Cluj Napoca Court decision can be appealed within 15 days. However, Oradea said in early March, it decided to sue several Romanian state institutions in international courts.

V.

NISTOR IONEL / April 15, 2010

0 0 Rate This

Pray that this message reaches the table Mrs. Chief Justice Magistrates ROMANIA.D Madam President-IONEL are some of Oradea, and want to bring to the attention DV FOLLOWING: CAN You have heard my case shocking medical malpractice Cluj-Napoca, the press or television! I would like to note the following: But first I WILL BE INTREBARE.CIND control, and when disciplinary action will be taken in the Institute of Cluj-Napoca LEGAL? for me . MEDICAL DEPARTMENT OF NEUROSURGERY STEFAN FLORIAN 1 Cluj-Napoca, in 2004 to an intervention on the spine during the surgery, broke a razor scalpel sharp metal fragments MORE HARD TO OR scattered among nerve structures and vertebrates , into my spine lumbar observed CLOSING OPERATION incident, he left a scalpel blade into my spine 4.5 cm long which remained stuck in the column where I spent 3 years without knowing her doctor COLUMN NA breathe a word to anyone DESI struggled to dismiss other fragments BISTURIU.SI TACIMUL BE COMPLETE CASA, I was infected with two hepatitis B, C and remained active. I noticed FLOORING Cluj Court of Appeal on 27.02.2004 and opened criminal proceedings the prosecution of Cluj FILE NR.4736/P/2007. Simultaneously, I OPEN THE FILE 8042/211/2007 civil action. Medical debt that is very corrupt and has great influences in the academic, medical, political, legal, and relatives having magistracy in Cluj, with friend and colleagues IMLCLUJ where he worked DOCTOR accused THESE 2 folder or delayed AND AFTER hushed medical boards ACESTUIA.SA relatives accused issued a report liking EXPERTISE FROM healthcare and forensics without the technical and scientific, and which was therefore to investigate the case by prosecutors CAZ.AM REQUIRED WRITTEN new expertise but not MI-SA PERMIS.PROCURORUL ANY CASE MORNAILA called me hearing evidence and evidence SAI THAT IS FULL scalpel blade removed from my column back after 3 years MEDICIII OF EMERGENCY SP.DE HELLIAS Bucharest, DOCTOR INDICTED have pleaded guilty in the civil trial STEFAN FLORIAN cited as MARTORI.PROCURORII took him guilty, and decided to medical facts, is not classified as a crime in CODE PENAL.COMISIA College in Romania him STEFAN doctor found GUILTY IN NEGIJENTA FLORIAN THE SERVICE, prosecutors! more than that my request to challenge resolutions, and order of the prosecutor in court I was rejected. denied access SO ME TO A FAIR TRIAL impartial and accurate, and access to justice. / infringement by magistrate human rights conventions, and treaties of the Rome Statute, Convention GENEVA.ULTIMA decision appeal which was rejected was issued on 04.11.2009. I did APPLICATION displaced the High Court of Cassation and Justice and he was also RESPINSA.CUMNATUL FLORIAN STEFAN IS DOCTOR INDICTED Court of Appeal judges CLUJ.SOTIA Dinse is a lawyer and member of the Bar CLUJ.ESTE Medical College. FILE IN CIVIL 8042/211/2007, so after 3 years of waiting sick in bed of 6 years, it stayed handicap locomotives This Bill OPERATOR faulty and a lot of pathologies, so in this civil case On 13.04.2010, deliberate and sentence was given the night at midnight, secretly behind closed doors, where I rejected a request for damages, MY LAWYER AND MORALE.DACA appeal this sentence, SAR MAY APPEAL BE JUDGED BY DOCTOR accused person who is brother Cluj Court of Appeal Judge, VALENTIN MITEA HUSBAND OR ATTORNEY BURZO Mrs. Mihaela assists and represents DOCTOR INDICTED STEFAN-FLORIAN, ie DL Judge Viorel BURZO WHAT Court Judge Cluj CALL OR THEIR COLLEAGUES! THEREFORE judge who handled the civil case postponed sentence 3 times, in fact has been sanctioned by the CSM, IN CONNECTION WITH THIS! STEFAN SO THIS DOCTOR FLORIAN to me his life DANGER and made attempts on my life and health MEA had won the case so far, is a hero, it is above the law, the Constitution! Conclusion So MAGISTRATES COURTS, PROSECUTORS AND THE DOCTOR Very influential was right, and did not to blame for the offense of NEGIJENTA IN ANY SERVICE!? More than that is not even taken into account MY LIFE HEALTH CARE is very serious, family and THE 4 COPIII.VA seised DV, before I straighten criminal complaint to the ECHR OR THE HAGUE, against all those who This act wrongly managed JURIDIC.PRIN plight by passing 6 YEARS AND JUSTICE coming to give me a slap! conclusively had to respond individually ABOUT THE CONDUCT OF TRIAL LEGAL DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT FOR HERE NOR-CA There can be no DE EROOARE JUDICIARA.ASA how to answer and physicians CONDUCT, ACT MEDICAL MANAGEMENT OPERATOR defective! Please take action against them in reviewing the 2 question before I start action UNDERSIGNED international courts .. THANK

NISTOR IONEL

VI.

Dr. Stephen Florian not have to pay any money for forgotten scalpel cuts into the patient

 

Ionel Nistor, Oradea who sued Neurosurgeons Cluj Stephen Florian because he had forgotten the knife cuts in the muscles of the spine, which had lost its claim for damages for malpractice. Friday, Cluj Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal, holding verdicts before judges and the Court of Cluj....

Ionel Nistor, Oradea who sued Neurosurgeons Cluj Stephen Florian because he had forgotten the knife cuts in the muscles of the spine, which had lost its claim for damages for malpractice.

 

Nistor, now aged 54, came in 2004 in Cluj with agonizing pain in the column. Initially, he was admitted to the Medical Clinic III, the diagnosis of infection in the column. Antibiotic treatment did not work, so he was transferred to the Infectious Diseases Clinic. Because neither here could not stop the spread of infection, the doctor Dumitru Cârstina transferred to neurosurgery, where Dr. Stephen Florian and bag of pus extracted from the column. During surgery, the surgeon's knife broke even while being inserted into the cavity in which perform the operation.

 

After two months of surgery Oradea has taken a retirement sickness because of hepatitis B and C in hospitals and due to neurological problems. "When I came from Oradea to Cluj hospitals did not have hepatitis. When I returned home, I had them both " . The court rejected the possibility that he may have infected with hepatitis during surgery.

 

After a few months, feeling bad, Nistor has x-rayed. Just discovered metal splinter remaining spinal muscles. Florian would be told later that it is a tiny piece and called to retrieve him. Nistor refused to longer operate in Cluj and went to Elias Hospital in Bucharest, where "chip" was removed. "We took it home as a souvenir," he says.

