Urban planning book – Alexandre Friederich leaves for Naypyidaw

“It’s a little book that fits everywhere,” Alexandre Friederich told me, handing me “Naypyidaw, City of Space,” whose title reads in Burmese on the cover. My friend didn’t believe so well! Barely eight millimeters thick, light as a feather, the book quickly found its way into my home behind a piece of furniture without my noticing it. I just found it by chance. This adventure finally corresponds to the author, who publishes this time at B2 in Paris. Since I have known him, Alexandre appears and disappears. A ghost. You never know where he is and what he’s doing. The last time I met him was by chance one evening on a station platform in Lausanne. All I can say is that the man moves a lot. The proof! Naypyidaw is located in Burma. It is even officially the political capital since November 2005.

Everything to the power of ten

Fascinated by the strange, the absurd and all that seeks to alienate you, the author of “Easyjet” (Allia, 2014) could only be interested in the construction of a colossal city raised in the place of old teak forests, felled for the occasion in the center of the country. This is an insane project of the military junta in power, led by Than Shwe from 1992 to 2011. An exercise in urban planning where everything would be calculated to the power of ten. Naypyidaw (1) covers no less than 7054 square kilometres, three times the area of ​​the Paris region. Or the sixth of Switzerland, if you prefer. But the people never followed. Apart from the civil servants and the military, forcibly transplanted in November 2005, hardly anyone lives here. Officially, the inhabitants were one million in 2014. The Americans think that they remained then ten times less numerous. The twenty-lane highways (ten on each side), which can be transformed into an airstrip in the event of an attack, therefore remain empty (2). However, you need a car to make, after a long way, the slightest purchase…

Why this megalomaniac capital, when Rangoon was more than enough? Why an urbanism offering, but only from time to time, constructions, ministries, supermarkets, (ruinous) hotels or an entirely gilded pagoda? Alexandre Friederich explains to his reader the paranoia of the state, which has grown with the decades spent at the top of the state by the junta since 1962. Burma believes itself to be permanently on the verge of being invaded. She acts in relation to this fantasy. A response. The small nation is not the only one to suffer from this phenomenon, which is quite Asian. Think of North Korea, whose financial resources go into armaments. Consider also Russia, a nation that is ultimately very un-Western. The Empire, then the USSR and now Putin have reversed the roles of culprit and victim (3).

A second city, underground

Throughout the pages of his short volume, Alexander Friedrich takes us through a ghost town, under which there is a second one, “reserved for the military and which no one should hear about”. The latter would be made of tunnels and underground spaces. The other, the official one, remains in principle accessible. It is a city “that one can visit, but that it is impossible to see”, because of its size. A colossal void that quickly becomes discouraging to survey. The writer, however, says the intellectual underside. As if the business weren’t crazy enough already, it still has to be completely based on astrology and numerology. Than Shwe was superstitious. He saw signs everywhere. Charlatans therefore shared power with the military. They also decided to the minute the moment of the transfer of government activities to Naypyidaw as dictated by its urban planning.

A little disturbing (but what isn’t these days?), the little book turns out to be fascinating. Well written, in a dry and detached tone. Factual. No pathos. The booklet reads like a novel. The only problem is that it’s not fiction. Alexandre Friederich describes a reality to us. The madmen are in power. Note that this is unfortunately hardly a novelty…

(1) The name means ‘the royal city’ or ‘the king’s abode’.
(2) There is also an airport in Naypyidaw. The largest in the world, of course. But during the author’s visit, only two planes landed there a day.
(3) In a way, the current Chinese-style Covid Zero stems IMHO from the same kind of state paranoia. Everything must be controlled against an external enemy…

Practice

“Naypyidaw, City of Space”, by Alexandre Friederich, Editions B2, 72 pages.

Posted today at 5:20 p.m.

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