THE TROUSER PEOPLE
Colonial Shadows in Modern-Day Burma
By ANDREW MARSHALL
Washington: Counterpoint, 2002. 256 pages, $26

reviewed by Adrienne Mong

Conventional historians have it that Burma was an incidental British colony—a land that was folded into Britain's Empire piecemeal through a succession of wars in the nineteenth century, only because it bordered the crown jewel, India. But one servant of Empire recognized Burma's intrinsic value: Sir George Scott, a Scottish adventurer who dabbled in journalism, photography, and sport. This singular character was responsible for charting Burma's frontiers in the 1870s, particularly the crucial border with China, and in doing so played a key role in establishing British rule over the Burmese highlands.

Described as having "a fondness for gargantuan pith-helmets and a bluffness of expression that bordered on the Pythonesque," Scott arrived in Burma "armed with nothing more than the moral force of the Raj." In hacking his way through the Burmese jungles, Scott would disarm every tribe he encountered. It is believed that he once won over members of the fierce Wa tribe, known principally for their head-hunting practices, by telling a joke so funny that it survived translation through four separate tribal languages before being presented to the Wa in their own tongue. But Scott was perhaps best known for The Burman, an 1882 work still considered today "an authority on everything Burmese, from ear boring and exorcism to monastery construction and the funereal requirements of sacred white elephants," according to the author of The Trouser People, British journalist Andrew Marshall, who first began writing about Asia in 1993 and is now based in Bangkok. Scott's masterly grasp of things Burmese, combined with a strong faith in imperialism, a colorful personality, and a trail of legendary tales, makes him an intriguing historical figure. So it is rather puzzling that this Victorian hero has lapsed into near-obscurity—much as Burma has itself.

Leave it to Marshall to attempt resurrecting Scott's spirit and reinvigorate interest in Burma. The Trouser People is part history and part travelogue, and labors hard to restore luster not only to Scott's reputation as esteemed adventurer and eccentric chronicler but also to Burma, which for the past half-century has been relegated to the margins of modern empire, hamstrung by a repressive military regime and forgotten by its former colonizers. Inspired by a dusty collection of Scott's diaries, Marshall treks across Burma, beginning in Rangoon and the surrounding plains and ending in the highland jungles bordering Thailand. Along the way, he encounters a vivid array of characters: a forgotten grandson of Burma's last imperial ruler, King Thibaw, who in 1886 was banished by the British to India; a casino-hall dancer from Siberia; a devout Christian American student of Chinese; and a motley lineup of hilltribe members–turned–guides.

A political parable of sorts also happens to be one of the more amusing accounts. At one point in his trip, Marshall attends a European football, or soccer, match. Scott, a great fan of the sport, had introduced it to a group of curious Burmese students at St. John's College in Rangoon in 1878. It wasn't long before regular matches sprang up between teams of Burmese (called the Putsoes, a putso being the sarong pulled up between the legs) and British (called the Trousers, because they didn't wear sarongs, and whence the book's title). The game also adopted political significance beyond what could be imagined by the self-assured colonials. "For the British, football was a way of communicating ideas of fair play and respect for authority. For the Burmese, it was something else: a rare opportunity to thrash their colonial masters at their own game," observes Marshall.

This subversive approach to sport would apply to present-day Burma, when Marshall sits in on a game between the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of Finance and Revenue. The level of play is middling and uninspired, but what seizes his attention is the behavior of the other spectators. In a country where gatherings of five or more people are considered illegal, it is astonishing to see a thousand football fans collectively shout abuse at the players—all of whom, of course, are officials. "They had smoked a few cheroots, they had watched some eventful footie, they had hurled abuse at various members of the police and military," writes Marshall. "For ordinary Burmese, that's just about the most fun you can have in public without getting arrested." Much of Marshall's writing is diverting, especially as he has a nice turn of phrase. Nonetheless, the book fails to engage the reader entirely. Part of the problem may be that the writer skips back and forth too frequently between his own journey and Scott's experiences. While the parallel narration occasionally works, more often than not it results in a disjointed story that repeatedly stops and starts. Moreover, while his observations are well drawn, they lack incisive analysis and depth to convincingly show how little has changed between colonial Burma and present-day Burma—surely one of the more compelling conclusions based on his tour around the country.