 

Process accuse the surgeon Stefan Nistor Florian malpractice took place behind closed doors at all three courts (Court, Court, Court of Appeal) as defenders claimed that a public trial would prejudice their client's image, write time of Cluj .

 

CONCLUZION:

Florian neurosurgeon treats patients like cattle

 

Written by Liviu Alexa / January 31, 2013 / 15 comments / 4084 views

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stefan florian

Lorand Minyo , a well-known blogger in Cluj, today tells a disturbing story about one of the most famous neurosurgeons in Transylvania - Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian, director of the Neurosurgery Clinic of Cluj.

 

About rich mouth "obieciurile" These teachers are special corridors stuttering clinic for years. Behold, now only takes a patient public to come forward and protest against such mistreatment.

 

Publish the full text of bloggers hoping Lorand Minyo will not stop here and will notify and College of Physicians:

   

"In what follows I will assume full & unreservedly what I will write. For a myth to be demolished, people will be upset, threats can come. But I recommend with the utmost sincerity:

 

Avoid it by Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian , the famous neurosurgeon, neurosurgery clinic director of Cluj. And I'll explain briefly why.

 

3 months ago universe wrestled with me and won. So I stuck with a beauty discopathy, triple (now) herniated disc, hemangioma in one of the vertebrae and a cracked vertebra + hardly bearable pain. I made ??the necessary treatment and went somewhat. I would not want to go on the surgery for those in neurosurgery Cluj clearly explained to me: "Do not shy away, it takes two concurrent" That whatever meant. And that told me a tinereii there for " Florian gotten it, But do not put them in anything like a good drink tonight "- attention, it said it's residents in the emergency room of the girl with a goalkeeper and another distinguished gentleman expecting the aforementioned accused.

 

After a month of treatment and one month of rest pain returned - so I explored various alternative treatments - such as Bowen therapy - which at least in terms of my therapist seemed to be more of a hocus pocus with biblical insights and faith healing than anything else. Maybe I did not give the therapist the best or even not work - although I have heard of some cases spectacular. I pray.

 

So I decided to ask an opinion endorsed a permanent solution to my problem. Said and done, half made ??my appointment Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian Medical Center Transylvania - the principle of private to put you in it. # Pebaniimei like, not those of the State.

 

Programming was for 19 hour clinic and to my surprise it was full. As nothing moves, I suspect that all are waiting for Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian: 12 people + own. Some had programming including 18 hours.

 

At 7:45 p.m. receptionist shouted a few names and climb upstairs to the office

 

It is 19:50, there neurosurgeon, greets the world, but he goes into cabinet without even a gesture sketch. Nor stripped off his clothes and shouting was between anyone!

 

I'm going I salute you not greet me back, call it names. He looked over my MRI (which was already in the system) and I say yes?

 

I ask him puzzled: what can be done, how it looks, you need surgery, you can get rid of pain? And I can answer hallucinating:

 

Too old, do another and get back. Goodbye (attention, MRI has 3 months utlimii problems occurred in 31 years, so ...)

 

Stupefied, I ask: OK, but what do I do to get rid of pain? Which comes hallucinatory response:

 

Do what you did before.

 

When it came to me to rush to the neck. I mean this man give him £ 200 for a consultation where they mock me? And asked: Okay, so where is the need for surgery, which is the process during convalescence, risks etc? In response comes the cursed right:

 

If so, you'll find out. Next? moment in which I asked him furious and obviously nervous: I can even say what's hemangioma, is dangerous, which is exactly the source of the pain? He looked at me like I would have interrupted something and I say I told you to do it again, until then we have to discuss.

 

Out nervous, come next, I go to reception, the receptionist looked at me and ask me already? So quickly? I tell him yes, I give £ 200 and ask invoice.

 

Please note, all the above were performed in 45 seconds: entrants neurosurgeon Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian office, sat down, questions and answers in only, out of the cabinet. Until we arrived at the reception it took 45s - barely understood I could not move, which is not at all interested in neurosurgeon.

 

During that made ??my bill, two other people down. And they nervous and upset. I got my bill, I went out for a smoke, I called up left and right to get a taxi slowly I saw lights flickering Transylvania Medical Center. So Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian managed to "solve" 12 patients in about 15 minutes. Patients of neurosurgery. Congratulations CMT, you have done a great advertisement.

 

I understand everyone has his bad days, but I will judge you by how you treat me in the worst day ever.

 

Some say that I would have ruined politics, others during its glory days are long over, but I, until I had a personal experience with it I heard only good. But after this experience, left with the thought that Prof. Dr. Stefan Florian is a jerk, cursed, cocky and totally unprofessional. Accordingly, I recommend to avoid this if you have problems Cluj neurosurgeon neurosurgical really important. For Prof. Dr. Florian Stefan will not help.

 

***

 

It's sad how we got to be sick of doctors "with staif". Until recently I thought better to go private as the world take you there and do not beat one game money. It seems like that was the sunset and it so necessary to our bags. "

FAM:

NISTOR IONEL

STR,SUCEVEI,NR.69,AP.5,

CITY,ORADEA

,STATE,BIHOR,

COD,CITY,410087,

COUNTRY,ROMANIA

MY GOD BLESS YOU !

RESPECT FAM,NISTOR

Florence (Italian: Firenze, pronounced [fiˈrɛntse]; Old Italian: Fiorenza, Latin: Florentia) is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany and has a population of 367,569 (1,500,000 metropolitan area).

The city lies on the River Arno and is known for its history and its importance in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance, especially for its art and architecture. A centre of medieval European trade and finance, the city is often considered the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance; in fact, it has been called the Athens of the Middle Ages. It was long under the de facto rule of the Medici family. From 1865 to 1870 the city was also the capital of the Kingdom of Italy.

The historic centre of Florence continues to attract millions of tourists each year and was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1982.

 

Florence was originally established by Julius Caesar in 59 BC as a settlement for his veteran soldiers. It was named Florentia ('the flourishing') and built in the style of an army camp with the main streets, the cardo and the decumanus, intersecting at the present Piazza della Repubblica. Situated at the Via Cassia, the main route between Rome and the north, and within the fertile valley of the Arno, the settlement quickly became an important commercial centre. The Emperor Diocletian is said to have made Florentia the seat of a bishopric around the beginning of the 4th century AD, but this seems impossible in that Diocletion was a notable persecutor of Christians. In the ensuing two centuries, the city experienced turbulent periods of Ostrogothic rule, during which the city was often troubled by warfare between the Ostrogoths and the Byzantines, which may have caused the population to fall to as few as 1,000 people. Peace returned under Lombard rule in the 6th century. Florence was conquered by Charlemagne in 774 and became part of the Duchy of Tuscany, with Lucca as capital. The population began to grow again and commerce prospered. In 854, Florence and Fiesole were united in one county.

