Where is happiness in Burma for Waso festival ?

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This day marks the beginning for Buddhist monks of a retreat which will last at least three months. During the Waso festival people offer flowers to the Buddhist imagem ushering all their devotions. One of the most important events in the course of the Waso is the offering of robes to the Monks which they generally wear during their retreat . People also offer them candles, known as the "Waso candles".

Waso is also the time for people to do meritorious deeds, practise contemplation and self-denial. Every one makes it a point of fasting and observes special precepts one day in the week. Even habitual drinkers take a vow of abstinence, for the season, at least, and practise in these days self discipline.

Burmese Names

“This article is from Atlantic Monthly, February 1958”

Burmese names are often very confusing to foreign visitors because we do not necessarily hand down family surnames from generation to generation and Burmese wives seldom use the names of their husbands. Thus U Sein Tun’s son might be Maung Saw Tin, and his wife might be called Daw Mya Aye.

The titles prefixed to a name are also a bit difficult at first. A boy will be called “Maung” (“young brother”) till he is about twenty, and a girl “Ma.” But Maung and Ma are also common personal names, as with the well-known writers Dr. Mauing Mauing and Ma Ma Lay. An older man will address a much younger one as “Maung,” while a landowner or a businessman would address a tenant farmer or laborer as “Maung.” A little further up the age and status scale comes “Ko” (“elder brother”), and, finally, “U,” the form for a man who has made his mark in life. Yet, no matter how successful, he would always be too modest to sign himself as “U,” and if...

Myanmar(Burmese) Names or Our Custom

About seven years ago, while I was spending a few days in Philadelphia and enjoying great hospitality of Professor Leonard Swindler, the distinguished Professor of Catholic Thought & Interreligious Dialogue at Temple University, I attended one of discussions with his graduate students. Once his students learned of my Burmese origin, the remainder of the discussion turned to Burmese culture, tradition, and finally names.“Do you mean to say,” asked one of the scholars, “that you have no last name according to your father?” On my replying in the negative all the scholars, except the venerable professor, looked at me in astonishment, and in a question which I shall not easily forget, they asked “No last name??? How do you trace the root of your ancestors?” The question stunned me at that time. I could give no perfect answer, for the traditional custom I was so used to, without thinking too much about my family roots after my grandmother passed away when I was still a little boy.A few...

Myanmar Cyclone Brings Rise In Centuries-Old 'Nat' Worship

YANGON, Myanmar -- At a small concrete shrine on the outskirts of this storm-battered city, people have been flocking to pay their respects to Nyaung Bin, "the old man of the solitary banyan tree." His statue wears a flowing pink robe, has a golden face, and bears a passing resemblance to the late actor Yul Brynner.

U Myaing, a regular worshipper who works at an animal farm across the street, says the reason for the increased attendance is obvious: Nyaung Bin is a "nat." And nats -- a group of centuries-old animist spirits -- can provide precious protection in precarious times. No one nearby who prays at the shrine, Mr. Myaing contends, was hurt by the deadly cyclone that ripped through the area in early May and left 134,000 dead or missing in Myanmar.

"We believe in the nats," he says. "Maybe that's why we're safe."

Myanmar may be best known, as far as faith goes, for its Buddhism and burgundy-robed monks. But as much as 80% of the...

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