Events of 23rd September, 2012
No, not London's underground line but the metre gauge surface railway in Yangon (formerly Rangoon) in Myanmar (formerly Burma). I first travelled on this line in March 2008 (described here) and, having a few hours available in Yangon on 23rd September 2012, thought it was time I sampled the line again.
I had a charming guide, car and driver at my disposal, so I discussed with her what was possible. The Circle Line is notorious for its unreliability and she wasn't sure we'd have time to do a complete circuit, so I compromised on a part circuit. We agreed to drive to an intermediate station on the east side of the city and catch a clockwise Circle Line train to Yangon Central Station (originally called Phayre Street which I presume was named after Lieut.-General Sir Arthur P. Phayre G.C.M.G., K.C.S.I. and C.B.).
The car duly dropped us at a point on the main road into the city where a short side street, teeming with commercial life, led to the station. The station building was on the other side of the double-track railway so we walked across the tracks (as everyone does in this part of the world) and she spoke to the booking clerk. She seemed to suggest that a train going in the right direction was not due for some time but that a possibility was to get a train going in the wrong direction and change after two stations, so we decided to do that. She offered me a drink at a nearby tea shop whilst we were waiting so I had tea with condensed milk plus a cup of Green tea.
We then returned to the station and I pointed out that I thought it unlikely that an intermediate station could sell me the one U.S. Dollar Tourist Ticket (locals pay a smaller fare denominated in Kyat). This required some serious discussion so we were invited into the office where what I took to be the Station Master was sitting at a table attempting, improbably enough, the repair of an electric soldering iron. It was concluded that I should travel without a ticket to Yangon Central Station where I could pay my Dollar Fare. With an interpreter available to explain my interest in railways, it became quite friendly with a lot of smiling and I ended up taking photographs of both the Station Master and the Booking Clerk.
The facilities in the office were very basic, home-made and grubby. The Booking Clerk had only a roughly-made shelf behind his ticket window. A pad of pre-printed paper tickets sat in pride of place and as passengers pushed a Kyat note through the window, he would tear off the next ticket and push it back to them. To one side, a little pile of Kyat notes built up. There was no obvious sign of any sort of cash box. The Station Master sat at a superannuated table which bore a bright orange hand-cranked magneto-ringing telephone. He made one call whilst we chatted and seemed to obtain a satisfactory reply which surprised me, since the tangle of wires leading away had the appearance of having been vandalised. Two plastic-insulated cables dangled from the ceiling and were terminated on a panel of bolt-type terminals.
When the train came in, we hurried to the rear coach and boarded. As I found before, there are no windows in the window frames, no doors in the doorways and (more surprisingly) no automatic brakes on the coaches, although the coaches had once been vacuum-fitted. The Guard squats on the longitudinal seat right at the back of the coach and is able to lean out of the last window to flourish a green flag to authorise departure from each stop. Young men and the many vendors are continually moving from coach to coach at station stops (these are non-corridor coaches). They seem to take a particular delight in deferring boarding until the train has gathered a little speed. Similarly, on entering a station, they choose to jump off early and run alongside. The guard's equipment appeared to consist of two well-used shopping bags. A selection of flags protruded from one bag - the contents of the other were only revealed a little later. The final part of the guards kit appeared to be a piece of string of some antiquity. When required, the guard would attach this string from one side of the coach to the other so as to define perhaps the last three feet of the coach as the guards area. This reminded me of the old tube trains on the London Underground when Guards were still employed. Coaches with Guards' Control Panels had a hinged bar which hung vertically when the Control Panel was not in use but could be fixed horizontally by the Guard to exclude passengers.
More on this trip when I can.
List of stations on the Circle Line
Stations are listed in a clockwise direction. Burmese words can be Anglicised in various ways, so alternative spellings of at least some of names may be found.
Golf Course
Kyait Ka Lei
Mingalardon Market
Mingalardon
Wai Bar Gi
North Okkalapa
Pa Ywet Seit Gone
Kyauk Yae Twin
Tadalay
Yaegu
Parami
Kanbe
Bauk Hlaw
Tarmwe
Myittar Nyuni
Mahlwagone (#1)
Pazundaung
YANGON CENTRAL
Pha Yar Lan
Lanmadaw
Pyay Road
Shan Road
Ahlone Road
Pan I Daing (or Pann Hlaing)
Kyee Myin Daing
Hanthawaddy
Hledan
Kamaryut
Thin Myaing
Oakkyin
Thamine
Gyogone
Insein
Ywa Ma
Phi Taw Thar
Phaw Khan
Aung San
Da Nyn Gone (#2)
#1: Before Mahlwagone the line from the north and east converges.
#2: Beyond Da Nyn Gone the line to the west diverges from the Circle Line to Golf Course.
Photographs:
Railways in Myanmar (pictures accompany an earlier post).
The Circle Line, Yangon (pictures accompany an earlier post).
Circle Line Revisited (pictures accompany this post).
Yangon Central Station (recent pictures accompany this post).
[First published 23-Sep-2012, revised 17-Nov-2012, 21-Nov 2012]
