As Myanmar clanender, Myanmar travel season will be soon. So I collected the Myanmar tourism industry news from local journal, magazine and website and posted in this section. I hope this section will be usefull to the tourist who want to come to Myanmar and find out the travel information.

Exotissimo Creates Trips to Irrawaddy Delta

Thailand, September 5, 2008 -- The world watched in dismay as Cyclone Nargis devastated the Irrawaddy Delta region and damaged outlying parts of Yangon three months ago.

During the initial recovery period, many NGOs and private organizations raised funds and helped rebuild the struggling area.

Exotissimo Travel was one of the companies that reached out and raised over 100,000 USD to provide food starting from as early as of 9th May, clothe people, rebuild homes, schools , medical clinics and help farmers reclaim their paddy fields.

Three months since this disaster, most of the world has forgotten Nargis and its victims. The survivors have moved from public shelters and back to their villages, intent on rebuilding their lives. These villagers have mostly moved on, though there remains much to be done for them to return to normalcy.

According to Mrs. Su Su Tin, Managing Director of Exotissimo Myanmar, "Many people want to visit the Delta, see the situation with their own eyes and lend a helping hand." To enable people from around the world to visit and donate to the disaster-stricken area, Exotissimo Myanmar is now able to offer tours into the delta town of Pyarpone .

While visiting this area, guests are able to talk with village elders, visit with local schools and clinics part of the reconstruction effort or donate equipment or livestock to help survivors re-start their lives. Visits to the delta can range from a day trip to a full four-day two-night itinerary, such as this one http://www.exotissimo.com/travel-asia/myanmar/mn-tours/heart-of-the-delta.html.

"The simple gift of a pair of pigs or a hand tractor can make a huge difference in someone's life. We want to show to the world that the Myanmar people are resilient, and remain hopeful in the face of tragedy," added Mrs. Su Su Tin.

Exotissimo Travel is a local tour operator based in Bangkok, but with offices throughout Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand including Yangon and Siem Reap.

The company focuses on designing custom travel holidays providing unique travel experiences. Opened in 1993, the company is now a network of 15 locally-based offices staffing over 500 travel professionals, and sales offices in San Francisco, Paris, Barcelona, Berlin and Melbourne. The company's depth of experience and large infrastructure enable it to create unique itineraries with the operational confidence to fulfill client expectations.
Ref : PR Web

All Resort hotels to reopen in Myanmar in October

YANGON, Sept. 4 -- All famous resort hotels lying in three beach areas of Myanmar will reopen next month despite drop of tourist arrivals over the past few months impacted by May cyclone, the local weekly 7-Day News reported Thursday.

    These beach resorts are Ngapali, Ngwe Saung and Chaungtha which escaped from being affected by the disaster.

    Hotel staff are being mobilized to keep ready for serving visitors, while domestic flights to the areas from Yangon are being arranged to operate in time, the report said.

    The key motor road between Yangon and Pathein under renovation is being strived for completion before October, it said.

    These measures are taken as part of Myanmar's efforts to revive its tourism industry severely affected by the May storm.

    Although it has been over three months after the cyclone smashed Myanmar, tourist arrivals during the period fell 90 percent compared with the previous years correspondingly.

    The drop of the tourist arrivals has brought about much impact on all tourism-related businesses, the Tourism Entrepreneurs Association (TEA) said, adding that means are being sought to overcome these difficulties and get free from the status.

    As part of the remedial measures, the TEA has reshuffled its central executive committee to pave way for improving its tourism undertakings in the next three years.

    Also as part of its efforts to restore tourism operation in the aftermath of the cyclone storm, Myanmar is planning to hold a market festival in Inlay, one of the country's famous tourist sites in Shan state, according to local report.

    Preparations including upgrading of hotels and restaurants are underway for the two-day market festival scheduled for next February, sources with the Ministry of hotels and Tourism said.

    Myanmar has also laid down a tourism restoration plan to strive for maintaining the momentum of tourism industry operation in the coming open season near the end of this year.
Ref : Xinhua

Exotissimo Travel Offers Expedited Visa on Arrival to Myanmar

Thailand, September 2, 2008 -- An often-cited complaint about traveling to Myanmar is that the visa application process can seem overly long and complicated. After the protests of September 2007 and even moreso after Cyclone Nargis ravaged the Irrawaddy Delta, global perception has been that the application process is overly long, too thorough and a sign that Myanmar is not welcoming to tourists. Some travelers worry that the long processing time makes it difficult for them to use their passports for travel while waiting for permission to travel.

Recognizing that this situation can be quite frustrating for travelers, Exotissimo Myanmar has worked out a relationship with the Ministry of Hotel and Tourism to offer expedited Visas On Arrival (VOA). Travellers to the "Golden Land" are able to send their information and a scanned passport ahead to the Exotissimo office in Myanmar as an alternative of obtaining a visa from Myanmar Embassies abroad.

