This photo was taken at a temple in Bagan, central Myanmar/Burma, in October 2007. I travelled through two weeks after the bloody riots in Yangon. Widely publicised military violence and government travel warnings had caused the usually busy temple complex to be void of tourists. These children are wearing the traditional makeup of Myanmar, a type of native root ground into a paste which acts both as sunscreen and as a decoration. The eldest boy in this photo is only eleven and has already learned to speak and read fluently in four languages.