Margrave Hugo chose Florence as his residency instead of Lucca at about 1000 AD. This initiated the Golden Age of Florentine art. In 1013, construction began on the Basilica di San Miniato al Monte. The exterior of the baptistry was reworked in Romanesque style between 1059 and 1128. This period also saw the eclipse of Florence's formerly powerful rival Pisa (defeated by Genoa in 1284 and subjugated by Florence in 1406), and the exercise of power by the mercantile elite following an anti-aristocratic movement, led by Giano della Bella, that resulted in a set of laws called the Ordinances of Justice (1293).

Of a population estimated at 80,000 before the Black Death of 1348, about 25,000 are said to have been supported by the city's wool industry: in 1345 Florence was the scene of an attempted strike by wool combers (ciompi), who in 1378 rose up in a brief revolt against oligarchic rule in the Revolt of the Ciompi. After their suppression, Florence came under the sway (1382–1434) of the Albizzi family, bitter rivals of the Medici. Cosimo de' Medici was the first Medici family member to essentially control the city from behind the scenes. Although the city was technically a democracy of sorts, his power came from a vast patronage network along with his alliance to the new immigrants, the gente nuova (new people). The fact that the Medici were bankers to the pope also contributed to their rise. Cosimo was succeeded by his son Piero, who was shortly thereafter succeeded by Cosimo's grandson, Lorenzo in 1469. Lorenzo was a great patron of the arts, commissioning works by Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli. Lorenzo was also an accomplished musician and brought some of the most famous composers and singers of the day to Florence, including Alexander Agricola, Johannes Ghiselin, and Heinrich Isaac. By contemporary Florentines (and since), he was known as "Lorenzo the Magnificent" (Lorenzo il Magnifico).

Following the death of Lorenzo de' Medici in 1492, he was succeeded by his son Piero II. When the French king Charles VIII invaded northern Italy, Piero II chose to resist his army. But when he realized the size of the French army at the gates of Pisa, he had to accept the humiliating conditions of the French king. These made the Florentines rebel and they expelled Piero II. With his exile in 1494, the first period of Medici rule ended with the restoration of a republican government.

During this period, the Dominican monk Girolamo Savonarola had become prior of the San Marco monastery in 1490. He was famed for his penitential sermons, lambasting what he viewed as widespread immorality and attachment to material riches. He blamed the exile of the Medicis as the work of God, punishing them for their decadence. He seized the opportunity to carry through political reforms leading to a more democratic rule. But when Savonarola publicly accused Pope Alexander VI of corruption, he was banned from speaking in public. When he broke this ban, he was excommunicated. The Florentines, tired of his extreme teachings, turned against him and arrested him. He was convicted as a heretic and burned at the stake on the Piazza della Signoria on 23 May 1498.

A second individual of unusual insight was Niccolò Machiavelli, whose prescriptions for Florence's regeneration under strong leadership have often been seen as a legitimization of political expediency and even malpractice. Commissioned by the Medici, Machiavelli also wrote the Florentine Histories, the history of the city. Florentines drove out the Medici for a second time and re-established a republic on May 16, 1527. Restored twice with the support of both Emperor and Pope, the Medici in 1537 became hereditary dukes of Florence, and in 1569 Grand Dukes of Tuscany, ruling for two centuries. In all Tuscany, only the Republic of Lucca (later a Duchy) and the Principality of Piombino were independent from Florence.

The extinction of the Medici dynasty and the accession in 1737 of Francis Stephen, duke of Lorraine and husband of Maria Theresa of Austria, led to Tuscany's temporary inclusion in the territories of the Austrian crown. It became a secundogeniture of the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty, who were deposed for the Bourbon-Parma in 1801 (themselves deposed in 1807), restored at the Congress of Vienna; Tuscany became a province of the United Kingdom of Italy in 1861.

Florence replaced Turin as Italy's capital in 1865, and in an effort to modernise the city, the old market in the Piazza del Mercato Vecchio and many medieval houses were pulled down and replaced by a more formal street plan with newer houses. The Piazza (first renamed Piazza Vittorio Emmanuele II, then Piazza della Repubblica, the present name) was significantly widened and a large triumphal arc was constructed at the west end. This development is largely regarded as a disaster and was only prevented from continuing by the efforts of several British and American people living in the city. A museum recording the destruction stands nearby today. The country's first capital city was superseded by Rome six years later, after the withdrawal of the French troops made its addition to the kingdom possible. A very important role is played in these years by the famous café of Florence Giubbe Rosse from its foundation until the present day. "Non fu giammai così nobil giardino/ come a quel tempo egli è Mercato Vecchio / che l'occhio e il gusto pasce al fiorentino", claimed Antonio Pucci in the 14th century, "Mercato Vecchio nel mondo è alimento./ A ogni altra piazza il prego serra". The area had decayed from its original medieval splendor. After doubling during the 19th century, Florence's population tripled in the 20th with the growth of tourism, trade, financial services and industry.

During World War II the city experienced a year-long German occupation (1943–1944) and was declared an open city. The Allied soldiers who died driving the Germans from Tuscany are buried in cemeteries outside the city (Americans about 9 kilometres (6 mi) south of the city, British and Commonwealth soldiers a few kilometers east of the center on the right bank of the Arno). In 1944, the retreating Germans decided to blow up the bridges along the Arno linking the district of Oltrarno to the rest of the city, thus making it difficult for the British troops to cross. However, at the last moment Hitler ordered that the Ponte Vecchio must not be blown up, as it was too beautiful. Instead an equally historic area of streets directly to the south of the bridge, including part of the Corridoio Vasariano, was destroyed using mines. Since then the bridges have been restored exactly to their original forms using as many of the remaining materials as possible, but the buildings surrounding the Ponte Vecchio have been rebuilt in a style combining the old with modern design. Shortly before leaving Florence, as they knew that they would soon have to retreat the Germans murdered many freedom fighters and political opponents publicly, in streets and squares including Piazza Santo Spirito.

In November 1966, the Arno flooded parts of the center, damaging many art treasures. There was no warning from the authorities who knew the flood was coming, except a phone call to the jewelers on the Ponte Vecchio. Around the city there are tiny placards on the walls noting where the flood waters reached at their highest point.

 

Florence lies in a sort of basin among the Senese Clavey Hills, particularly the hills of Careggi, Fiesole, Settignano, Arcetri, Poggio Imperiale and Bellosguardo. The Arno river and three other minor rivers flow through it.

 

Florence is usually said to have a Mediterranean climate. It has hot, humid summers with little rainfall and cool, damp winters. Due to being surrounded by hills in a river valley, Florence can be hot and humid from June to August. Because of the lack of a prevailing wind, summer temperatures are higher than along the coast. The rain which does fall in summer is convectional. Relief rainfall dominates in the winter, with some snow. The highest officially recorded temperature was 42.6°C in July 26, 1983 and the lowest was -23.2°C on January 12, 1985.

