Al Jazeera Podcasts.

Today, Myanmar's rebels take on its government.

What these people want now is a real federal Myanmar that encompasses everybody.

Why is Myanmar's government struggling to keep rebel forces at bay?

I'm Kevin Horton, and this is the take.

The city of Mayawadi is on Myanmar's border with Thailand.

A pair of bridges span the river, connecting it to the Thai town of Maysat.

Al Jazeera correspondent Tony Chang visited it for the first time in 2008, sneaking in as a tourist because of restrictions on reporting there.

It was a very different place. There was trade going across the border in a considerable

amount of it, but there were people living in bamboo shacks on top of small ponds that they

would keep fishing. It was very undevelopeded dirt roads, very few tarmac roads even.

In the last 15, 16 years, it's grown into a very sophisticated city. There's a lot of

border trade, ties who go to do duty-free shopping on the other side, and other tourists,

a lot of tourists from China, for example, who are attracted

by the casino businesses that have grown up on the edge of the city.

And it's an indicator of the country's fortunes.

There's a direct line from here to Yangon, the biggest city inside Myanmar.

A massive amount of trade went across that border.

I mean, some years ago it was estimated that 40% of Myanmar's GDP came this way.

Now I think it's estimated that trade is worth well over a billion dollars.

More recently, Tony has been reporting from just across the border in the town of Maysat and Thailand

on what's going on in Myanmar.

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