Comments for Fifty Viss

Comment on Finding Burmese food in America by Santhosh Rajangam

Santhosh Rajangam — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:25:15 +0000

I am a huge fan of khauk hswe thoke and mohinga.. I used to have it in Chennai, where I am originally from.. There are loads of places that sell burmese food in chennai.. It is unfortunate that I can’t find burmese food in Minneapolis.. Can anyone suggest good recipe to try on own??

Comment on A glimpse of Naypyidaw by Mi Mi

Mi Mi — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 22:12:19 +0000

No supression by this military government are everywhere.

Comment on 10 things I hate about the Burmese language by zin moe oo

zin moe oo — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 08:33:28 +0000

I’m Burmese and I can speak Burmese but my writing and reading is not good. Does anybody know where they teach Burmese in L.A. Great job on you Burmese btw because I think Burmese is not too English friendly. I went to a website were they Burmese everyday word is English with English meaning. If i wasn’t Burmese I wouldn’t be able to read the pronunciation in English.I’m currently taking Japanese and knowing Burmese helps.

Comment on Finding Burmese food in America by zin moe oo

zin moe oo — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 08:24:40 +0000

my dad made some dan pauk for his friends and they really like it. So every time they have a party, they order dan pauk from my dad and he makes some money.

and Myin Phin Gya is mad because it said not including mixed burmese ex. burmese chinese and burmese indian ect…

Comment on Does God exist in Burmese Buddhism? by May

May — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:47:38 +0000

It’s natural to feel in this way as a traditional burmese buddhist, even most of our parents didn’t try to understand fully so that they couldn’t pass the depth of buddhism to their children. However, I find as an adult, we should take our responsibility to find out what really buddhism is all about without blaming our ancesstors.
Although I myself went to a few vipassana meditation centres in Myanmar quite often and yet very vague about buddhism. Finally I got chance to go to S.N. Goenka 10days Vipassana meditation course in singapore (http://www.dhamma.org) and it made me realize how wonderful and scientific our buddhism is. And I find that there is no way as a laymen by just reading to understand the depth of buddhism without practising what buddha taught. One must practise and one will know the law of nature and our mind & matters relationship. Sayagyi Goenka also explained that “Buddha” means “enlightenment” and whoever practise and enlighten are able to be named as Buddha. There are several centres all over the world opened by him and a lot of different religions come to practise as this technique is non-sectarian and very scientific. Btw, in his centre, you don’t need to “shit kho” or paid homeage to any God, and no single cent are needed to pay for your food and accomodation, you just need to meditate every single day. All expenses are provided by purely the donation from those who finished courses and benefited from the technique. May all human beings are able to learn this technique taught by Gottama Buddha and are peaceful & harmonious in their life!
It’s not a complete web page, but here is how I felt about my meditation experience, http://meditationrecommend.blogspot.com/

Comment on Interesting Burmese word origins by Snr General Than Shwe

Snr General Than Shwe — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 02:47:56 +0000

Yeah , you are right. First Burmese king was Anurahddhin ( known as King Anawrhata ). I dare not say this when my late predecessor arthuba ne win was in power because he declared he alone was a pure bamar race and the only one of the kind in Burma.

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:47:59 +0000

Here is the Mon scripts:
http://www.myanmarnlp.net.mm/doc/20040421_winmyanmarmon.jpg
It is the same as standard Mranma alphabet.
I found a Rakhine alphabet used in Wethali era (4 AD – 6 AD) from a different source;
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_zzdgNPibWhU/Siphqd6YO8I/AAAAAAAAAJ0/H1bTsPECNL8/s1600-h/2972196641_986dfecacd_o.jpg
Source: http://kyaukphru.blogspot.com/2009/06/some-sanskrit-inscriptions-of-arakan.html
Note: a message in that article is to highlight the danger of that religion, not our belief.

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 22:19:53 +0000

Evolution of Rakhine Alphabet (displayed in the Museum of Rakhine Culture, Sittwe)
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_DHAgiG3nUDI/Se22xC4BaII/AAAAAAAAAe0/OBzSxYZ4QcY/s1600-h/2485657021_ef5af6fa82_b.jpg
(Source): http://ancientmyanmar.blogspot.com/search/label/%E1%80%9B%E1%80%81%E1%80%AD%E1%80%AF%E1%80%84%E1%80%B9
It is interesting to see the evolution of alphabet. Wethali period spanned from 788 AD to 1018 AD. The letter “Nga” is consistently the same from the Danyawaddi period (2666BC-327AD) to Mrauk-U era. But “Nga thet” was used only from Lemro era.
I think we need to look at the Tibetan alphabet also. The pronunciations of their alphabet are almost identical to ours.
http://tibet.dharmakara.net/img/TibetanABC1.gif
Ancient Mranma might’ve reconciled their pronunciation with already-developed Rakhine alphabet. On the other hand, Ashaythar (Baganthar) adopted many Mon words to their language. So there could be a little bit of this and that during the transition and eventually developed to a standard Mranma language and alphabet.