 

Florence is known as the “cradle of Renaissance” (la culla del Rinascimento) for its monuments, churches and buildings. The best-known site and crowning architectural jewel of Florence is the domed cathedral of the city, Santa Maria del Fiore, known as The Duomo. The magnificent dome was built by Filippo Brunelleschi. The nearby Campanile (partly designed by Giotto) and the Baptistery buildings are also highlights. Both the dome itself and the campanile are open to tourists and offer excellent views; The dome, 600 years after its completion, is still the largest dome built in brick and mortar in the world.

In 1982, the historic center of Florence (Italian: centro storico di Firenze) was declared a World Heritage Site by the UNESCO for the importance of its cultural heritages. The center of the city is contained in medieval walls that were built in the 14th century to defend the city after it became famous and important for its economic growth.

At the heart of the city in Piazza della Signoria is Bartolomeo Ammanati's Fountain of Neptune (1563–1565), which is a masterpiece of marble sculpture at the terminus of a still functioning Roman aqueduct.

The Arno River, which cuts through the old part of the city, is as much a character in Florentine history as many of the people who lived there. Historically, the locals have had a love-hate relationship with the Arno — which alternated from nourishing the city with commerce, and destroying it by flood.

One of the bridges in particular stands out as being unique — The Ponte Vecchio (Old Bridge), whose most striking feature is the multitude of shops built upon its edges, held up by stilts. The bridge also carries Vasari's elevated corridor linking the Uffizi to the Medici residence (Palazzo Pitti). Although the original bridge was constructed by the Etruscans, the current bridge was rebuilt in the 14th century It is the only bridge in the city to have survived World War II intact.

The church of San Lorenzo contains the Medici Chapel, the mausoleum of the Medici family – the most powerful family in Florence from the 15th to the 18th century. Nearby is the Uffizi Gallery, one of the finest art museums in the world – founded on a large bequest from the last member of the Medici family.

The Uffizi itself is located at the corner of Piazza della Signoria, a site important for being the centre of Florence civil life and government for centuries (Signoria Palace is still home of the community government): the Loggia dei Lanzi was the set of all the public ceremonies of the republican government. Many well known episodes of history of art and political changes were staged here, such as:

In 1301, Dante was sent into Exile from here (a plaque on one of the walls of the Uffizi commemorates the event).

26 April 1478 Jacopo de'Pazzi and his retainers try to raise the city against the Medici after the plot known as The congiura dei Pazzi (The Pazzi conspiracy) who murdered Giuliano di Piero de' Medici and wounded his brother Lorenzo; the Florentines seized and hanged all the members of the plot that could be apprehended from the windows of the Palace.

In 1497, it was the location of the Bonfire of the Vanities instigated by the Dominican friar and preacher Girolamo Savonarola

On the 23 May 1498 the same Savonarola and two followers were hanged and burnt at the stake (a round plate in the ground commemorates the very spot where he was hanged)

In 1504, Michelangelo's David (now replaced by a reproduction as the original was moved indoors to the Accademia dell'Arte del Disegno), was installed in front of the Palazzo della Signoria (also known as Palazzo Vecchio).

It is still the setting for a number of statues by other sculptors such as Donatello, Giambologna, Ammannati and Cellini, although some have been replaced with copies to preserve the priceless originals.

In addition to the Uffizi, Florence has other world-class museums. The Bargello concentrates on sculpture, containing many priceless works of art created by such sculptors as Donatello, Giambologna, and Michelangelo. The Accademia dell'Arte del Disegno (often simply called the Accademia) collection's highlights are Michelangelo's David and his unfinished Slaves.

Across the Arno is the huge Palazzo Pitti containing part of the Medici family's former private collection. In addition to the Medici collection the palace's galleries contain a large number of Renaissance works, including several by Raphael and Titian as well as a large collection of modern art, costumes, cattiages, and porcelain. Adjoining the Palace are the Boboli Gardens, elaborately landscaped and with many interesting sculptures.

The Santa Croce basilica, originally a Franciscan foundation, contains the monumental tombs of Galileo, Michelangelo, Machiavelli, Dante (actually a cenotaph), and many other notables.

Other important basilicas and churches in Florence include Santa Maria Novella, San Lorenzo, Santo Spirito and the Orsanmichele, and the Tempio Maggiore Great Synagogue of Florence.

Florence has been the setting for numerous works of fiction and movies, including the novels and associated films Hannibal, Tea with Mussolini and A Room with a View.

 

The population of the city proper is 365,744 (2008-11-30), while Eurostat estimates that 696,767 people live in the urban area of Florence. The Metropolitan Area of Florence, Prato, and Pistoia, constituted in 2000 over an area of roughly 4,800 square kilometers, is home to 1.5 million people. Within Florence proper, 46.8% of the population was male in 2007 and 53.2% were female. Minors (children aged 18 and younger) totalled 14.10 percent of the population compared to pensioners, who numbered 25.95 percent. This compares with the Italian average of 18.06 percent (minors) and 19.94 percent (pensioners). The average age of Florence resident is 49 compared to the Italian average of 42. In the five years between 2002 and 2007, the population of Florence grew by 3.22 percent, while Italy as a whole grew by 3.56 percent. The current birth rate of Florence is 7.66 births per 1,000 inhabitants compared to the Italian average of 9.45 births.

As of 2006, 90.45% of the population was Italian. An estimated 60,000 Chinese live in the city. The largest immigrant group came from other European countries (mostly from Albania and Romania): 3.52%, East Asia (mostly Chinese and Filipino): 2.17%, the Americas: 1.41%, and North Africa (mostly Moroccan): 0.9%.

 

Tourism is the most significant industry within the centre of Florence. On any given day between April and October, the local population is greatly outnumbered by tourists from all over the world. The Uffizi and Accademia museums are regularly sold out of tickets, and large groups regularly fill the basilicas of Santa Croce and Santa Maria Novella, both of which charge for entry.

Florence being historically the first home of Italian fashion (the 1951–1953 soirées held by Giovanni Battista Giorgini are generally regarded as the birth of the Italian school as opposed to french haute couture) is also home to the legendary Italian fashion establishment Salvatore Ferragamo, notable as one of the oldest and most famous Italian fashion houses. Many others, most of them now located in Milan, were founded in Florence. Gucci, Prada, Roberto Cavalli, and Chanel have large offices and stores in Florence or its outskirts.

