The rhythm of the night in the 19th Street

The glass window shimmered as the rays of the setting sun finally sliced through the thick monsoon cloud that brought intermittent downpour throughout the day. The rain eased to a drizzle and then stopped completely.

Down on the street, vehicles parked on both sides of the lane gave way to plastic chairs and tables, which young kids, women and men alike expertly laid out.

“It’s going to be a good night,” said the headwaiter in one of the restaurants in the 19th Street, undoubtedly the most famous barbeque and drinking place in downtown Yangon.
A group of five young professional men sat around one of the newly laid out tables and immediately the kid waiters took their orders. Minutes later a woman sidled up to the man sitting at the centre of the table and sat on a chair beside him.
“It’s my birthday,” the man said as he raised his first mug of beer, in a toast, to the headwaiter who nodded with a knowing smile.

The evening was darker than usual because of the thick clouds, but LED bulbs lit up the street and the sweet smell of grilled meat and fish lingered in the air. Almost every restaurant has a glass and steel cabinet where pork, chicken, beef, fish, intestine, meatballs, tofu, ribs, squid, prawns, and then mushrooms, broccoli, carrots, asparagus in skewers are stacked.
Not to be outdone, ambulant fruit vendors set up their stalls in the middle of the lane especially near the corner of Maha Bandoola Road, and the whole 19th Street party got into the groove.
Curious tourists trickled in along with groups of young and not so young local habitués who just wanted to unwind with a mug of beer or two after work.
“I just want to relax,” said Ko Kyaw Lin, a worker in an insurance company, who was with his four male friends. “Most of my colleagues come here every Friday night, we just enjoy watching people.”
On the next table one cannot help but overhear two young men passionately discussing – over a tall bottle of beer, of course – communism and anarchism; that such ideals could not be achieve because of man’s innate greed and pride. The two apparently noticed that someone was listening to their lively banter and lowered their voices, eventually drowned out by the chatter of those around them.

Moving deeper into the 19th Street is a hipster bar called Terminal 5, a fully air-conditioned pub, usually frequented by the younger generation of millennials and not a few foreigners. It has a second floor for those who want some quiet place to talk. But downstairs is where the action is, a live band was playing on one side, while live football matches in the English Premier League, were screening on the other.
Two friends came in, sat on the bar and took out their own bottle of Ballantine’s, while a lone young man sat beside them and immediately ordered two shots of whiskey.
“Long day,” said the stranger beside him. He nodded and started toying with his smartphone, apparently not interested in any small talk. A couple of tourists broke into applause after the band’s soulful rendition of the Myanmar version of All-4-One cover “I swear”, and others followed.
A few steps from the Terminal 5 is the Double Happiness bar, which served cocktails and appeared to be a favourite hangout of western backpackers. Then the street turned quiet, poorly lit and gloomy as it empties to Anawrahta Road.
There was nothing in there except for one or two trishaw drivers and two taxi drivers waiting for customers.

But the night was still young and the party was in full swing.
The crowd in Terminal 5 swelled to the street, waiters rushed to set tables for new customers. Ko Kyaw Lin and his friends were still nursing their beer while the two young men next to them were still deep in discussion, hopefully they moved on from pondering about communism and anarchism to reflect on Utopia and platonic love. The young Casanova and his friends was still having a good time, with the woman still sitting beside him.
“This is life in the 19th Street,” said an ethnic Chinese Myanmar citizen who introduced himself as Tom. “People come here to shake off the drudgery of daily life. They come to relax, to have a bit of fun after a hard day’s work.”
Way back in the 1980s, the 19th Street was the go-to place for stevedores and other workers from nearby grains and vegetable warehouses to eat lunch and to have a bottle of local spirit and rum after work. There was no more beer then but the place was always packed with people eating and drinking.
“This has always been a crowded place as far as I can recall,” said the 31-year-old bachelor who now manages the restaurant, which is co-owned by his father and two uncles. “Fights broke out often then but they rarely happen now.”

Tom said that he has been frequenting 19th Street since he was a kid.

“I am not living here but I usually come here because I like to play with my cousins and we have many friends here. When it gets too crowded here we ran to the temple two blocks away and we play there.”
Tom, who works for a small Internet company during the day, considers the 19th Street as a big classroom, where he can learn so many things from the people he meets every day.
When the military ordered the warehouses transferred to another place sometime in the early 1990s, business plummeted in 19th Street for over a year, Tom recalled.
But in 1993, the military allowed beer to be sold in the establishments in the 19th Street and Tom’s restaurant was among the first two, which started selling the alcoholic beverage and the business perked up again.
“You can learn business here and establish many contacts,” he said. “My English is mostly practiced here. There are foreigners here and I talk with them. So I learn from them. Here, everyone speaks in English.”

“If you want your time to be useful you have to love and enjoy anything you do,” he added. “If you are not interested in your job don’t do it anymore. If you choose it you must love it.”
It was quarter past one and Tom and his workers started folding the tent umbrellas and stacked up the chairs and tables inside the restaurant. It was a good business day. Down the street others have also cleared their tables and chairs, except for the young Casanova and his friends who were still drinking while their woman companion rested her head on the table.
As Oscar Wilde said, the only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.
“Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself,” the Irish poet and playwright added.