Word: teak
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Rice & Rubies. Prewar Burma was the world's largest exporter of rice, teak, rubies and jade. Its oil wells supplied its own needs and most of India's. The Mawgmi mine was the world's chief single source of tungsten...
...Mawgmi mine closed down in June, the teak sawmills in July. Gem prospecting has almost stopped, and Burma is now reduced to importing instead of exporting oil. Rebel forays on transportation lines have forced the Burmese to fly oil to the interior, where the price has risen to $6.30 a gallon. Rice exports have tobogganed, too. Burma exported about 3,000,000 tons of rice before the war. This year's exports will be less than 1,000,000. Next year the government hopes to have 730,000 tons for export, but many believe the figure will be lower...
Tourists behaved as tourists should, trekked dutifully to the Floating Market and the Cobra Farms, gawked earnestly at the gleaming Emerald Buddha in the Grand Palace temple. Bangkok's shops were bulging with niello silverware, hand-woven silks, carved teak heads and snakeskin bags. What was more, the prices were low. For lunch the visitors ate cold prawns in the air-conditioned Chez Eve,* while an Indonesian quartet imported from Singapore played Slow Boat to China...
...colonial heyday, Burma had been a joy and profit to the British Empire. It was rich in rice, teak, petroleum and jewels; its amiable people (according to one historian) "caused no governor-general a sleepless night." In 1942 the British awoke; as British troops retreated from Burma, the conquering Japanese made quick friends among Burmese politicians. In 1943, the British returned as liberators, but only to prepare a graceful exit...
...plays which would reform wayward girls; a monk hoped that Buddhism would flourish. But even with British help, the new state will have a hard time enjoying the blessings of sovereignty. Twice a battleground in World War II, Burma emerged with its oil refineries in ruins, its rice and teak exports paralyzed...