Mobile Holmes

When the Myanmar Vineyard Management Company released their first wines 5 years ago they failed to anticipate the problem their customers would have uncorking them.  Burma has never had a wine culture and there was scarcely a corkscrew to found anywhere in the country.  Buying a bottle of wine you couldn’t open didn’t help sales!  As if producing wine in the tropics wasn’t difficult enough, after their first release they had to switch their whole production to screw caps.

In 1998, 3000 vines were imported from Europe. A year later the original vineyard was moved to Aythaya in the mountains of the Shan States on the fringe of the infamous Golden Triangle and another 10,000 vines were added.  This eastern tip of the Himalayan foothills is predominantly limestone soil which combined with the cooler climate of the almost 5,000 thousand foot elevation barely allows the vines to provide high enough yields to make the operation viable.

German winemaker  and Director of Technical Operations, Hans-Eduard Leiendecker,  told me that the yield is one-tenth of what he used to get in his native Mosel. Low yields and scarcity of  corkscrews aren’t the only problems.  At these latitudes, there are significantly fewer hours of sunlight than in the traditional wine growing regions and careful canopy management is critical to ensure  that fruit reaches optimum sugar levels before rain and molds destroy the crop.

International sanctions have been a minor obstacle to importing supplies but almost anything is available through neighboring China.  However, barrels are unrealistically expensive to import and oak  chips are the obvious solution. These are not wines that anybody is going to lay down.  It even seems improbable that a $9 bottle of  wine produced in the tropics is going to be worth drinking at all.

The main varietals grown are Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Sauvignon Blanc and the wines are surprisingly good, particularly the Sauvignon Blanc.  The Australian style cab/shiraz  blend, sold as Aythaya Red, is not bad either.  I wouldn’t choose them over a half-decent Bordeaux but after a couple of weeks in Burma they taste pretty damn good.

Workers walk the vineyards frightening ravenous tropical birds with a scarer made from huge bamboo canes.

Where is home?  I grew up in England, left when I was already an adult and I have lived for the last 30 years in California.  During that time I have traveled extensively, mainly in Asia.  I think of England as home, call California home but feel that Asia is home.  And Burma, or Myanmar as it’s now officially called, is quintessential Asia.  This is still the old Asia, unchanged for centuries and the corrosive effect of tourism has yet to be felt.  Ironically, this has largely been thanks to the international tourism boycott.

I was last there in 1997 and little has changed physically or politically.  However, 13 years ago there was a tangible feeling of oppression.  Censorship of media was obvious and although the people were delightful they were careful about what they said.  When I was there 2 weeks ago, I saw satellite dishes throughout the country, most towns had internet cafes, many people I met had gmail accounts.  The biggest surprise was that politics were discussed openly and opinions freely given.  This doesn’t discount the underlying cloak of fear that people live with on a daily basis but indicates that at least the junta is making an attempt to shed it’s tarnished image.

Superficially, the country appears to work – apart from frequent brown-outs.  The rampant consumerism of the West is refreshingly absent and in spite of sanctions essential supplies freely enter through neighboring China.  Chinese motorbikes are particularly evident and at US$400 they are in reach of a surprisingly high percentage of the population.  Outside of the major cities, Yangon and Mandalay, life is simple, the people appear to be content and certainly well fed.  Burma is a land of farmers and as the 50 million rural population is mainly involved in agriculture, food is plentiful. Markets are overflowing with good, fresh produce that would be the envy of any farmer’s market in the West.

It is naïve to suggest that all is well in Burma contrary to popular opinion but does a tourism boycott have any affect?  A frequent comment was “Thank you for having the courage to visit our country”.  There is a strong desire for change and tourism is seen as a means of accomplishing this.  International relations are gradually changing and the Obama administration has announced a shift in US policy on Burma towards engagement rather than isolation, though without specifying any concrete steps.  Even organizations such as Voices for Burma and Free Burma Coalition that traditionally supported the tourism boycott have now changed their view and they urge tourists to do as much as possible to help private Burmese citizens and not put money in the government’s pocket.  Although any major hotel is going to have some governmental connection, we made every effort to avoid government owned hotels and where ever possible patronized local restaurants.

Tourism may or may not improve the political situation but has a tourism boycott been effective either?

I’m back at the place I call home but my heart is still on the continent that I love.

In 1985, if any of you can remember that far back, I co-hosted a forum on The WELL, an early on-line community founded by Stewart Brand and Larry Brilliant.  I used a Kaypro computer with a 1200 baud modem and the messaging was far from instant.  It was, however, exciting to be at the forefront of things to come although at the time no one realized the dominance the computer would have over our lives.

Now, 25 years later, I can sit with my laptop in virtually any place on Earth and communicate instantly with anyone who wants to listen.  My daughter moved to Bangkok earlier this week to study at Rangsit University and we communicate through Skype.  Being able to see her and talk to her in real time makes the distance seem so much less and although I wouldn’t want it any other way, it has eroded the adventure of travel.   25 years ago I would unhesitatingly depart on 3-month photographic assignments to remote areas completely out of contact with the rest of the world.  I shot film and had no idea if I had the shots until I returned home.  I accepted this as being the life of an editorial photographer. Digital photography now allows me to know within seconds if I have the shot. It has taken away all the risk and even if I can sleep better at night there is no longer the edge that can inspire creativity.

In three weeks I leave for Myanmar (Burma) where even basic telephone communication is problematic and I feel uneasy at being out of touch for two weeks. Once again I feel the apprehension that I felt as a student hitch hiking to the French Alps to climb Mont Blanc.  This is travel at it should be.  Meaningful and memorable with surprise and serendipity.  I can’t wait to get on the road.  The decade is off to a good start.

On New Year’s Eve a friend shared with me a bottle of 1975 Chateau Petrus.  This should have been a sublime start to the year.  The last time I tasted Petrus was in Hawaii with Mark de Vere who was Master of Wine at Robert Mondavi.  The wine in Hawaii was everything we expected it to be, it was still young and it was a luscious bottle of ripe fruit with a depth and complexity not normally associated with Merlot.  I was expecting all that and more from the 1975 vintage and with prices at $2000 and up for a bottle my expectations were unrealistically high.  The wine was undeniably good with minimal oxidization but $2000 good?  I didn’t think so.  I was disappointed.

On Christmas Day I had opened a 1967 Chateau Gloria, a wine that has been in my cellar for several years and I have avoided opening it because of the expected disappointment.  1967 wasn’t a particularly good year and the wine was way past its sell by date.  The level of the wine was down to the shoulder of the bottle and it had the distinctive brown tinge of an old red wine.  I was prepared to pour it down the sink but it turned out to be very drinkable.  All the fruit had disappeared but the structure remained.  It was not great but neither was it a disappointment.

So many factors enter into wine appreciation; expectations, who it is shared with, state of mind.  Admittedly some of my most memorable quaffing has involved great wines such as a Chambolle-Musigny grand cru, Bonnes Mares poured at IPNC last year but many far more humble wines have left equally lingering memories.

Travel is the same.  Sure, a week at The Four Seasons Resort at Sayan in Bali is memorable but no more so than a night at an undiscovered inn in the Scottish Highlands.  This blog is about food, wine and travel by an opinionated blogger.  Stay tuned.