Passage to Burma

It is a charming and satisfying thing that there are still places in this world where magic seems to pervade the sights, smells, and sounds of a place more than the trappings of the so-called modern world. For more than ten years Scott Stulberg has made multiple pilgrimages to Burma (sometimes called Myanmar) to capture this sense of magic with his cameras. The result of those pilgrimages is captured here in a collection of images that display the heart and soul of this magnificent country.

Burma is a place of dreams. Bagan, where two thousand pagodas carved from the native rock occupy an area one-sixth the size of Washington, DC. Mandalay, an exercise in calm and chaos that seduces the eye in every direction. Inle Lake, where small villages cluster along the water like mussels clinging to the rocky shore. Mrauk, a place so remote that tourists are a curious rarity. And Yangon, (once Rangoon), a tropical coastal city that still bears the trappings of colonial rule along its shady avenues. And around every corner of this country of contrasts are Burma’s Buddhist monks in their distinct saffron robes. Their warmth and openness have come to symbolize this amazing country.

Passage to Burma is Stulberg’s photographic tribute to this remarkable place. It is a country in transition, yet with a timeless quality to it that is captured beautifully in the images in this book. “This is Burma,” wrote Ruyard Kipling, “it is quite unlike any place you know about.”