Food and wine have long been an important staple of the economy. Florence is the most important city in Tuscany, one of the great wine-growing regions in the world. The Chianti region is just south of the city, and its Sangiovese grapes figure prominently not only in its Chianti Classico wines but also in many of the more recently developed Supertuscan blends. Within twenty miles (32 km) to the west is the Carmignano area, also home to flavorful sangiovese-based reds. The celebrated Chianti Rufina district, geographically and historically separated from the main Chianti region, is also few miles east of Florence. More recently, the Bolgheri region (about 100 miles/200 kilometres southwest of Florence) has become celebrated for its "Super Tuscan" reds such as Sassicaia and Ornellaia.

 

Florence keeps an exceptional artistic heritage. Cimabue and Giotto, the fathers of Italian painting, lived in Florence as well as Arnolfo and Andrea Pisano, renewers of architecture and sculpture; Brunelleschi, Donatello and Masaccio forefathers of the Renaissance, Ghiberti and the Della Robbias, Filippo Lippi and Angelico; Botticelli, Paolo Uccello and the universal genius of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo.

Their work, together with those of many other generations of artists up to the artists of our century, are gathered in the several museums of the town: the Uffizi, the most selected gallery in the world, the Palatina gallery with the paintings of the "Golden Ages".

The Bargello Tower with the sculptures of the Renaissance, the museum of San Marco with Angelico's works, the Academy, the chapels of the Medicis, Buonarroti' s house with the sculptures of Michelangelo, the following museums: Bardini, Horne, Stibbert, Romano, Corsini, The Gallery of Modern Art, The museum of the Opera del Duomo, the museum of Silverware and the museum of Precious Stones.

Great monuments are the landmarks of Florentine artistic culture: the Baptistry with its mosaics; the Cathedral with its sculptures, the medieval churches with bands of frescoes; public as well as private palaces: Palazzo Vecchio, Palazzo Pitti, Palazzo Medici Riccardi, Palazzo Davanzati; monasteries, cloisters, refectories; the "Certosa". In the archeological museum includes documents of Etruscan civilization. In fact the city is so rich in art that some first time visitors experience the Stendhal syndrome as they encounter its art for the first time.

 

Florentine (fiorentino), spoken by inhabitants of Florence and its environs, is a Tuscan dialect and an immediate parent language to modern Italian. (Many linguists and scholars of Dante, Boccaccio, and Petrarch consider standard Italian to be, in fact, modern Florentine.)

Its vocabulary and pronunciation are largely identical to standard Italian, though the hard c between two vowels (as in ducato) is pronounced as a fricative [h], similar to an English h. This gives Florentines a distinctive and highly recognizable accent (the so-called gorgia toscana). Other traits include using a form of the subjunctive mood last commonly used in medieval times, a frequent usage of the modern subjunctive instead of the present of standard Italian, and a reduced pronunciation of the definite article, [i] instead of "il".

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence

Our disabled daughter, Christina Nichole, was physically and mentally abused by a doctor and police officer at the Gray's Harbor County Hospital in Aberdeen WA last Thursday, March 11, 2010, while she was there after being transported by ambulance to seek care for a 10-day severe headache and nearly continuous epileptic seizures. She just spent a week in Harborview Hospital receiving her 3rd brain study and medicine change by Dr. Wilensky throughout her life so far, which again diagnosed the many types of seizures she has. Dr. Wilensky's staff had advised her to call 911 to go to the ER, which she did. She was instructed to have the ER doctor call them, with a number they gave Christina, and to make arrangements to have her flown to Harborview, if needed. The ER doctor apparently did not like that, and told Christina to leave, without any work-up or care. Christina requested a different doctor and a patient's advocate. In response the non-caring doctor called the police to have her removed from the ER. The policeman told her to get out of the bed, and she tried to cooperate, but went into a seizure, falling back on the bed. The policeman grabbed her arm, pulling her out of the bed. In the process he damaged her shoulder and neck, and caused her to land on her feet which have both been recently operated on 3 times and are still trying to heal correctly. Her feet were hurt and damaged and she screamed in pain from the abusive, sedistic, arm pulling which resulted in trauma to the arm, shoulder, and neck, as well as her feet. Then she felt nauseaous and reached toward to the wall dispenser for a vomit bag and the policeman forcefully hit her other arm with his fist, not allowing her to get the bag. She again screamed from the new pain of her other arm being hit so hard. She kept falling down because she was still very much disoriented, confused, and unstable from her seizure(s) and the relentless headache, which had been diagnosed a few days earlier when she was taken by ambulance to the same ER for the same reasons, by had a caring doctor who treated her correctly, even though failing to follow standard procedures of care and testing by not taking a cat scan, blood work, or UA, which her family doctor, local neurologist, and Harborview Epilepsy Center had requested when advising her to go to the emergency room, four days in a row while my husband and I were in Seattle where I had surgery at Swedish Hospital leaving home on Monday and returning Thursday night. The policeman continued man-handling her limp body and threw her into a wheelchair without leg and foot rests. He told her to pick up her feet because they were dragging under the wheelchair backwards, but she had no body control to be able to follow his orders. He said she could let her feet drag behind her under the wheelchair because he did not care. He called her a baby and told her act her age when she cried and was terrorized. Her records show clearly that she was in a coma in 2004, declared brain dead, somehow came back but lost 20 years of memory and has daily short-term memory loss and multiple kinds of seizures, including life-threatening grandmal seizures. She looks like a 37 year old woman, but is very much like a 12 year old child when put in stressful situations. She was terrified, feared for her life, and could not understand anything clearly. The officer told her to leave the hospital, go out into the cold, rainy night, with no transportation. She asked to call her parents but could not understand how to operate the pay phone or remember our cell phone numbers. The policeman told her that no one wanted to talk to her so she was on her own and if she did not leave the hospital he was going to arrest her. She somehow left a message on our home phone. As soon as my husband heard the message he called the hospital and told them to keep her there and safe until he could drive the 25 miles to get there. During the wait the policeman intimidated Christina by standing behind her, jingling coins and keys, and threatening her to leave immediately or be arrested. When my husband arrived the policeman attempted to intimidate him by puffing himself up and threatening to arrest them both if they did not leave immediately. My husband took out his notebook and began collecting names and titles. He spoke with the head nurse. When finished he took Christina to our car and brought her home. She was emotionally damaged as much as she was physically damaged, and the brain swelling, headache, and seizures were not treated. The next morning deep bruise marks were showing on both arms and both feet. Her shoulder and neck were in tremendous pain. Her entire body hurt from the abuse, mishandling, torture, and trauma she had experienced. My husband drove her to Olympia WA, to the Capital Mall Hospital emergency room where she received kind and caring evaluation of all her injuries. The staff consulted with the doctor at Harborview Epilepsy Center and they determined an appropriate course of treatment. It was determined that she did not have to be airlifted to Harborview with this treatment plan being provided in this ER. X-rays and a Cat Scan were taken of her brain, arms, and feet. A suspicious spot was found on the Cat Scan that may explain why she was having so many seizures, headache, and brain swelling. It needs to be further evaluated, which she has an appointment with her Neurologist to do. The injuries inflicted by the policeman are severe, but no bones were broken. The bruising is massive and was documented with photographs and medical records by us and the Olympia ER staff. On Saturday my husband took Christina to the local Westport Fire Station to meet with the ambulance crew. Christina is well-known in Westport and everyone on the ambulance crews knows her medical history and has taken care of her dozens of times since we moved here after her coma. They call her their 'miracle girl' and always tell her how much they enjoy her and her always cooperative and happy nature, regardless of how much pain or distress she may be in at any time. The ambulance crew was devastated to learn that Christina was abused by the doctor, nurses, aids, and policeman at the emergency room they took her to on Thursday evening. They documented everything and reported the situation to the local city police department. The Westport police came and was equally upset. He took statements and then called a County Sheriff to the fire station. The Sheriff also took statements and made a report. On Monday (today), 3/15/2010, Christina was seen and evaluated by her family physician, Dr. Jackson, her foot surgeon, Dr. Tronvig, and her Chiropractor, Dr. Failor. They are all shocked and disgusted at what they saw. They all know Christina to be a sweet, trusting, loving child who has survived unimaginable odds and is always happy and thankful. Like us, they cannot fathom how this horrible abuse, neglect, and trauma could have happened to her. Why would anyone want to hurt her this way? Tomorrow she has an appointment to see Dr. Miller, her local Neurologist in Aberdeen. He will do his evaluation of the damages and follow-up on her seizure and headache conditions. He will determine if she needs to begin phychological counseling, either as an out-patient or as an in-patient, because Christina is so severely traumatized now. Coming out of the coma knowing that her doctors fought with us to try to get us to sign papers to allow them to euthanize her and harvest anything viable when she was in her locked-in coma, hearing everything but unable to respond was bad enough, but this added to that is simply too much. She has an appointment to see Dr. Wilensky at Harborview Epileptic Center on March 26, 2010 for further evaluation. I want to stress that Christina was following her doctor's orders to call the ambulance each time she went to the ER while my husband and I were away. Her doctors called her each day, several times a day, to ask how she was doing and to supervise her care while she was home alone. At no time was she seeking 'drugs', as the ER doctor flattly told her and labeled her. At no time did she resist the officer or do anything to warrent him putting his hands on her or drag her feet under the wheelchair. Dr. Wilensky called a prescription of pain pills into the pharmacy for her on Friday to take for her head pain, but she declined to pick up the prescription because she does not like to take pain pills as they make her very sick to her stomach and alter her thinking and feelings. She may take what is prescribed to her at an ER for pain while she is there, but does not want to take it at home. Her foot doctor says that her feet will heal, but her foot surgery recovery has been set back by at least another two weeks due to the damages the officer caused her. The bruises will eventually heal and the pain from them will fade away with time. Her shoulder and neck injuries will heal with the care of the Chiropractor. But Christina's trust in the emergency room at Aberdeen and the police there has been shattered and can never be repaired. The Westport ambulance crew said that they will take her to Willapa Hospital ER from now on, which is about twice the distance, but they no longer trust the Gray's Harbor Hospital ER to take appropriate care of Christina again. When my husband or I take her to an ER, we will make the long drive to Olympia and never let her out of our sight for even a minute. We retained an attorney today to handle this case against the Gray's Harbor Hospital and staff and the Aberdeen Police Dept. and officer. What amazing timing. We are scheduled to give our first depositions this week in Seattle in our lawsuit against Eli Lilly who makes Zyprexa, which put Christina into her coma in 2004. Attached are some photos of Christina's bruises taken on Saturday. If you haven't read the story of her coma yet, you can find it at: pekingeseshihtzu.wordpress.com/christina-nichole%e2%80%99...

