A well-dressed man in glasses is frowning at me. I am on the dock of the last major town on the Irrawaddy, in the delta region where greenery has replaced the desert scrub of the dry zone.

Ignoring protests from foreign governments and aid agencies, Burma's reclusive military junta refused widespread access to the devastated Irrawaddy delta for weeks after the storm hit. Foreign ...

This is surprising, for gourmets have always viewed hilsa from the Irrawaddy delta with scepticism, considering its taste inferior to the catch from the Ganga in Bengal or Padma and Meghna in ...