It's been a time of heat. I don't mean just the summer, which has been a suffocating one - but also a very strange one. Unfamiliar because 21-degree Celsius weather does not descend 1.5 weeks before supposed-to-be steaming Songkran, the Thai new year. But we live in, and worry about, these climate-extreme times.There are other points of heat - the violence in Myanmar persists. "Things are getting worse day by day. All the prices are high," one of our Myanmar news contributors wailed. We have three Myanmar stories below.While huge contrasts exist between Myanmar and Ukraine, some of the similarities do strike you about the updated ways of war: Russian soldiers demand to see residents' phones in the Ukrainian towns they occupy, just as security forces do in Myanmar. This note too has some pickings around gender, though International Women's Day just passed in March. I share a book I wrote, 'Gender on Our News Radar: A View from Southeast Asia', about gender-informed journalism and how it can improve accuracy, currency, relevance and sensitivity in news work. It's published by Fojo Media Institute.Elsewhere, the political heat has been intense, even incendiary, in the Philippines, with a month left to national elections in May. "Wait, wait, I don't understand. How can people want to vote for Marcos?" is the frequent question posed to me by non-Filipino friends and colleagues. Meantime, it's the time to remember that Songkran comes from a Sanskrit word indicating change or movement. So, may you move well, and safely, in traditional new year! That's Songkran in Thailand, Pi Mai in Laos, Thingyan in Myanmar :)JohannaFounder/editor - Reporting ASEAN | Bangkok reportingaseandesk@fastmail.net