Impromptu charities aid Myanmar cyclone survivors

TWANTE, Myanmar (Reuters) - People in Myanmar's capital Yangon, dismayed by their government's torpid response to the cyclone catastrophe, are driving out to the countryside to hand out donations to villagers.

"The government's not doing anything, so we have to try," said an employee of a company that loaded up a small truck with rice and water and was planning to drive to Pathein, a staging area for the government's relief effort.

"I'm just going to hand things out from the truck, because I heard someone was beaten by the police when he went to the village."

Yangon driver Thi Ha, 24, and 10 friends filled two pickup trucks with 1,600 bottles of water and biscuits and went down to Twante township, an hour's drive south of Yangon. "Everyone should try to give something," Thi Ha said. "People are so poor. They really need it."

One businessman from Yangon turned up in the roadside village of Aii Gyaing handing out the traditional wrap-around longgi skirts that both men and women wear. He was mobbed. People in Aii Gyaing said one man drove past throwing money out the window of his car. A cleric from a Yangon mosque came by and gave each family 2,000 kyat ($2).

Another car handed out bread to children. Than Myo Tun, 7, who said he hid under a blanket during the storm was appreciative. "I've never eaten this before. It's very delicious."

Roadside villages were getting something at least from these impromptu charities. Places further into the countryside and reachable only by paddle boat were getting hardly anything.

One such village in Twante township had not seen anyone since soldiers came by five days ago giving out three cups of rice per family.

"Usually, villagers here buy food day by day," said U Toe Maung, head of the village of 1,000. "But prices are so high now we can't buy anything." The village's fresh water pond has been flooded with salt water from the cyclone that whipped up a 3.5 metre surge of sea-water, and the rice mill destroyed.

(Writing by Bill Tarrant; Editing by Valerie Lee)