 

Medical Malpractice Attorney Hawaii - Jan Weinberg

www.janweinberg.com/medical-malpractice/

 

Established in 1922, the Belchertown State School for the Feeble Minded was opened as an institution for the mentally "defective".

 

"Residents of Belchertown State School (occasionally referred to in the press as “inmates”) were crowded into wards; privacy was totally lacking".

 

"In many buildings, the air was characteristically foul with the smell of urine, feces and body odors".

 

“Many [residents], especially those who are less capable and tend to be incontinent, are given inadequate showers in large groups or are showered quickly one after another with one attendant undressing residents, another attendant or a more capable resident in the shower giving them a summary washing and usually a more proficient resident giving them an equally insuffient drying. Multiply-handicapped residents are placed on a porcelain slab and sprayed with a garden hose”.

 

“Parts of the living quarters at Belchertown are in violation of the State Sanitary Code. Because of lack of screens, flies have infested several buildings to the extent that fly larvae (maggots) have been found nested in a sore of a resident's ear”.

 

“Cockroaches have been chronic, ever present and in the recent past, have overrun several buildings to the extent of crawling over immobile patients.”

 

“Cacophony was everywhere. In such brutal environments, made worse by overcrowding, grunts, groans, crying, shrieking, screaming, and constantly operating television sets combined to produce noise that reached harmful decibel levels. Was it any wonder that more than seventy percent of the residents had hearing disabilities?"

 

“Due to lack of screening, residents have fallen 15-20 feet over second story railings to the ground”.

 

“As to food, until recently, the entire meal was served to many residents mixed in a single metal bowl".

 

“None of the physicians on the staff, save one, were licensed to practice medicine except in the Massachusetts state mental hospitals and Massachusetts state schools. To underscore the seriousness of this matter, practicing lawyers emphasized that for any unlicensed physician to dispense even an aspirin just outside an entrance to an institution operated by the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health could invite a malpractice lawsuit".

 

- All quotes from "Crimes Against Humanity: A Historical Perspective" by Benjamin Ricci (2004), the man behind the class action lawsuit that finally closed the Belchertown State School in 1992.

Schirrous cord is an infection in the distal part of the cord that attaches the testicle to the abdominal cavity, which is left behind. This can result in the formation of a closed abscess.

 

Schirrous cord is the second most common complication seen when castrating horses, the first being excessive hemorrhage.

 

Although castration is the most common Equine Field surgery it is also the number one reason for malpractice suits in the Equine industry.

 

Read on at vetmoves.com/equine/schirrous-cord-complication-of-a-rout...

Classic Law Firm Business Card design template by La Prawatyotin.Showcased on Inkd.com.

 

This business card is ideal for a dedicated, trusted lawyer. The use of imagery and translucent boxes help to give the business card a serious image.

From the Solidarity with Ferguson rally in Madison, Wisconsin. 09/07/2014

 

Dorothy Krause is a progressive-minded Supervisor at Dane County Board of Supervisors and Common Council Alder at City of Fitchburg.

 

Here is a link to the petition:

www.change.org/p/joe-parisi-we-want-solidarity-with-fergu...

