Extraordinary Love in Thailand: burma border hopping.

With the type of Visa I have (passport, not credit card) I have to leave the country every 90 days and get a stamp. The closest place to cross the border is a little town called Tachilek in Burma (Myanmar). Yeah, there's a lot of bad happening there right now. Here's a few questions that arose in my mind as we were travelling, and may shed some light...
1. What's the difference between Burma and Myanmar? Myanmar is the new name given to Burma when the militaristic regime took over.
2. What's up with Burma now? Seems to have quieted down since the initial protests... read about it here: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071111/ap_on_re_as/myanmar
It's a super-oppressive country, and people try to escape to Thailand. This picture with the barbed wire is the border. The side closest is Burma and the other side it Thailand. There's a river in the middle you can't see from this angle.
3. Why are these policemen boarding the bus? When you ride the bus to Chiang Rai, or anywhere really, police board every trip and check everyone's citizenship card to make sure there aren't any illegal immigrants. Really by everyone, I mean anyone that looks Asian. We don't really get asked for ours.
4. Is going to Burma safe? Oh yeah, the little town we went to has a large market and we just stayed there and shopped for a bit. The most dangerous thing we encountered were the boxes of Marlboros being shoved in our faces...no less than 50 times. Also, evidently I had "lucky money" and they wanted me to spend it. haha. If you were going to travel through the country (which you could...and go to China), Burmese officials would accompany you, and make sure you spend the night in hotels, and not in homes with residents.
4. Are they going to keep my passport? So when you walk through the border, no lie, they ask you to step into this little room, behind this curtain. They take your picture, 500 baht ($15) and hold your passport until you come back through. They give you this "entry permit" that's good for 2 weeks, and you just turn it back in when you leave.
I hope you learned a little...I did. As we sit here on our computers, safe and peaceful, I implore you to do 2 things...Thank God you live in a democracy and PRAY FOR BURMA!!! We have no idea how blessed we really are.