THIS is a very rough, non-scientific, unscholastic, with scanty research, of my opinion. So plz bear with me. Thnx

Comment on 10 things I hate about the Burmese language by David Chase

David Chase — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 05:12:13 +0000

Hello,
I stumbled across your site and found it very insightful. I need some advice and was hoping you could help me out – I just met some Burmese refugees at a church last week. I spoke with one person who speaks pretty good English and has been learning for the last two years. I would like to develop a friendship with many of the people that I met last week and I want to learn to speak their language. I was told the group here in Texas speaks three languages: Burmese, Thai, and ?Karen? – does that sound right? Could you point me in the right direction to find resources to help with learning the languages and learn some of the culture? Thank you for any help you can give.

Comment on Finding Burmese food in America by Alfred Thein

Alfred Thein — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 17:12:43 +0000

He is angry that sometime in the past his mother opened her legs and there is no time travelling coat hangers in the world at the moment.

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 22:19:56 +0000

I found this from the Making of Modern Burma by Thant Myint U:

“The Arakanese ruling class spoke Burmese,
and there existed many similarities in court culture and social organisa-
tion between the two societies, but the area’s principal role as a centre of
Indian Ocean trade and piracy also meant that Arakan was much more
exposed to Indian Ocean influences, in particular from Bengal, but also
from further afield. The religion was primarily Theravada Buddhist, but
with a large Muslim minority and strong Brahmanical influences. In the
late eighteenth century, the kingdom was in a period of disarray andmore
than one of its rival palace factions appealed to the Burmese for assist-
ance, providing Ava with a welcome excuse to invade .”

Hmm… I wish the author had learned more about the Arakanese history. The truth is at the time of Bodaw Maung Wine’s invasion, the king of Arakan was a Rambray thar(Ramree) elected by the court noblities. That is why he was named Maha Thamada Razar. He was nowhere close to the Royal blood. I don’t think the Burman ruling class elected and kowtowed an ordinary Arakanese. The author implied the ordinary people spoke a different language. What language? I think it is very ignorant of the author to write this fanciful story.
Since the king was not a blue blood, some unhappy nobilities, Nga Thande (a distant royal descent) and U Kyaw Zan went to Ava for help. That is what happened. The author went on to say that there was a large Muslim minority. He might’ve heard of it thru the media. It is true by now, but it was not that much that time. An information-rich Arakan website should educate him the exodus of Muslim population into Arakan. With a limited knowledge of Arakan history, he should’nt deal with a touchy subject. It was a result of a lack of research. Copycatting from Oxford libraries and reading online news don’t necessarily make him an academic.

Comment on Interesting Burmese word origins by Dho-ong Jhaan

Dho-ong Jhaan — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 11:17:59 +0000

Mon say ‘preng-sit’ for ‘French’ or ‘Francaise’. It’s spelled pa-zout r-rit nga-that: preng, tha-way-htoh tha ta-that: sit so ‘preng-sit’. That might be a gap between Burmese ‘pyinthit’ and French ‘francaise’! In his well-known novel, Thu-kyun-ma-khan-pyi, Tekkatho Pon Naing used ‘paransit’ for ‘French’ or ‘France’.

Comment on Interesting Burmese word origins by Wagaung

Wagaung — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 09:23:29 +0000

Pyinthit is probably a Burmese corruption of ‘française’. Khaukswe has been discussed above.

You rebel against an overlord. I doubt it if we ever lorded over the Tayoke unless they got mixed up with the Shan. Interesting to learn kalar is black in Hindi but it was used for both the white man and Indian alike. Hpyu (white) for Europeans was only suffixed by people to distinguish the two later, not when they were first encountered starting from the Portuguese.

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 03:34:05 +0000

FYI
This is a Michael Aung Thwin’s assumption of Arakanese people;
“(61) I suppose one could argue that the history of the Arakanese, Shan, and Mon are
left. But the latter histories were not made independently of the Burmese speakers.
Thus, for example, one cannot speak of a kingdom of Arakanese speakers as if it were
a distinct ethno-linguistic entity from one composed of Burmese speakers, since the
language and people are the same. Initially, they were part of the same demographic
movement into ‘Burma’, the drang nach suden of the Burmese speakers that diverged
only later. The foundations of the first ‘Arakanese’ state in Arakan around the
eleventh century was based on, and followed the development of Pagan’s emergence
around the mid-ninth century and so was part of the latter’s expansion into its
‘frontier’ areas–the coasts. Prior to the advent of the Burmese speakers in Arakan,
we do not know what the ethno-linguistic background of the people was, as they left
mainly (or only) Sanskrit inscriptions which could belong to any ethno-linguistic
group. Indeed, if the Arakanese are combined with the Burmese speakers as part of
the same linguistic group, they actually form a much larger percentage of the total
number of Burmese speakers (about 75 per cent) than usually given by those who
desire to minimise it (as 69 per cent) for political reasons. The real distinction
between the Arakanese and Burmese speakers lies not in their ethno-linguistic
differences but in their regional geopolitical and historical experiences. Even
Arakan’s vaunted ‘difference’ in terms of the number of Muslims who are Arakanese
amounts to about 12 per cent of the population today; the rest are still Buddhists.”

