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A longyi is a sheet of cloth widely worn in Burma. It is approximately 2 m (6½ ft.) long and 80 cm (2½ ft.) wide. The cloth is often sewn into a cylindrical shape. It is worn around the waist, running to the feet. It is held in place by folding fabric over, without a knot. It is also sometimes folded up to the knee for comfort. Similar garments are found in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, the Malay Archipelago, and Juiz de Fora. In the Indian subcontinent (Bangladesh, West Bengal, South India, and Sri Lanka), it is known variously as a lungi, longi, kaili or saaram.
The Mros, also known as Murangs or Mru, are a community inhabiting the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh and also in Burma with a population of 21,963 in Bangladesh according to the 1991 census. The Mros are the 2nd largest tribal group in Bandarban District of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. A small group of Mros also live in Rangamati Hill District.<br/><br/> They primarily speak the Mru language, a Tibeto-Burman language, and one of the recognized languages of Bangladesh. The Mru language was considered "definitely endangered" by UNESCO in June 2010. The Mru people live near the intersection of Myanmar, Bangladesh and India. Many Mru live within the Yoma District and the Arakan hills of Rakhine State in western Myanmar.
The Tripuri (Tipra or Tipperah) people are the original inhabitants of the Kingdom of Tripura in North-East India and Bangladesh. The Tripuri people through the Royal family of the Debbarmas ruled the Kingdom of Tripura for more than 2000 years till the kingdom joined the Indian Union in 1949.<br/><br/> The Tripuris live on the slopes of hills in a group of five to fifty families. Their houses in these areas are built of bamboo or ua as it is called in Kokborok and raised five to six feet high to save themselves from the dangers of the wild animals. Nowadays a considerable section of this community are living in the plains and erecting houses like the plains people, adopting their methods of cultivation, and following them in other aspects of life, such as dress, manners, and cosmetics.
Singapore hosted a trading post of the East India Company in 1819 with permission from the Sultanate of Johor. The British obtained sovereignty over the island in 1824 and Singapore became one of the British Straits Settlements in 1826. Occupied by the Japanese in World War II, Singapore declared independence, uniting with other former British territories to form Malaysia in 1963, although it was separated from Malaysia two years later. Since then it has had a massive increase in wealth, and is one of the Four Asian Tigers. Singapore is the world's fourth leading financial centre, and its port is one of the five busiest ports in the world.
Sri Lanka had always been an important port and trading post in the ancient world, and was increasingly frequented by merchant ships from the Middle East, Persia, Burma, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and other parts of Southeast Asia. The islands were known to the first European explorers of South Asia and settled by many groups of Arab and Malay merchants.<br/><br/> A Portuguese colonial mission arrived on the island in 1505 headed by Lourenço de Almeida, the son of Francisco de Almeida. At that point the island consisted of three kingdoms, namely Kandy in the central hills, Kotte at the Western coast, and Yarlpanam (Anglicised Jaffna) in the north. The Dutch arrived in the 17th century. The British East India Company took over the coastal regions controlled by the Dutch in 1796, and in 1802 these provinces were declared a crown colony under direct rule of the British government, therefore the island was not part of the British Raj. The annexation of the Kingdom of Kandy in 1815 by the Kandyan convention, unified the island under British rule.<br/><br/> European colonists established a series of cinnamon, sugar, coffee, indigo cultivation followed by tea and rubber plantations and graphite mining. The British also brought a large number of indentured workers from Tamil Nadu to work in the plantation economy. The city of Colombo was developed as the administrative centre and commercial heart with its harbor, and the British established modern schools, colleges, roads and churches that introduced Western-style education and culture to the Ceylonese.<br/><br/> On 4 February 1948 the country gained its independence as the Dominion of Ceylon. It changed its name to Sri Lanka in 1972.
The First Indochina War (also known as the French Indochina War, Anti-French War, Franco-Vietnamese War, Franco-Vietminh War, Indochina War, Dirty War in France, and Anti-French Resistance War in contemporary Vietnam) was fought in French Indochina from December 19, 1946, until August 1, 1954, between the French Union's French Far East Expeditionary Corps, led by France and supported by Emperor Bảo Đại's Vietnamese National Army against the Việt Minh, led by Hồ Chí Minh and Võ Nguyên Giáp. Most of the fighting took place in Tonkin in Northern Vietnam, although the conflict engulfed the entire country and also extended into the neighboring French Indochina protectorates of Laos and Cambodia. The war ended in French defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954.
The River Mekong is the world's 12th-longest river. From its Himalayan source on the Tibetan plateau, it flows some 4,350 km (2,703 miles) through China's Yunnan province, Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, finally draining in the South China Sea. The recent construction of hydroelectric dams on the river and its tributaries has reduced the water flow dramatically during the dry season in Southeast Asia.