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From MIZZIMA News Group (r)



The only US product Burma knows: Jeep

>From the Asian Age newspaper
7th July 1999

Checking the oil on the Jeep he's driven as a rural taxi for 30 years,
Khin Maung Than explains why be turns away city slickers who keep
showing up offering big money for it. "I know what these Jeeps are worth
- they're priceless," he says, lighting a cheroot. "They're very hardy
and easy to fix. Nothing is better for the roads around here. In the
city, Jeeps are just a new fad."

Burma, is experiencing the Jeep mania. Car-crazy young people are
rediscovering the World War II workhorses that still ply potholed
backwaters like Kalaw. They're customising the old US Army road warriors
into the flashiest rides this long-isolated country has ever seen. The
love affair is rooted in Burma's role as a battleground, impoverishment
that followed a military coup in 1962, and an uneven surge in wealth
this decade after younger generals ditched socialism for a more open
economy.

Every morning, Mr Than pulls his Jeep into the taxi stand in Kalaw, a
hill station where British colonists escaped hot summers, and packs in a
dozen passengers heading to market 25 miles away. This past year, he's
been approached by brokers offering up to 300,000 kyats, or about $850.
He always refuses, though it's a lot of cash in Burma and 10 times what
he paid for the Jeep.

His Jeep is in original condition. But it wouldn't stay that way long if
someone like Maung Thura got his hands on it. In his sarong and baseball
cap. Mr Thura looks like any ordinary 27-year-old bachelor in Rangoon,
the capital 250 miles southeast of Kalaw. But he has money by virtue of
his aunt, who owns the biggest lottery shop. And the loosened economy
means for the first time, the affluent young like him have lots of
imported cars and parts to spend it on.

Mr Thura spent $1,100 on and old Jeep in original condition down to the
three-speed transmission. It's now worth five times that, and old the
body and frame remain. He dropped in a Toyota turbo-diesel engine with a
five-speed gearbox and power steering. The body is started up with
metallic blue paint, flared fenders, chrome roll band and alloy wheels.
There's a chrome crash bar and fog lights - though Rangoon never gets
fog.

"I could never have done this five years ago," Mr Thura said. "There
were no engines, so spare parts." Now, he has one of the coolest cars in
town. Dozens more made-over Jeeps are also turning heads, as are another
new youth favourite, customised Volkswagen Beetles. Just to make sure no
one hanging out in the tea shops misses him coming, Mr Thura cranks rap
music out of huge speakers tucked under velour bucket seats. "Girls are
always asking for rides," he says. Due to historical accident and
necessity, Burma probably has more Jeep, in both wartime and early
civilian versions, running on original parts than anywhere. The first
Jeeps arrived when Burma was a battleground of the China-Burma-India
theatre. The spunky four-wheel-drives earned an unmatched reputation for
raggedness in the mountains and rice paddies. Civilians snapped then up
after the war. Many became taxis on the northern roads between Mandalay
and the Chinese border, stomping ground of hill tribes, smugglers and
opium lords. After 1962, the military government cut Burma off from the
world. (AP)