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 02:05:03 +0000

Dear Thageeblood
Marma people pronounce their name Mranma, not marma. It is a little bit weird why their name doesn’t include “r” letter. The British or Bengalis might’ve spelt wrongly. Just FYI.

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 02:03:53 +0000

Comment on Interesting Burmese word origins by Estuu

Estuu — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 22:26:30 +0000

According to this link, Dr Than Tun’s definition of Tayoke is rebel.
http://navana07.blogspot.com/2009/04/blog-post_23.html

Thant Myint U’s Kalar definition is not correct. Kalar is black in Hindi.
http://utopianvision.co.uk/hindi/dictionary/word/black

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 21:57:26 +0000

Dear Aung Zeya
This is a follow-up to my previous post.
You gave some examples; Latin America? Anglo-phone Africa? Franco-phone Africa?
I don’t think they are comparable to the one we discuss. In Latin America, say Brazil, they speak Portugese. So you assume the native Brazilians were ordered to speak Portugese. Right? The native Argentines changed their language to Italians and Spanish for fear of their occupiers? I hope you already know that the portugese government moved to Brazil thanks to Napoleon’s invasion of Portugal, followed by newer immigrantions to Brazil. Another probable reason why all the native inhabitants changed their language to Portugese might be that greater culture and language prevailed as time went by. Is the Burmese language more advanced than Hindi?
In Argentina, waves of Spanish and Italian immigrants settled down there so the local language might came down to the same fate as in Brazil.
Anglophone Africa and Francophone Africa examples are way incomparable to this topic “Arakanese Dialect”
And also your examples of Mandarin language is not very close to this subject. You didn’t say before Mandarin they spoke a different language. There might be several dialects which is mutually intelligible and Mandarin could be one of them as in Mranma Pran (pronunciation of Myanmar Pyi in Bagan era)
What about your theory of “elites”? Do you have any proof that Burman elites were going about inside the Mrauk-U court? Since you mentioned a couple of times, I need to put more emphasis on that, because you seem to be so sure.
You are surprised to hear that I didn’t know the Arakanese crossed the Yoma around 7th century AD, which covers in any standard Burmese history books. Can you prove a title of one of those standard Burmese history book and it’s author? I don’t mind if it is written by a Burman or foreigner Is that a typo? Or 9th century? I’d love to order that book even if that book is tainted, biased or unreliable.
This link might be of some interest to you.
http://www.hiriautatpa.com/2008/07/29/thats-our-bamar-15/

Comment on The Arakanese dialect by Estuu

Estuu — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 18:41:31 +0000

Dear Aung Zeya
I am sorry to hear that it was your last post. Honestly, I am by no means a historian. But as I grow older, my interest in history becomes intense.
I’ve found out that the standard Burman history is so much tainted especially when it comes to their neighbors; maybe that is because of Burman historians’ pride or because of political influences or both. If you learn Mon history from Burman history books, you’ll have a different version. So I think if somebody refers the Burman history, he should be more careful and think twice. And it is advisable to view from other side as well. Whatever good or bad about Arakanese history, I want to hear unbiased opinions. That is my true intention.
Firstly I’d like to say that during Bagan dynasty, the Arakanese tended to ask a royal blood from Bagan, not the whole bureaucracy, and it did happened once or twice according to Arakanese history. I mean just the king ONLY. There is no evidence it proved differently OR it proved correctly. Nobody knows exactly. On the other hand, if we rely on the facts that is currently available, the Arakanese asked the king only. So I assume that there were no others except from his family. That is why I believe the king and his family would hardly influence the language of the whole population. Even the military junta, currently colonizing the Rakhine state with its bureaucrats and thousands of soldiers, can’t change the way we speak. If they ask by force to speak Burmese, I am sure they won’t succeed. From this perspective, I have this very question: how could that be possible that one Burman-speaking family imposed the Arakanese people successfully to speak Burmese instead. This is something I just relied on my judgement, not a piece of history. That might be contrary to what you referred to: the vague idea of Thant Myint U. And again it is very new to me that there existed Burman elites. I’d love to hear more from you.
I am in no mood to argue about the scripts and also I don’t trust what Burman historians and foreigners said. It is gonna be fair if we see from the Arakanese side, thus we’ll have a better conclusion.
As to paragraph 4, ancient kings in south east asians used Pali names, not Sanscripts. Sancscript is an Indo-aryan language. That conform with the Arakanese history that ancient Arakanese were Indo-aryan so they definitely took Sancript names. That is my opinion. I might be wrong. If you have a better explanation, please let us know. Hope to hear from you soon.

Comment on Interesting Burmese word origins by KoKo

KoKo — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 17:28:16 +0000

Hi,
Tayoke – Ta= one, yoke=face so Tayoke= one face ( or ) same face.
Pyinthit = French, France. What about this ? Repair new ?
One thing, Khaukswe, Khauk= fold and swe=pull. Do you see how to make noodle by hand ? That’s it, Don’t think too far.