TWANTE, Myanmar — When the bullock carts lugging passengers and produce pulled into Yangon, coated in the umber dust of the countryside, the people on board, if not the oxen, used to be able to count on refreshment.

On many a street corner, often under a shade tree, stood what looked like a dollhouse on stilts. Inside was a rotund clay pot covered by a triangle of woven leaves. The pot held drinking water.

Cool without refrigeration, sweet with the taste of earth, nothing slaked the insistent thirst of the tropics better, according to some residents of Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city.