Travel another couple of hours up the Lemro River from Mrauk U and you’ll enter the lower reaches of the Chin State. Most of this mountainous area is currently off limits to travellers but a handful of ethnic villages can now be visited with a guide. The main attractions for tourists, in addition to the outstanding natural beauty, are the ethnic Chin women who sport impressive facial tattoos.

In most villages there are only two or three women remaining with the distinctive tattoos as the tradition is said have died out. I hope to be able to get permission to explore deeper into the Chin State at a later date and see if this is true or not.

The women are very welcoming as they don’t receive too many visitors yet. However, Myanmar’s tourist industry is on the verge of a boom and I suspect these lovely women will soon tire of the intrusion.

The ladies told me that they were about 12 years old when the tattoo ritual took place and the process lasted for three days. Reasons given for the practice vary but the most common explanation is that it was done to make the young girls less attractive to other tribes and prevent them being kidnapped. All agree, however, that the process was extremely painful to endure with even the eyelids being tattoo with the needle and dye extracted from a plant.

There are occasions when I must admit to being a reluctant photographer and upon meeting the Chin women, I experienced one of those moments.  Despite being told that they had no objection to me photographing them, I think I would have preferred just to sit and talk rather than shove my lens in their face. Nevertheless I had a job to do. I was also made to promise that I will try and get a picture to one of the ladies which I intend to do.