Anthony Kuhn

As Myanmar Reforms, Old Tensions Rise To The Surface

Anthony Kuhn — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 20:42:00 +0000

The town of Meiktila in central Myanmar presents a tranquil scene on a hot April day: A woman presses juice from sugar cane while customers loll around in the midday heat. The town is right in the center of the country, on a broad and arid plain where white cows graze among palm trees and pointy pagodas. It's a bustling trading post on the road between the capital, Naypyidaw, and the country's second-largest city, Mandalay.

But just down the street, there is evidence of a conflagration: Large areas have been reduced to heaps of charred rubble.

After Long Isolation, Myanmar Now Has Suitors

Anthony Kuhn — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 22:20:00 +0000

For decades, Myanmar was isolated diplomatically, an economic backwater that seemed almost frozen in time amid a Southeast Asian region that was modernizing at a rapid pace.

But the political reforms under way in Myanmar, also known as Burma, are redefining its place in the world. President Obama's visit in November was a sign of the dramatic turnaround in relations with the United States.

Meanwhile, China, which has been Myanmar's main backer for years, is stepping up its investments. Chinese media report that 700-mile oil and gas pipelines will be completed in May.

An Indonesian Extremist Trades Rifle For Spatula

Anthony Kuhn — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 08:39:00 +0000

Tucked away in a back street of Semarang, a city in Indonesia's Central Java province, is a tiny, four-table restaurant. In the cramped kitchen, Mahmudi Haryono whips up a plate of ribs — lunch for two customers.

He brings it out and serves it to two Indonesian soldiers in olive drab uniforms.

Haryono is smiling and cool as a cucumber. But he acknowledges that after getting out of jail a few years ago, serving men in uniform set butterflies aflutter in his stomach.

"Sometimes, I felt insecure," he says, sitting down at a table to talk as the soldiers eat.

In Myanmar, A Hunt For Fabled Cache Of Buried WWII Spitfires

Anthony Kuhn — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 21:35:00 +0000

For the past few weeks a team of scientists, archaeologists and documentary makers has been digging at Yangon's international airport in Myanmar, also known as Burma. They are searching for a legendary trove of Spitfire fighter planes, said to have been buried in Burma in the waning days of World War II.

The tale of the Spitfires has lived on among old soldiers and aviation buffs. One of them, 86-year-old British veteran Stanley Coombe, is part of the search team. He recalls his time in Burma during the final, chaotic days of the war. Japan had been defeated.

South Korea Prepares The Young For A Rapidly Aging Population

Anthony Kuhn — Fri, 04 Jan 2013 18:39:00 +0000

At a clean and sunny community center in Seoul, the South Korean capital, senior citizens make clay models of their own faces in an arts class. Some of the faces are vivid and lifelike. Others are expressionless and indistinct. The project is intended to help the seniors remember what they look like.

This is the Gangseo District Center for Dementia. Since 2006, Seoul has opened a dementia center in each of the city's 25 urban districts.

It's one of the novel approaches that South Korea has developed to cope with an epidemic of dementia.