DOWNTIME in NGAPALI BEACH

No words needed.  Quiet, beautiful, brilliant sunsets and starry nights. For just a taste click for the photos…

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BAGAN

The medieval site of Bagan occupies an area of about 50 sq. km., was reputedly visited by Marco Polo and was considered a major center of study in Asia between the 11th and 13th centuries.  Today the large archaeological area comprises the villages of Old Bagan, New Bagan and the largish town(over 50.000 inhabitants) of Nyaungu, where our boat dropped us.  We’ve opted to stay in New Bagan, where our hotel is at the edge of town, and while old fashioned, very well appointed with spacious rooms and an inviting pool, not to mention an extremely attentive staff.

After the turmoil of the cities, it’s wonderful to be “out in the country”, something that becomes even more of a joy, when we discover that we can rent an e-motorbike to make our own way around the area.  We cut a deal with the savvy Ay Ay, who runs one of the multitude of e-bike rental stands, hers being at the corner just beyond Ruby’s Guest House.  She’s thrilled to have 6 days of rental and we’re excited to head out and about.
 
After breakfast it’s a surprisingly chilly and horribly smoky ride to Old Bagan, the epicenter of the archaelogical site.  The incessant morning smoke is due to all the leaf burning from the continuously shedding dessicated trees. We park our bike and wander the extensive grounds.  There are a couple of large temples, both of which are still in use by locals, and numerous stupas and temples that house Buddhas, but appear to be of lesser importance.  Each temple has its contingent of sand painters, souvenir hawkers and drink stands, along with wandering postcard selling waifs, and often a handful of students who sell George Orwell’s Burmese Days and other English language novels about Burma/Myanmar.  They’ve all got stories about how they need money to go to school, and want to practice their English.  More  amusing is the number of usually young locals who literally come right up to you to take selfies with one or both of us.  To our surprise this often includes monks!  This has happened all over the country, but we still haven’t quite got used to this celebrity status.

I’ve determined that our map is pretty useless, but after driving around a bit, I get a decent sense of where the major sites are.  Outside the main “fenced” archaeological area lies the famed Ananda Temple, which has a  beautiful double corridor running around its central four beautiful standing Buddhas.  The hallways are full of  framed niches for a variety of smaller Buddhas.  It’s early afternoon, so we ride home on our wonderfully silent e-bike, and duck out of the tremendous dust and peak level heat.

Each day we’re up early, several times to look at the sunrise from a nearby temple we’ve discovered where you can sit on the roof with virtually no company.  Not as high as the famed and generally mobbed Shwesandaw Temple, which is one of the only remaining structures that is climbable in Bagan, but just as nice, and infinitely more peaceful.  It’s a good spot to take in the early morning array of hot air balloons that inch across the smoky dawn, and to marvel at the vastness of the area’s pagoda spires which cut through the smoke and early morning mist.  We then return to the hotel for a solid breakfast, getting in as much papaya as we can, and then tooling around the area on our e-bike. 
Plenty to keep us busy for the six days we’re here, and as time goes by, we spend more time just looking at the variety of styles, the landscape of groups of stupas, and enter small villages, spend more time “talking” with different vendors, just to get a little more of a sense of the place.  Outside the Gubyaukgyi Temple, Andres speaks with a woman who is selling lacquerware, and she then offers to have her husband take us around the village and show how it’s made.  She gives him a call, and he arrives on his motorbike in a couple of minutes.  He spends more than an hour taking us around the village, Myin Kabar, where he tells us people have been making lacquerware for generations. 

He shows us everything from the straining of what he calls lacquer juice—which resembles tar—to the phenomenal number of steps in making the bamboo shells that are covered in lacquer, to what the traditional vs. new colors are and the incredibly detailed work of cutting designs.  He also takes us to his home where we meet his mother and “aunty”, his workshop, and the underground drying “cave” built by his grandfather where traditional lacquer spends weeks, and depending on size, up to a year properly drying.  He  explains the difference between traditional lacquer-ware and some of the modern stuff, where color is painted rather than rubbed into the designs.  Most of all though, he shines as a genuine artist, and he is especially proud of his innovations in design, using copper wire and small copper chips.  It’s a wonderful and unexpected treat, and we end up buying some of his work.  I also have him write out his name for us.  Both he and his wife are incredibly gracious and generous with their time, and it’s truly special to see the very subdued pride he takes in his own artistry and that of his village.

The days and the temples do begin to blur, although there are standout constructions, gilded stupas  and some beautiful murals and tiles.  We get into the rhythm of our days, wandering dusty pitted lanes and grounds in the cool smoky mornings, escape from the hot afternoons at the pool, and then  venture out again as the heat begins to taper off.  It’s a pleasant mix and we truly enjoy our mobility.

