Shin Daewe

A woman in Myanmar. A documentary about her, I think. Will watch it soon, I'll come back to you.

This film offers a unique window onto Yangon, a city undergoing immense change. Living in harmony is the art of living in life. A city’s attractions can be irresistible and enticing. Yangon, is a safe fortress for the migrants where all live together. Through a unique mixture of narrated poetry and juxtaposed images from Yangon’s urban landscape, this documentary depicts a city that holds the hopes and aspirations of a diverse population, struggling and enduring in the hearts of all who live within it.

Ma Aye Kaung is girl who was born during the reign of military government. Now she is living in middle part of Myanmar. Her father is an alcoholic and neglects family duties. At the age of nine, she started as a child labour. Now she is thirteen and a herd of goats. Ma Aye Kaung wants to read and write. Though the primary education is free but she had no chance of schooling. Now our country in the political transition period too, the girls like her, have no chance of going to school.

The painter Rahula lives a modest but contended existence with his family in Mingun, a village on the banks of the Ayeyarwaddy 11 km upriver from Mandalay. As a new work takes shape on a canvas in his studio next door to the towering base of Mingun's famously brick pagoda, we learn how this easy-going artist has managed to survive a sizable chunk of Myanmar's chequered history. Sawing the air with a cheroot, the jovial Rahula also reveals how he acquired his unusual name, his now successful abstract style, and his supportive wife, of whom he admits: 'If it weren't for her, I would still be painting pictures of monks and pagodas for the tourists.'

When the Paungdaw Oo monastic school was founded near Mandalay in 1993 the aim was to provide orphans and children from disadvantaged families with a decent education. Fifteen years later, the school has swelled to 7200 pupils and is a resounding success not least on account of its inspired, child-centred approach to teaching (known as CCA) as well as the integral role played by teachers, parents and income-generating vocational training programmes. In this lively portrait, the school's abbot and several of Paungdaw Oo's teachers – many of whom were once pupils there themselves – talk about the school's CCA concept, the astonishing benefits of encouraging children to think for themselves, and how these methods can be a model for schools across Myanmar.