It was another hot day, but I took to the streets to walk down to the Yangon River. I didn’t know what was down there, and I wanted to find out. Was it an industrial wasteland? Was the shoreline dotted with fishing villages and fishing boats? Could I even reach the river? Could I then cross it? What is on the other side?

A lot of these questions were answered on my stroll along the river, and more questions were raised, such as the wisdom of the “foreigner price.” In some countries, foreigners are charged as much as 20 or 50 times more than local people for basic services, such as a ferry trip across a river. Does this ultimately hurt or harm tourism in any particular country?