The road to Mandalay

I was in Hong Kong recently and chanced upon the Orient Express Magazine which included an interesting article on “Cruise the Road to Mandalay”. I had been to Myanmar but had gone around by road without knowing that there was such a river cruise. Very few know about this journey through the Ayeyarwady River unless of course you had more than a passing acquaintance with Myanmar. Among them, as some guidebooks have pointed out, are British royals who know the best of what was then Burma during colonial days. The Orient Express has brought the idea of a luxury cruise along the Rhine to an Oriental situ. The Road to Mandalay refers both to cruise and the boat. In my mind it evokes the prose of Rudyard Kipling who spent many days there, just writing and feeling the magical quality of the land from the vantage point of a calm boat ride along one of the greatest rivers in the world. I saw the river from a viewing tower on land so it was not the same experience when aboard a boat and watching the panorama of its history through old sights on the river banks and peasant life unchanged through hundreds of years.

Unfortunately, this cruise can only be made every August/September when the Road to Mandalay sails through the dramatic gorges of Ayeyarwady to Bhamo, near the Chinese border. The article says “the post monsoon season is the only time that the ship can make this journey but it is an experience worth having to enter a world of pristine scenery and quiet village life.”

Mandalay was the last capital of the Burmese kings before the British claimed it their possession in 1886. My experience of it was being in a place of awesome silence faced with an entire landscape dotted with shimmering pagodas. I asked my guide who was an aspiring monk what compelled Myanmar people to build so many of them. He said a pagoda was like a car in modern times. When you have become successful you buy a car to show you can afford it. In ancient days, building a pagoda was a kind of thanksgiving and homage to Buddha for good fortune so anyone who can afford it and had the land to build it on did so. That is why there are all kinds of pagodas, some stupendous like the Shwedagon that can be seen from any point in the city of Yangon. When I first saw it from a window of the Japanese run Nikko Hotel its light reminded of the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

But pagodas are not just about splendor or success and wealth, there are other humbler structures along the wayside built privately by devout Buddhist families. That is why there are literally thousands of pagodas all over the country. Since the pagodas are painted gold it radiates a beauty unseen at any other time of the day than at sunset when the ebbing light casts a glint at their arching domes that can be seen for miles. My Myanmar friends coaxed me to go because there is nothing more awesome than this sight anywhere in Asia. I did and never regretted it.

It proves yet again that there are many realities about a place and the reality I have chosen is the beauty of the place and its people. This is not to deny that the country is in political turmoil but as many of them have told me it is a mistake to think only of them in the light of politics, oftentimes not even theirs. Life goes on and it would be wrong not to reach out to this many who depend on tourism for their livelihoods.

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I am yielding some space to my husband, former Ambassador Alberto A. Pedrosa for his novel approach to the NBN Senate hearings. His views coincide with others who think there must be a step forward to this broadband mess other than just finger pointing. For one, there are many who want to understand the project itself. Would it be possible to salvage it while removing it disputed aspects?

“It is unfortunate that the Senate hearings on NBN seem directed at exposing “corruption” when it can be a venue for a technical, non-partisan analysis of the different proposals put forward.

“Dean E. De Dios was asked by Chairman Cayetano what an internal rate of return (IRR) is. A straight-forward response and an illustration would have been welcome as IRR analysis would show cash flow streams from the project over its life, discounted by the hurdle rate of 15%. A loan package would give cash inflow (income and savings if any) while debt service, operation and maintenance expenses etc would be among outflows. The government will be the recipient of income streams.

“Under a BOT (and its variants) proposal, there would be no capital investment by the Government but the income streams would probably be lower because the proponent would have to pay for the investment plus whatever royalty or fee is agreed on.

“Net cash flows, after discounting, plus residual value at project term can then be compared and an IRR struck (software can easily do this). Now, it is said that Government is lousy at implementing projects. So the projected gross income streams can be discounted by a probability scale of zero (if it is thought that such income or savings would be null) or whatever probability is “agreed” on. (One has to be extra careful in assigning probability to be associated with any income stream).

“Benefits to society, connection of rural barangays etc. can be factored in, after evaluation of comparative IRRs. Cost-benefit analysis, welfare economics are difficult subjects but the World Bank and/or ADB probably have software programs to carry this out. They may also have benchmark figures on equipment comparable to ZTE’s offer.

“I don’t want to sound callous but “commissions” etc are not an added cost because they will probably come from the profits of the proponent. Of course, such fees can be deducted from project cost.

“Let us (the public) have more technical analysis. To use Milton Friedman’s terminology, more positive economics rather than normative ones, please.”

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