 

Here are the demands:

1. Diversity training - All common council members and All law enforcement departments within Dane county must participate in an ongoing, diversity training program approved by a diverse group of council members, officers and civilian experts on issues of diversity and policing such as Gloria Ladson-Billings, Seema Kapani and David Couper.

•All law enforcement departments within Dane county must commission an annual poll to determine the success and needs for diversity training.

•The poll must be commissioned through an independent non-law enforcement institution approved by civilian experts on issues of diversity and policing. Examples of such civilians would be Gloria Ladson-Billings, Seema Kapani and David Couper.

 

2. Sensitivity training - All common council and all law enforcement departments within Dane county must participate in an ongoing sensitivity training program approved by a diverse group of officers and civilian experts on issues of diversity and policing. Examples of such civilians would be Gloria Ladson-Billings, Seema Kapani and David Couper.

•All law enforcement departments within Dane county must commission an annual poll to determine the success and needs for sensitivity training.

•The poll must be commissioned through an independent non-law enforcement institution approved by civilian experts on issues of diversity and policing. Examples of such civilians would be Gloria Ladson-Billings, Seema Kapani and David Couper.

•All law enforcement departments within Dane county must meet with Community Solutions Teams in each district to determine a plan for developing greater and more honest communication between themselves and their respective communities, particularly the communities of color.

 

3. Racially diverse employees who live in the city they police -All law enforcement departments within Dane county must strive to employ people whose race reflect that of the community they police most often and hire employees who are live or are willing to live in the city they police.

 

4. Independent CRIMINAL and INTERNAL investigations -for all injuries inflicted by law enforcement officers within Dane County to be performed by an agency that does not employ anyone from the department of the officer involved. It has become clear that police cannot be “objective” in their pursuit of “reasonableness.” Bias lays waste to justice. Let's prevent it as best we can.

•The race of the investigative leads must equally represent the race of those involved in the incident.

•The names of the investigative leads must be revealed to the public within 48 hours of the incident.

•Photographs of the civilians that are released to the media must be offered and approved by the civilian's next of kin.

•Civilians must have the right to redact information from police records before they are made public.

•If a department breaks this law and investigates itself as we are seeing in Milwaukee with the Dontre Hamilton investigation, the chief of police must be reprimanded with 6 months minimum jail time for misuse of confidential information and tampering with evidence.

 

5. Front facing cameras for all law enforcement officers - an investment in having the advantage of complete video footage of officer-involved incidents would save lives and money and it would restore some trust in the police.

•Everyone would think twice about behaving inappropriately, trust in that transparency would be inevitable and money in that far fewer days and hours would be spent piecing together multiple takes of a single incident. Cameras must not be turned off at the officer's discretion. To do so is tampering with and attempting to conceal evidence.

•The footage must not be altered in any way.

•Civilian and officer witnesses must be permitted to view the exact same footage, no more or less than one another, in the company of their attorneys, before giving their statements to anyone.

•Civilians must be allowed to redact elements of footage that if released to the public would cause further trauma or damage to their lives.

 

6. The District Attorney must not review or make the determination in criminal investigations. In the history of Wisconsin policing, there has been only 1 case when a D.A. charged an officer involved in a fatality. The D.A., who cannot win re-election if s/he loses the law enforcement vote and who depends on good rapport with officers to try and win cases, must no longer make the final determination in the criminal investigations of officers involved in potentially criminal activity - nor should they prosecute. To date, there is no greater conflict of interest built into the infrastructure of law enforcement.

•A diverse grand jury must make the determination for criminal investigations of officer-involved excessive force and fatal incidents.

•A special prosecutor must prosecute in these cases and be appointed by the grand jury or an ombudsman

 

7. The chief or sheriff must not review or make the determination in officer-involved injury or death investigation.

•In the past 129 years, not a single Wisconsin police chief, sheriff or police and fire commission has found an officer in the wrong for excessive force or taking a life. This proves that chiefs and sheriffs will not or feel that cannot find one of their own officers guilty of excessive force.

•All officer-involved injury and death investigations must be reviewed and determined by a diverse grand jury

8. If an officer is found to have used excessive force, they must be fired.

9. All law enforcement departments within Dane county must terminate every officer named in settled lawsuits - This seems like common sense, but the fact is that officers that cost millions in lawsuits are routinely allowed to keep their jobs. If a jurisdiction chooses to settle a lawsuit against an officer for excessive force, civil rights violations, or other abuses of power, the department must terminate the officer and the officer will be placed on the National Police Offender Registry.

 

10. Firing vs Resigning - As with the military, officers who are charged internally with policy violations that would have them fired should have to go before their commission and be fired. A firing and a resignation look different on a job or gun owner application, as they should. The former West Allis officer who went on to be a security guard before he killed two woman and put them in suitcases is one example of why officers must be held fully accountable, on paper, for their actions.

 

11. Early Warning System: There is no worse time and place for a chief or sheriff to find that they have a bigot or loose canon in their department than at the scene of an officer-involved injury or death. The development of early warning systems for all law enforcement departments within Dane county that tracks all complaints made against police officers and flags destructive patterns is needed. These systems should be reviewed by the police and fire commission.

 

12. MDC Screening: As we learned from Rodney King's beating and the 2012 forced resignation of former Madison Police Officer Heimsness, it is essential for all police communication systems for all law enforcement departments within Dane county to be screened.

 

13. Screening for drugs and mental fitness: All law enforcement departments within Dane county must conduct random drug and mental fitness screening. The program used for screening for and supporting mental fitness must be developed by an impartial institution. For example: "Force Science" is is not an impartial institution. The UW Center For Investigating Healthy Minds is.

 

14. STATS: All law enforcement departments within Dane countymust report to the FBI's UCR (uniform crime reporting) program for more accurate data. Additionally, they must release all statistics involving their employees and complaints made against them for all injuries afflicted on civilians to a database housed by an independent location that is easily accessible to the public.

15. National Police Offender Registry: All law enforcement officers within Dane county that violate the public’s trust should not be treated differently than sex offenders. "If an officer is found to have used excessive force, violated a citizen’s civil rights, or abused the power of their office, they should be added to the registry and be barred from holding a law enforcement related position for life. " - Justin King

16. No death penalty by WI Police: Fatal shooting is too often employed in circumstances when public safety could have been secured with far less drastic measures. All law enforcement departments within Dane county must commit to researching and developing non-deadly and non-injurious methods for stopping a threat, to codifying the precedence of these methods in procedural policy, and to employing them in practice.

 

17. Shifts for law enforcement employees with the sole purpose of decompressing and restoration: Traumatic events occur in the everyday lives of officers. It would benefit everyone if the resulting trauma were taken seriously. When an officer commits a crime, we often hear from his/her co-workers that "we saw no signs." All law enforcement departments within Dane county must be required to go before psychologists on a regular basis in order that those signs be detected. Additionally, officers should have shifts that include scientifically-supported decompression and restoration techniques. UW Center for Investigating Healthy Minds would be a good resource for compiling these techniques.

