Stories & Photographs by Jofelle Tesorio

Veteran Thai journalist Kavi Chongkittavorn says with the latest visits from powerful foreign diplomats to Burma, the isolated country could become a key player in the ASEAN region.                                (Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi after a visit from the British foreign secretary recently. AFP Photo) For decades, Burma has shielded itself from foreign interferences but occasionally deals with the regional bloc ASEAN as a member.  With its upcoming chairmanship of ASEAN, Burma has been showing some signs of opening up. Could it be for real? For more opinion on the Burmese issue, read Chongkittavorn's column at The Nation (Thailand) newspaper .

Gifted with amazing natural resources and untapped tourism destinations, the Philippines should have been getting a lion's share of tourists. But it's beaten black and blue by it's neighbouring countries in Asia like Thailand,  Malaysia and even the unnatural Singapore. These countries get between 10-14 million tourists a year while the Philippines get at most 3 million tourists a year. The new tourism secretary, who used to be a CEO of an advertising agency, used his experiences as an 'ad man' to revive the industry by first creating a catchy slogan that would bring peoples' attention to the country of 7,100 islands. To match Amazing Thailand, Truly Asia and Incredible India, the tourism department came up with 'It's more fun in the Philippines!'                                               (Photo by Roland Benzon via http://interaksyon.com/gallery-fun-with-m...

A Filipina, Lorie Matulay (below, right),54, from Mountain Province, Philippines, has made it on the cover of Dutch Volkskrant magazine. The magazine devoted 6 pages on her story as an Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) cleaning houses in Singapore, Hong Kong and the Netherlands. Now, she finally retires and gets to go home for good.                                                                          (Photo from Volkskrant magazine) Matulay is one of the estimated 8 to 11 million migrant Filipinos that are scattered around 214 countries worldwide, according to the Commission on Filipinos Overseas, whose remittances have reached US$18.76 billion or about 10% of the GDP in 2010. By end of 2011, it was expected to reach $23 billion, making the Philippines the fourth largest remittance-receiving country...

China Eastern Airlines is training its flight crew to kick and punch to assist aircraft police during emergencies.                                                                                                 (Photo from China Daily) The crew are being trained in qin na, a Chinese martial art, according to China Daily. "The first group of 20 China Eastern stewardesses took their first training class on Dec 16, and the company intends to expand the training programme to all its 2,600-plus flight attendants". Knowledge in martial art is also a good way of dealing with unwanted advances from passengers, who think flight attendants are just glorified waitresses.

Among the most admired Asians when it comes to singing are the Filipinos. They are a bunch of talented singers who make entertainment scenes in Bangkok, Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong and even Burma alive. Children are trained early by singing in the Karaoke. the karaoke culture is very much alive in Filipino diasporic communities around the world. Here's something to convince our readers that Karaoke is a Filipino thing. 'Happy Slip', a Filipino-American, made her point in this video... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44s2aur3SJE&feature=relmfu (Photo from NYT)

The best way to welcome the year is to give you who made headlines last year. Asia News Network, an alliance of Asian newspapers, made their choice and it's none other than the renegade Chinese artist Ai Wei-Wei. For more details on outstanding Asians as well as those who didn't make the cut, visit http://www.asianewsnet.net/home/epaper.php?id=3209&st=e