"Burma's Slowly Shifting Landscape" - Photo Essays- TIME

Gorgeous stuff, nice to see there appears to have been some recovery from the disasters of a few years ago.

Thanks Lisa. Surprisingly, there’s almost no trace of destructions from the cyclone, which is good.

Good work there. I had spent a year and a half as a technical writer for bp solar where 75% of the production workforce was Burmese. I can say after spending a lot of time photographing them, and recording their operations for bp, I can tell you that they are definitely a very rich group of people to be around.

great, bang
J

Hi Kemal, did you actually go to the Irrawady delta region? Those pictures all seem to be shot in Rangoon, and Kachin/Arakan in the north. It’s hard to imagine there would be no trace of destruction down in the south, where the cyclone hit.

I also don’t quite understand the title. Rather than being about Burma’s issues with foreign investors, it appears to mostly be a collection of photographs of monks and street scenes. If you narrowed it down to a much tighter set of images, focusing on the gold panning, damming projects and other foreign investment-related projects, it could actually say something about the problems there. As it is, it just looks like a daily life story.

Hi Will, no i didn’t go to the Irrawady delta region. I was only speaking about what i saw in Rangoon which was also affected by the cyclone.

As for the title, Time magazine gave that title. I guess that’s because the original assignment was about foreign investment in Burma. The editing was also done by Time. We of course were not granted any permit to visit any foreign investment-related projects. We found the gold panning accidentally while looking for the damming project area and could only stay very quickly to avoid any suspicion. As for the damming project itself, the actual construction of the dam has not yet started. So the pic you saw online was from the site where they housed the Chinese workers from China working for the dam project. It was a restricted area and we only managed to get inside pretending to be a lost tourist asking for directions. After just a few clicks we were kicked out by the head worker. The same goes for the oil exploration site by Indian Petroleum giant Essar in the remote western Arakan province. The pics you saw online was shot from a nearby village which was the closest we could get to the actual restricted site.

With all the limitations (access, time, equipment, etc.) , i tried to illustrate the story the best i can by showing the daily life and poor condition of the people living nearby those foreign investment projects. Some of the street scenes were also photographed to show the Burma Road which was built in WW II, once connecting China to India and now being revitalized with Chinese aid. Although the monk pics are not directly related to the foreign investment issues, it is an important aspect to complement the story. Some of the monks i photographed are from a monastery in Sittwe where a procession in defense of an imprisoned activist in 2007 took place which sparked riots and protests. The street scenes and temples’ shots in Rangoon were indeed to illustrate daily life in the area where some of the worst crackdowns on monks and protesters by Burma’s military regime took place. So, although it’s far from perfect but it’s more than just a collection of random photographs of monks and street scenes.

Anyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Thanks also to Aaron and Jefri…:)

So, this was the secretive mission :)
Good stuff!

Nice work ….; )

Um, ok. But don’t you think it’s slightly irresponsible as a journalist to say “Surprisingly, there’s almost no trace of destructions from the cyclone” if you didn’t actually go to the primary area where the cyclone hit?

Kemal, some of us were there during all the events you mentioned, (Cyclone, uprising, crackdown etc…) “With all the limitations (access, time, equipment, etc.)” and some of us also went back to those places to see the aftermath later on, where it happened.

(BTW, did you happen to notice the lack of trees in Yangon? did you go to the pier?)

Check out Will’s work from Burma on his profile. Since when is the editor’s choice an excuse for anything? did the editor chose what photos to capture and what caption to add to it?

I understand the urge to make a statement in a place like Burma, but you were sent to Burma on a specific story about Foreign investors and the natural resources. Trying to add captions to make up for 2 more subjects (the cyclone and the crackdown) when you don’t have the photos to support it, is at best, irresponsible.

Burmese villagers in the delta are still suffering from cyclone Nargis and the irresponsible reaction of the Junta that followed it. some of the islands in the south are still under water and some villages haven’t even began reconstruction, many others lost so many friends and family members that they can’t physically rebuild their homes and are left stranded in towns where they took refuge with no means to go back and restart their lives. The “rice bowl” of the nation is damaged for years to come, impacting the whole nation.

Anyway, thanks for sharing your work.

Hi Kemal. well you seem to be taking alot of heat for something you had no control over. After having worked there during the uprising I fully understand the restrictions you were working under. After knowing you for many years I have no doubt you did the best you can under very difficult conditions. Since I’m blacklisted I haven’t been able to go back but imagine the paranoia has only increased in the insuing time. Hope to see you at some point in Jakarta.

Great work.

brother, i can see the effort and the hardship in making those photographs.Good&Important stuffs! see ya in Jakarta in few weeks time.

what a cool images bang Kemal…i like the last photo from the slide, embers of the night…

great work.. i like that you made them a little bit dark, bang.. mantap..

congrats kemal. beautiful images and a great story!