MYANMAR GIRLS

YouYou and Kat, two Burmese girls entering their final year of high school, are preparing for the overseas Chinese student exams that may take them from Yangon to Taiwan. Power cuts, shrill whistles, demanding exams, and teenage anxieties shape their everyday lives. Kat is driven and ambitious; YouYou is diligent, determined not to disappoint those around her. As Myanmar’s civil war quietly encroaches on the city through rumours of conscription and parental worry, the girls push themselves to maintain discipline. As the exams approach, they wonder whether studying abroad truly leads to freedom, or to another kind of uncertainty.