It was unthinkable. The wildest dream ever. To talk to Aung San Suu Kyi, the Myanmar democracy icon and 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, a few days after she was released from15 years of incarceration, was next to impossible in 2010. Calling Myanmar was like dialling a distant planet. “Are you crazy? BBC and CNN guys are still stuck in Bangkok trying to get a visa. And you want to talk to Daw on the phone?” retorted a Myanmar opposition leader living in exile in Thailand.
I replied with an affirmative YES. “Do you know she has no cell phone and the army hasn’t allowed her a landline?”
“I don’t care. I MUST talk to her.” A series of secret facsimile messages were since sent from Bangkok to a spokesperson of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) in Myanmar. An old NLD leader having a cell phone connection was arranged to visit her, and the time I should call the number was fixed. It was as precise as a surgical operation. The phone that rang after twenty minutes of relentless dialling was passed on to the then 65-year-old Oxonian who said a hello as sanguient as a hero. The rest’s history. And a world exclusive.
