On Yangon's teeming streets, 2012 was the year of Aung San Suu Kyi. Her once-banished image now appears everywhere, on T-shirts, keychains and coffee mugs. Pirated copies of "The Lady" – the big screen version of Suu Kyi's life – are the best-selling DVD. And in this devoutly Buddhist country, calendars with Suu Kyi's pictures are now outselling even the Lord Buddha.
In just over a year since her release from house arrest, the 66-year-old opposition leader has made the once unthinkable leap into Myanmar's mainstream, transforming from political prisoner to political campaigner. And then another big step: from icon to elected official.

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