Rakhine & the Ayeyarwady Delta

Rakhine, historically Arakan, faces west across the Bay of Bengal and was long separated from the Ayeyarwady valley by the Rakhine Yoma hills. Early kingdoms at Dhanyawadi and Waithali were Buddhist and Hindu, and Rakhine tradition holds that the Mahamuni Buddha image was cast at Dhanyawadi in the Buddha's lifetime. In 1430 King Min Saw Mon regained the Arakanese throne with help from the Sultanate of Bengal, and for the next three centuries the Mrauk U kingdom was a trading power whose kings used Muslim titles alongside Buddhist ones and dealt with Portuguese and Dutch merchants.

The Konbaung king Bodawpaya conquered Arakan in 1784 and carried the Mahamuni image to his capital near Mandalay. Britain took Arakan in 1826, and Akyab, now Sittwe, grew into a rice port. The delta changed even more: in the late 19th century the colonial government and migrants cleared mangrove and swamp to create one of the world's great rice-exporting regions, settled by Bamar, Karen and Indian labour.

After independence both areas saw insurgency, including the Karen insurgency from 1949. In 2008 Cyclone Nargis killed around 138,000 people, mostly in the delta. In Rakhine, violence between Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims in 2012 confined many Rohingya to camps, and the military's campaign of 2016–17 drove about 740,000 into Bangladesh. The Arakan Army, a Rakhine nationalist force, fought the military from the late 2010s and after 2023 took control of most of the state's townships.

The Rakhine are Theravada Buddhists who speak a language closely related to Burmese and often treated as a dialect of it, and they are proud of their separate kingdom and history. The Mahamuni image, cast at Dhanyawadi according to Rakhine tradition, has been in Mandalay since its removal in 1784. Traditional kyin wrestling is a cherished part of Rakhine culture.

Rakhine State is also home to the Rohingya, a Muslim people denied citizenship under the 1982 citizenship law and referred to by the state as "Bengali", as well as the Kaman Muslims, who are recognised citizens, and hill peoples such as the Chin and Mro. Relations between communities are deeply scarred.

The delta is Bamar and Karen, Buddhist and Christian, with Karen Baptist churches in many towns. Pathein is known for its parasols, painted cotton and silk umbrellas made in family workshops, and delta life revolves around the pagoda festivals, the river and the rice calendar of planting and harvest.

Pathein, on the Pathein river, is the delta's main city and port; Hinthada, Myaungmya, Pyapon, Bogale and Labutta are the other main towns, and millions live in villages along creeks and embankments. The delta grows much of Myanmar's rice, along with pulses and jute, and fishing, shrimp farming and fish-paste making are major livelihoods. Mangrove clearance for farming left villages exposed to Nargis, and replanting has been a long project since.

Sittwe is the Rakhine capital and port; Kyaukphyu on Ramree Island is the start of the oil and gas pipelines to Yunnan in China and the site of a planned deep-sea port, and Thandwe serves Ngapali.

Since the renewed war, Rakhine has lived under blockade: shortages of food, fuel and medicine, long internet and phone cuts, and displacement on a large scale, with Rohingya camps near Sittwe among the most vulnerable. The delta's rhythm is slower and quieter, set by boats, markets and the monsoon, but conscription and rising prices have reached every village.

Rakhine food is closely associated with fish and seafood. The signature dish is Rakhine mont di, rice vermicelli noodles now popular across Myanmar. Ngapali's fishing villages supply fresh seafood to the beach restaurants, and dried and fermented fish are central to the region's everyday cooking.

The delta is Myanmar's larder of rice and fish. Freshwater fish curries, prawn dishes and ngapi, the pungent fermented fish or shrimp paste, are made here in quantity and sent across the country, and mohinga is a natural breakfast in a region of rivers and fish.

Pathein is famous for its halawa, a pudding of glutinous rice flour, milk, butter, coconut and sugar, first sold in the town in the 1930s. Coconut, sticky-rice snacks and fresh toddy palm juice complete the region's sweets, with sweet milk tea in the teashops.

In Rakhine State, Mrauk U is the region's great site: a former royal city of stone temples and stupas spread across low hills and rice fields. The Shite-thaung temple, built in the 16th century and filled with Buddha images and carved reliefs, the maze-like Koe-thaung, the fortress-like Htukkanthein and the Andaw pagoda are the best known, and the Lemro river, rising in the Chin hills, flows through Mrauk U township. Sittwe, at the mouth of the Kaladan, was the start of the boat trip upriver to Mrauk U.

Further south, Ngapali Beach near Thandwe is a long sweep of sand backed by palms and fishing villages, and Ramree Island lies off the coast between them.

In the Ayeyarwady delta, Pathein has the gilded Shwemokhtaw Pagoda, parasol workshops and a riverside market, and is the base for the beaches of Chaung Tha and Ngwe Saung on the Bay of Bengal. The delta's waterways, reached by boat from Pathein, Bogale or Pyapon, lead through rice fields, fishing villages and mangroves, and the Meinmahla Kyun wildlife sanctuary protects mangrove forest and saltwater crocodiles at the edge of the sea.