I took this picture in Yangon. She wears Myanmar traditional dress, called longyi. What I realized in Myanmar is that Myanmar people are proud of their country. I saw not only people wearing traditional clothes, but also Myanmar's national flag at many places in Yangon. One thing I was surprised is that most of older generations answered that they wear traditional one because they are Myanmar nationalities and belong to the country when I conducted interviews to them. Compared to people in Japan, they have few opportunities to feel the sense of belonging to Japan. Moreover, I’ve heard some of my friends say that they don’t like Japan.

 

There are a lot of possible reasons for this difference. One of these is history. As for Myanmar, in 1948, they finally got their independence from British. In Maha Bandoola park, there is also the independence monument which commemorates independence from British. Every time people visit the park and see the monument, they remind their history and patriotism. On the other hand, Japan have never been independent from other countries. So I could say that they have less opportunities to proud of their country. Another reason is that necessity of unity. Since Myanmar include a lot of ethnic groups, it is inevitably needed to make citizens feel their country as one group contrary to Japan which is known for its monoethnicity.

 

Above all, there is a quite big gap of the sense of belonging between Japan and Myanmar. This reflects that even both countries belong to Asia, the mindset in people are different in some extent.