"We are very proud to be able to offer this service to our clients," says Mrs. Su Su Tin, Managing Director of Exotissimo Travel Myanmar. " Some of the tourists who wish to come to Myanmar are turned-off by the visa process. Being able to offer a VOA is something that we can do that makes it easier for people to visit our country, and certainly takes most of the sting out of the visa application process."

Upon arrival at Yangon International airport, Exotissimo staff meet visitors at the gate and escort them through the visa process. Guests will need to pay the 20 USD visa fee and provide two passport pictures direct to the airport Immigration. "Our office is very experienced and arranged VOA efficiently without any problem. We can also obtain last minute VOA for urgent cases" says Mrs. Su Su Tin.

Exotissimo Travel is a local tour operator based in Bangkok, but with offices throughout Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand . The company focuses on designing custom travel holidays providing unique travel experiences. Opened in 1993, the company is now a network of 15 locally-based offices staffing over 500 travel professionals, and sales offices in San Francisco, Paris, Barcelona, Berlin and Melbourne. The company's depth of experience and large infrastructure enable it to create unique itineraries with the operational confidence to fulfill client expectations.
Ref : PR Web


Myanmar's colonial-era Strand Hotel well preserved

YANGON, Myanmar - In the colonial heyday of this elegant Victorian hotel, gentlemen in white dinner jackets and ladies in flowing gowns sipped cocktails on the shaded verandah as the sun went down, enjoying a welcome respite from the tropical heat.
The legendary Strand Hotel was one of the great watering holes of theBritish Empire. Just like Raffles Hotel in Singapore or the Mandarin Oriental in Bangkok, the 107-year old Strand remains a national landmark.
Yangon has the largest number of colonial buildings in Southeast Asia, including colonnaded government offices and sumptuous official residences, but most are dilapidated, neglected for decades.
Large black water streaks mark most of the facades, and bushes sprout from the roofs of some, including the stately High Court building _ adjacent to a rooftop statue of a British lion still gazing over his domain.
Surprisingly, however, most of the old buildings appear to have survived relatively unscathed the fury of Cyclone Nargis which devastated the capital when it roared through on May 3. Although many modern structures were badly hit with their roofs torn off, the city's historic downtown district appears relatively undamaged ..
The Strand was built in 1901 by the Sarkies brothers, Armenian refugees from Turkey who founded a chain of luxury hotels in the region, including Raffles, the Oriental, the Majapahit in the Indonesian port of Surabaya, and the Eastern & Oriental in Penang, Malaysia. In the 1920s and '30s, it became a favorite hangout of famous writers, British officers, celebrities and even royalty. Luminaries such as Rudyard Kipling, W. Somerset Maugham, Graham Greene, Noel Coward, George Orwell and Lord Mountbatten were all regular customers. More recently, it has accommodated the likes of Mick Jagger and Oliver Stone.
Completely renovated in 1990, its teak floors are polished and gleaming, the antique chandeliers sparkle in the spacious and luxurious reception rooms and the quintessential colonial icon _ the ceiling fans _ gently rotate above tables surrounded by rattan chairs in the cozy cafe.
But today, the Strand is mostly empty, just like in other hotels in this city of five million once called Rangoon. Since the cyclone swept through the nearby Irrawaddy Delta killing more than 130,000 people, the number of guests has plummeted.
«It's understandable that a tragedy of this scale has badly affected Myanmar's entire tourist industry,» said the hotel's manager Budiman Widjaja. «But we hope that with the passage of time things will improve.
Before World War II, the Strand was reserved for «whites only,» but during the Japanese occupation of Burma _ as Myanmar was formerly known _ it became an army barracks. It received its first Burmese guests only after the war.
The socialist military regime that ruled the nation from 1962 to 1988 nationalized the hotel and it became a rundown shadow of its former self.
But since the early 1990s, the military junta has tried to encourage foreign tourism, and the property was acquired by Adrian Zecha, the founder of Singapore's exclusive Aman Resorts chain, and renovation began.
The Strand reopened in 1995 as an all-suite, top-of-the range boutique hotel. Its teak and marble floors, mahogany furniture, and canopied beds compliment original pieces, like period bathroom fixtures.

But unlike the other grand old hotels in the region, the Strand's restoration remained true to its architectural past, and it has no new wing, and no swimming pool or tennis courts.
«We came to the Strand because of its old-world romantic charm,» said Tomas Llobet, from Brussels,Belgium, who was celebrating a marriage anniversary with his wife Victoria. «We wanted to be in a place with a lot of historic character, properly renovated without huge concessions to modernity.
The ghosts of the British colonels would approve their choice.
f You Go...
STRAND HOTEL: 92 Strand Road, Yangon, Myanmar; www.ghmhotels.com/ or 011-951-243-377. Room rates listed on the hotel's Web site begin at US$550. 
Ref : AP