"This is Burma" composed Rudyard Kipling famously "it is quite unlike anything you have seen" he added. One could imagine Kipling, the legendary British poet who championed the spirit of Colonial Imperialism, writing these memorable lines at the Pegu Club in Yangon. The Pegu Club, a Victorian style Gentleman's club for British Army Officers, was just one of the many colonial structures the British built in Downtown Yangon in the 1800s.
Staunch British imperialists believed the sun would never set on the British Empire. Therefore, the architecture was grand, defiant and ambitious. When the British left Burma in 1948 they left behind an array of Victorian structures reminiscent of other colonial cities like Bombay or Calcutta. In 2005, after consulting a fortune teller the Myanmar Government shifted the countries capital from Yangon to Nay Pyi Taw. Having lost its status as a capital, Yangon's colonial past is today in a state of disarray.
These grand old buildings lie scattered around the chaotic streets of Yangon like the neglected elderly. Here is one of my favourite images from a heritage walk around Downtown Yangon with the highly recommended @freeyangonwalks
