Later tonight we will head to the airport and fly to Seoul, effectively ending my fifth diplomatic tour in Burma (Myanmar). As excited as I am for what is before us, and as much as I am ready to move forward, I inextricably feel that this departure may be the most bittersweet since we left our beloved Australia in 2019.
It was precisely 53 weeks ago tonight that we first arrived in Rangoon for this one-year assignment. The time flew by just as quickly as many people declared it would.
Although at times it has felt as though a lifetime had passed since we arrived, we have only begun to scratch the surface of how this country functions and to learn how to read the invisible cultural currents that run beneath it. I feel I would need many more years to truly grasp the complexity, beauty, history, and enduring mystique that make Myanmar such a remarkable place.
But I appreciate it all the same: the humility of its people, the damp, colonial character of Rangoon, and the golden temples peeking through the jungle foliage.
We’ve had very good times and some very bad times here. I almost lost my life at this post, and I was so lucky to recover the way I have—with the support of family, colleagues, and friends around me. I’ll need some space to truly absorb it all.
This afternoon, right before I left the embassy, I attended a memorial ceremony for a colleague who died here three months ago. I couldn’t help but feel such an emptiness around that loss, and such a gratitude for my life and health.
I believe that, upon reflection, it will be the work our consular section team did together in support of U.S. citizens in trouble that will truly be the legacy of my time here. Not my accident, not the visa restrictions that dramatically changed our workload and operations, and not my mother-in-law’s illness that took V out of post for about 10 percent of our time here.
Every tour is truly different and contains conditions and factors that leave you simultaneously both happy and sad to go. Every PCS move that arrives leaves me in a bit of disbelief, trying to find words adequate to sum it all up while also failing to reconcile how much everything is about to change, again.
I have fallen behind in my blogging as this tour has wound to a close and the pace of everything around me has accelerated.
I have multiple blog posts in draft — on my two recent visits to Bangkok, as well as trips within Burma to Bagan and Mandalay, and reflections on various aspects of both having served here and how it might feel to leave. I look forward to being able to write about all of those things and more during the coming relaxation home leave and its self-determined, free-wheeling schedule will afford.
So long, for now, beautiful land of golden pagodas. Thank you for the embrace. May you find kindness, equilibrium, prosperity, and peace in the future that lies ahead. I hope to see you again.
In case I forget that it always ends…
Zero Miles Later (Farewell, Children’s Issues, 2024)
Farewell, Mexico (2022)
Farewell, Australia (2019)
Farewell, Uzbekistan (2017)
Collecting Postcards 