After 50 years, the isolated nation of Burma -- which was cut off from much of the modern world by its military government for decades -- has begun opening up closed bureaucratic positions to
civilians, freeing political prisoners, and most dramatically, allowing Nobel Peace
Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for
Democracy (NLD) party to run
for elections in April 2012 -- dramatic events in this mysterious
Buddhist land once known mostly for its golden pagodas.
Photographer Geoffrey Hiller
is one of a handful of journalists who has been quietly slipping into
the country since 1987, before the 1988 democractic uprising and the subsequent arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi. In May 2011, he went back to the country for several months to
photograph the capital, Yangon, and other places.
Six months later, in January 2012, hearing the news of Hillary Clinton's historic visit to
Burma, Hiller flew back in. The country he found was "night-and-day different."
Pictures and memorabilia of Aung San Suu Kyi and her father, Gen. Aung San -- once strictly banned -- appeared in the streets. And, for the first time ever, regular people began to talk openly: teachers, students, monks, nuns, doctors, and taxi drivers consented to be photographed and interviewed on film. Here's a slice of life inside a beautiful and rapidly changing Burma.
Above, supporters carry a portrait of Aung San Suu Kyi at a rally in the city of Pathein in February 2012. Until last fall, images of Aung San Suu Kyi were forbidden in Burma.
Geoffrey Hiller
Young Buddhist nuns with begging bowls walk through Yangon in February 2012. In
Burma, both girls and boys take monastic vows for some period of their lives.
Geoffrey Hiller
NLD party members assemble before the Pathein rally in the early
morning.
Geoffrey Hiller
Supporters rally for Aung San Suu Kyi in Pathein in February 2012. Thousands,
young and old, waited for hours to hear her speak at the NLD rally, one of the first permitted since 1988.
Geoffrey Hiller
A monk uses a computer in a Yangon monastery in June 2011. Internet use is
still censored, according to the whims of the government, but limitations began to relax in 2011.
Geoffrey Hiller
A Yangon resident waits for a ferry on a pedestrian bridge
over the Yangon River in May 2011.
Geoffrey Hiller
A young woman sits in a taxi in Yangon in May 2011. Most taxis in Burma are used vehicles
from Japan, which means the steering wheel is on the right side of the car even though traffic also drives in the
right lane.
Geoffrey Hiller
Colonial-era buildings in old town Yangon in February 2012. The
British established the city, then called Rangoon, as the capitol in 1852 and brought in a mix of
Asians, Hindus, Muslims, and Chinese, an ethnic metling pot that survives to this day.
Geoffrey Hiller
Women wait in front of a private pre-natal clinic in Yangon in February 2012. Burmese health care ranks among the worst in the world.
Geoffrey Hiller
A young monk stands next to a picture of Aung San Suu Kyi and her father Aung San in February 2012.
Gen. Aung San, who was one of the key players in Burma's independence from British colonial rule, is considered "the father of independence" by many in the country. He established the Burmese Communist party and the modern Burmese army, but
was assassinated in 1947.
Geoffrey Hiller
A girl rides in the back of a bicycle rickshaw, called a trishaw, in Yangon in February 2012. Despite recently discovered
oil reserves, few can afford automobiles and gasoline is rationed and expensive.
Geoffrey Hiller
Boats bob on the edge of the Hpa-an river in February 2012. Isolation has left the
countryside undeveloped, but the Burmese are concerned about the environment as
the economy opens up. Recent opposition to a Chinese hydroelectric dam
united the government and citizens.
Geoffrey Hiller
Muslim girls in a
madrasa in Hpa-an in February 2012. The Muslim population in Burma is estimated to be
between 5 and 10 percent of the country's population.
Geoffrey Hiller
In a market in Yangon in February 2012, a T-shirt showcases both Aung San Suu Kyi and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Clinton made a historic
visit to Burma in November 2011.
Geoffrey Hiller
A man wears a T-shirt bearing Aung San Suu Kyi's face in an open air market in the city of Mawlamyine in February 2012. Motorcycles, which are often smuggled in from Thailand, are an expensive luxury.
Geoffrey Hiller
A Mawlamyine resident in February 2012.
Geoffrey Hiller
