Ma Thanegi News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

>> chances are, you haven't been to this place. chances are, this is a place you've never seen. other than maybe blurry cellphone videos, old black-and-white newsreels from world war ii. chances are, bad things were happening in the footage you saw. myanmar. after 50 years of nightmare, something unexpected is happening here, and it's pretty incredible. ♪ ♪ in yangon, capital city of myanmar, it's dark. blackouts are frequent with the ancient power grid. what sources of light there are in the street cast an eerie, yellow-orange hue. for almost 100 years under british rule, this w...

In 2007, a japanese journalist was shot point-blank and killed filming a street demonstration. be seen talking to anybody with a camera, and there would likely be a knock on your door in the middle of the night. yet so far confronted with our cameras, a few smiles, and mostly indifference at worst. shocking, considering how recently the government has started to relax its grip. >> we love to eat. and don't forget, for 50 years, we were under two dictatorships, and officially under socialist, there were not a lot of things to do but, you know, cook and share food and, you know. >> this is ma th...

Whew. >> anthony: a millennia ago, in a period of just under 250 years, over 4,000 structures like this were built here. they say that a king began this project after a conversion to theravada-style buddhism. they started a new temple, like, every 14 days. over 3,000 pagodas, temples, and monasteries remain today. inside almost every one of them, a buddha figure, each one different. >> philippe: and i like how integrated it is with those trees, ox trails, and -- >> anthony: actually, funny you should mention that.

Inside almost every one of them, a buddha figure, each one different. >> philippe: and i like how integrated it is with those trees, ox trails, and -- >> anthony: actually, funny you should mention that. people used to live here, but the government came along in the '80s, i believe, and relocated. it was a mass relocation project. >> philippe: right. >> anthony: so any homes, anything, it was understood that this is a good -- you know, there's some tourist bucks here. they relocated the entire population. we're in one of the first mass waves of tourists. european tourists have been coming here...

Dictatorship, there were not a lot of things to do. get shampoo and eat. >> this is ma thanegi, a famous and very controversial figure in public life. >> myanmar or burma? >> myanmar, because that's the original name since the 13th century. >> ma thanegi, like u thiha saw, has also spent time in prison. emerging after three years, they became to the minds of many an apologist to the regime. fairly or not -- to others. >> you know, it's only after the military went away, you know, that things happen, especially with the state like -- >> but her many well-known books on the culinary traditions o...