The two years of living in Yangon passed rapidly. During that time friends from Japan paid three or four visits to me. The first thing to surprise them was the fact that there were so many cars in Yangon. Although Myanmar do not have as much cars as her neighbor Thailand, sometimes traffic jams occur.

Especially at the quarters of downtown, it is full of people, buildings and cars. The downtown area that is called (unofficially) Chinatown because of the Chinese Living there it is unbelievably overcrowded every day. I live in this Chinatown.

At first, it may be called culture shock. I had to face surprising and disappointing things day after day. comparing each case with experience in Japan, I realized that "This is a foreign country". It is just natural that it is different from my mother country. At once Myanmar became a likable country.

Streets and buildings are extremely dirty. But I do not feel anything significantly for that. I do not mind the forks and spoons not well washed or the litter thrown away at random.

The thing that interested my friends was the roadside teashops. You would be disappointed if you compare them to the clean, neat and tidy seats of Japan. The seats were round plastic ones about 20cm high used in bathrooms and tables were so small and low just like the ones used for playing chess.

Men sat in the tea shops sipping and drinking tea which was 30 kyats a cup (about 10 yens, sometimes even cheaper) while talking about rumors and making small talk the whole day.

I will write how much people of this country love the rumors and gossips the next time.

Taxis were very expensive compared with fares for other vehicles. A taxi fare for a short trip downtown cost about 200 kyats (about 70 Yens). As there was no customary meter you had to bargain for the fare. The taxi drivers asked for fares three times the normal one to foreigners. So bargaining was a must. At first it was very exhausting but when you became used to it, it would be an enjoyable game.

You would lose if you became angry. This was a Buddhist country. Buses were running all around the city but for a stranger the numbers and lines were hard to study. Fare on a truck a reconditioned Luggage carrier was five kyats. On a jalopy it was ten. On an old Japanese car labelled 'Air-con' it was 20 Kyats. Buses producing black smoke and running fast were learnt to be driven owners themselves.

You would have to scramble for a seat on a bus just like in Japan. But you would be pleased to see that the one who got a seat helped the one standing by holding things for him and women and elders were assisted as necessary. The happiest were ones dangling along behind the truck busses. When you went to the rural areas you would find passengers sitting on the roofs of the cars among the luggage. I praised their skill in riding in that style without falling off but I would not dare to do so myself.

Lately I rode a second-hand a bus made in my native Fukuoka. The advertisements n the car was the original ones and I wondered how did it came to Myanmar. I was had to laugh feeling nostalgic.

My friend told me if the Japanese system of car inspection were used 99 per cent of the cars in Myanmar would be out. But cars, which would be discarded soon in Japan, were so useful here in Myanmar. They would be running for another ten years. After repairing again and again they would be good enough for use. This was not the only case for cars but for the other entire machine too. As a person from a country where things were discarded easily after using once and where the phenomenon of stinginess of was lost forever, I though this country recycle things well and never threw away anything so easily. Although I had been living in Chinatown overcrowded with so many people and cars I had never encountered horrible hazards, not even for once.