U Thant’s House

It’s a rags-to-riches story like none other in Myanmar’s history: the boy from the Ayeyarwady Delta, born into a poor family, who grew up to become Asia’s first United Nations secretary-general. During his 10 years in office, from 1961 to 1971, U Thant played a pivotal role in defusing the Cuban Missile Crisis, oversaw an end to conflict in the Congo, and launched several humanitarian projects. He won respect overseas and adoration at home. After his death in 1974, student protesters died trying to seize his coffin from the military so he could be buried where they saw fit.

“We think he is a hero,” as one local put it.

Now, more than four decades after that chaotic funeral, and despite attempts by the former military junta to erase his memory, a museum at U Thant’s house in Yangon is bringing his story to a new generation. In tribute to its past owner, the restored two-story colonial house has also hosted meetings of United Nations representatives and groups working to make peace between the army and ethnic groups in Myanmar.

The U Thant House, denoted by a large blue and white sign in the driveway, stands in a leafy part of the commercial capital. On a recent Sunday evening, the grounds were empty apart from a young female guide in a shirt and longyi, or Burmese sarong. On the balcony of the room that was U Thant’s bedroom, an easy chair soaked up the last of the sun’s rays. Black and white photographs in the dining room downstairs showed the diplomat shaking hands with world leaders – John F Kennedy, Indira Gandhi, Haile Selassie and others – and on the cover of TIME magazine.

It was during the 1950s, the era of Myanmar’s brief flirtation with parliamentary democracy, that U Thant lived in this house, working as secretary to the country’s first prime minister, U Nu. The pair had been friends since boyhood. They took walks around the neighborhood, where the prime minister also lived, and chewed over the critical issues of the time, the diplomat’s grandson, Thant Myint-U, described in The River of Lost Footsteps. It was the last place they lived before moving to the United States, where U Thant worked first as Myanmar’s permanent representative to the United Nations and, four years later, as secretary-general.

“I think, for [my] mother, it’s been a very special thing to have the old house come back to life,” wrote Thant Myint-U, in an email from Europe. In a speech at the opening of the museum Aye Aye Thant, who was a teenager when the family lived in the house, remembered walking with her father after dinner, taking two steps for every one of his. “I remember times when I would be talking on the phone with a friend and the phone operator would come on the line and say things like, ‘The prime minister is calling, would you please put the phone down!’” she said.

Thant Myint-U, founder of the Yangon Heritage Trust (YHT), which protects historic buildings, initiated the project to restore his grandfather’s house in 2012. The place, like many colonial structures in Yangon and across the country, was in ruins. “The roof had fallen in, the bricks were coming apart, the stairs had collapsed and there was a four-foot high termite nest underneath what was left,” he wrote in an email. “The garden was a jungle.”

The museum opened in 2013, with a basic photo exhibit. The newest display, laid out on the top floor of the house and unveiled in late February, features detailed panels on U Thant’s personal and political lives, as well as revealing letters to and from world leaders. In addition to its capacity as a museum, the house has hosted lectures on issues ranging from the Cuban Missile Crisis to contemporary United Nations politics. According to Thant Myint-U, the Beyond Ceasefires Initiative has also held meetings there over the past year, with world experts joining representatives of Myanmar ethnic groups. There are plans to house a digital library on-site. So far, the funding has come from private donors, including tycoon Tay Zar, known for his close ties to former Senior General Than Shwe.

‘Smoldering Hatred’

But for many years U Thant’s name was anathema to Myanmar’s leaders. Ne Win, the junta chief who led the 1962 coup that displaced the U Nu government, nursed what Thant Myint-U calls a “smoldering hatred” for U Thant, due to his close ties to the former Prime Minister. When the diplomat died from lung cancer, the military regime denied him any special treatment. A government minister who suggested that the day of the funeral be a holiday was fired. The issue became a rally point for student groups, who hijacked the burial twice, driving the coffin to the old Student Union, a symbolic spot. In the military crackdown that followed, dozens were killed – some of the students reportedly trying to shield the coffin to the very last.

“The Ne Win regime as well as the military regime which followed (1988-2010) was wary of the memory of U Thant, because of the military’s crushing of the 1974 demonstration,” said Professor Paul Chambers, a researcher on Southeast Asia, in an email. “Today, U Thant is still held in enormous regard by those Burmese who remember him – honored as a Burmese statesman, peacemaker and devout Buddhist – all unencumbered by any military dictatorship.”

But Thurein Aung, a researcher with YHT who worked on the installation of the new exhibition, said that the younger generation was less informed about the history. The inclusion of U Thant’s life in the national curriculum was not in the interest of the ruling military, he wrote in an email. “Until a few years ago, the life of U Thant and his achievements were virtually unknown to most young people. Young people might have heard of him, but that’s about it...I hope the story of a boy from a rural town from the backwater of the British Empire becoming the Secretary General of the UN will inspire many young people from Myanmar who are in dire need of a role model to look up to.”