Parts of this journey undertaken in 1954 could have been lifted directly from my travel diary of Burma in 2013. So much has remained the same in Burma, including the suicidal method of gaining access to a river boat in Mandalay. You walk a narrow (no more than 6 inches wide) plank slung between the shore and the bobbing boat. Ethel didn't like it and neither did I. Only Ethel was lucky - she only had to walk one plank, but the boat I was taking had moored out in the stream, seven boats and seven planks away. No one explained this to me. The last plank between the two boats was narrower and canted to one side, and at that point I decided to go home. However, I hadn't counted on the fact that the Burmese are a helpful and resourceful people, so I was ushered below decks while they aligned the two boats, then pushed me through the porthole of one into the other. I was brought up triumphantly by the owner of the boat to cheers and laughter, while I subsided into a bamboo chair and proceeded to quietly have hysterics.

Many of the sights Ethel saw have been cleaned up, perhaps a little too much, the political situation is very different and of course there are more "mod cons" available, but most of Burma is very much the same. A traveller to the country could still learn a lot from this book. ( )