Three Pagodas Pass

Most western critics of the junta that has ruled Burma since 1962—violently suppressing the democracy movement and crushing human rights while dominating the international opium trade—have hesitated to visit the country lest the cost of their trip help to prop up the regime. George Fetherling shared these concerns. But motivated by a desire to see the situation first hand, he resolved to go anyway—as economically as possible.

Setting out from Greece, he hitchhiked on a reconditioned but very...