Does a protective curse prevent the regime from pulling it down?... Yawnghwe Haw, the large wood and brick palace of Burma?s first president, Sao Shwe Thaike, near Inle Lake in southern Shan State, has survived the ravages of Burma?s turbulent history—unlike its ill-fated former occupant, who died in jail. Some suggest that the palace owes its survival to a protecting curse on anyone daring to pull it down. That was the fate of the famous Shan palace Haw Sao Pha Kengtung, demolished by the Burmese military junta in 1991. Now known as Yawnghwe (Nyaungshwe) Haw Museum, Sao Shwe Thaike?s palace has undergone superficial renovation to repair damage caused by years of neglect, when squatters occupied outbuildings and graffiti was scrawled on some of the walls. The exhibits themselves have been catalogued and explained by the museum?s curators with only a cursory nod to historical fact. Built in the Mandalay tradition and completed in the late 1920s, Yawnghwe Haw is a fine example of Shan palace architecture, though perhaps not as impressive as the demolished Haw Sao Pha Kengtung. The museum?s collection contains precious and beautiful artifacts—elaborate royal thrones, teak tables, divans, sedans and palanquins. Also included are numerous costumes belonging to the Shan sawbwas, or rulers, from Yawnghwe as well as Kengtung..."