 

18. Rate Leadership: All law officers with in Dane county must be polled anonymously by an independent and impartial group to gauge whether their needs are being met by their leadership and whether or not they feel comfortable upholding justice at the expense of their department's reputation.

 

19. Dash cameras must not be turned off at the officer's discretion.

 

20. Two-way radios should stay on throughout officer interactions with civilians for backup evidence.

 

21. Ask for help when needed: Develop an interface through which the police can solicit community assistance and collaboration, ideas and programs that foster better communication, transparency and relations with the community.

 

22. Stop accepting and maintaining military equipment. Dane County, there is no war but the one you are waging with yourselves!

 

23. Re-examination of Graham Vs Connor and the Objective Reasonableness Standard: In the past 129 years, not a single police chief or sheriff has found an officer in the wrong for taking a life. That means in 129 years, WI officers have never made a mistake when taking a life. Impossible. This statistic represents a systemic failure of oversight and malpractice on the part of those supposedly keeping watch. How does this happen?

 

The Objective Reasonableness Standard is used as a guide for deadly force policy by a chief or sheriff to determine whether or not the amount of force used against a civilian was reasonable. Chiefs and sheriffs look to past cases to determine what a "reasonable officer" would have done and so the criteria for such a decision can essentially be determined after the fact.

 

The highly flexible ways in which the Standard has been interpreted have only served the interests of the police force and, in fact, no officer has been found to have taken a “wrong" action in any of these investigations by a chief, sheriff or commission. This irresponsible looseness is legally, systemically supported at every level of law enforcement, from the statutes to the rulings of District Attorneys. This fact serves virtually to eliminate accountability in policing and, placing little value on the lives of civilians.

 

Though serving our community poorly, the looseness of this Standard serves well the elected officials who make determinations on controversial Officer-involved injuries and fatalities etc. in that sheriffs and D.A.s can stay elected and appointed chiefs are allowed to keep their records of “perfection” intact.

The general public has no idea how little value this standard places on all of our lives. Currently, if an officer has a civilian within reach of their weapon, s/he can at any time claim the civilian went for his/her gun, that s/he feared for his/her life, and that s/he therefore shot to kill.

•Because all of this is true, Dane County and its cities must commission a poll through an independent institution approved by impartial civilian experts on deadly force such as Michael Scott at the center of Problem Oriented Policing and former Madison Chief of Police, David Couper. The purpose of this poll would be to determine how comfortable Dane County civilians are with both current and historical applications of the Objective Reasonableness Standard, use of force policies and Wisconsin's 129 year record of perfect policing in all officer-involved fatalities.

•The Objective Reasonableness Standard allows officers to be conveniently selective as to what information coming from the suspect or witnesses can be interpreted as "fact". This flexibility allows officers to get away with intentional recklessness and negligence as we saw in the in the 1989 case of Graham vs Connor, the 2012 shooting death of unarmed Madison resident Paul Heenan, the 2004 shooting death of handcuffed Kenosha resident, Michael Bell and the 2012 suffocation death of Milwaukee resident, Derek Williams.

•The Objective Reasonableness Standard must be re-examined and changed to better protect civilians and to place value where it belongs: on human life.

•The exoneration of an officer must be supported by proof of prior and current mental fitness and drug screening of that police officer.

 

Without an agreed upon definition of justice, there can be no peace. These changes represent a justice that protects all human life no matter what color we are or badge we wear. I ask that you to take this stand and act as if the lives of all who live in Dane County are invaluable and irreplaceable.

COPYRIGHT IS CREATIVE COMMONS ATTRIBUTION SHARE-ALIKE WHICH MEANS YOU MUST ATTRIBUTE MICHAEL VADON IN AN OBVIOUS MANNER TO REUSE

 

Governor of Florida Jeb Bush at TurboCam, Barrington, New Hampshire on August 7th by Michael Vadon Part 1 of 4

  

CONCORD, N.H. —Less than a day after the first debate of the GOP primary, former Florida governor Jeb Bush is back in New Hampshire campaigning.

 

Less than a day after the first debate of the GOP primary, former Florida governor Jeb Bush is back in New Hampshire campaigning.

 

At a town hall Friday night in Barrington, Bush spoke about how he won't campaign with anger and instead spoke a lot about policy.

 

He started his day at Brown's Lobster Pound in Seabrook. After greeting voters -- trying a lobster roll -- Bush told reporters he plans to campaign hard on and off the debate stage between now and the primaries.

 

"I think I did fine (in the debate). I am who I am," Bush said.

 

He's declining to criticize his Republican rivals, including Donald Trump, who refused to pledge support to the party's eventual nominee. Instead, Bush says he's focused on sharing his record as governor with voters and letting people get to know who he is.

 

"So you take advantage of opportunities when you have them, speak from your heart," Bush said. "I don't view this debating as question of winning or losing. It's the cumulative effect of shaping peoples opinion of who you are over the long haul."

 

Bush said Democrats' attacks against him show he is the candidate they fear most.

 

"Let me think why they would be. Because maybe it's because they consider me the biggest threat," Bush said.

 

Jeb Bush – Town Hall Barrington

 

August 7 @ 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

 

Jeb Bush Town Hall in Barrington

 

Friday August 7th, 6:00 PM

 

Turbocam, 863 Franklin Pierce Highway

 

Barrington, NH

 

John Ellis "Jeb" Bush (born February 11, 1953) is an American businessman and politician who served as the 43rd Governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007.

 

Bush is the second son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush, and the younger brother of former President George W. Bush, grandson of the late Prescott Sheldon Bush, American Banker and United States Senator from Connecticut. He grew up in Houston, Texas. He graduated from the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts and attended the University of Texas, where he earned a degree in Latin American affairs. Following his father's successful run for Vice President in 1980, he moved to Florida and pursued a career in real estate development. In 1986, Bush was named Florida's Secretary of Commerce, a position he held until his resignation in 1988 to help his father's successful campaign for the Presidency.

 

In 1994, Bush made his first run for office, narrowly losing the election for governor by less than two percentage points to the incumbent Lawton Chiles. Bush ran again in 1998 and defeated Lieutenant Governor Buddy MacKay with 55 percent of the vote. He ran for reelection in 2002 and won with 56 percent to become Florida's first two-term Republican governor. During his eight years as governor, Bush was credited with initiating environmental improvements, such as conservation in the Everglades, supporting caps for medical malpractice litigation, moving Medicaid recipients to private systems, and instituting reforms to the state education system, including the issuance of vouchers and promoting school choice.

 

Bush is a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2016 presidential election.