Our last stop will take us down to the Bay of Bengal, where we look forward to four days of rest and relaxation at famed(in Myanmar) Ngapali Beach.  

Check out the photos by clicking the links.

https://goo.gl/photos/UvjwPd5g1TfbwQS38

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BY BOAT TO BAGAN

Feeling rested and significantly healthier, we set off in the dark to the “jetty” for our boat, along with packets of breakfast which the hotel has prepared for us unsolicited.  They’ve been incredibly kind and generous, particularly with the hints of illness we’ve shown during our stay.   A long steep staircase leads from the side of the dark road to the sandy litter-strewn banks of the Ayeryawaddy, as the Burmese call the great Irrawaddy river.  A single plank leads onto the boat, luggage tossed in the lower deck, and we look for seats on the upper deck.  They’re a sort of bamboo lounge chair, and quite comfortable, although the head rest has been made—rather comically, considering the average size of the locals—way too high for one’s neck.  No matter, there’s space to wander during the day and stretch out!  

We’re among the first on the boat, but it fills up steadily with perhaps sixty passengers.  An older Dutch couple who farm in southern France sit behind us, a scholarly Indian gentleman and ex civil servant and his wife sit in front of us, and there’s animated expectation before we leave.  No one checks tickets, identification, luggage, or is in fact even visible until just before we leave, when a couple of people walk back to the kitchen area with bags of tomatoes, onions and other food presumably for the breakfast and lunch we’re told the ticket includes.  Evidently this is the “crew”.  With no preamble, the boat sounds its horn, a handful of characters push us off from the shore, we turn south, and we’re off.

The river is wide and muddy, flows along  the western edge of Mandalay, and while early morning takes us past boats tightly packed with passengers making the early river crossing into the city, the far side of the river is almost entirely agricultural. Plodding oxen and carts are out and about, while herders walk with groups of skinny goats, and people bathe and wash clothes at the river’s edge.

After a big bend in the river we come to Sagaing, the town’s hillside dotted with golden stupas and a great sitting Buddha.  After that, there is less and less activity along the riversides.  There are some fishing boats out on the water, but little else.  Beyond rural villages comprised of a couple of handfuls of bamboo dwellings, sandy shores, frolicking children and more beasts of burden, there is little that catches the eye.  Breakfast in a box is distributed and we sit back and nibble on hard-boiled eggs and some sort of croissant.

The landscape is a parched pancake and looks frighteningly barren, all the more surprising in that water is so readily available.   Occasionally there is a burst of palm trees, or a patch of tropical green, but the further down the river we move, the quieter it is. There is a tea/coffee call mid-morning, so people line up for their cup and begin waking up in earnest.

An occasional barge puffs loudly down the river, but the biggest change in scenery are the growing sand flats along the shores, and the looming sandbanks in the river. The ship’s captain rarely moves straight ahead, but zigzags his way down the river.

By noon, the heat intensifies, despite the breeze created by moving down the river.  People are baking out at the back of the boat, as well as on the small bow, but most are taking cover in the largely shaded chairs.  At this hottest point of the day, a hot lunch of rice, fried noodles meat and some vegetables are served on heaping plates, but we find it far too hot to eat, and nibble on our bananas and tangerines left from our hotel breakfast.

It’s a tranquil passage, nice to just sit back and read and look at the river go by for most of the afternoon.  Another tea break with hot slices of a sort of French toast breaks up the afternoon, but by about 4:30 we catch sight of distant silhouettes of stupas and temples, and suddenly we’re there.
Getting off the boat with our luggage is tricky on the narrow plank with an occasional bamboo pole to hold on to, but from there it’s haggling with taxi drivers up the long sandy beach at Nyuang U.  A half hour ride and we arrive in New Bagan, the town on the northern edge of the greater archaelogical zone.  Ready for the next week, we’re especially happy to be out of the big cities and look forward to exploring the countryside and the thousands of stupas and pagodas in the area.

Click the link for photos of the boat trip.
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AROUND MANDALAY

We’re planning to spend four days in Mandalay, and it’s hotter than hell when we arrive on a Sunday afternoon.  Our modern hotel is an oasis in the midst of the downtown area, especially after our day long ride in the van.  Even in the late afternoon as we venture out to get our bearings, it remains oppressively hot.  A nearby place to eat has passable food, and we later stop for a semblance of ice-cream at a very busy corner spot called “Nylon”.  Seems an odd name for a place that mostly sells milk-based drinks and ice cream, but it’s a welcome change from the usual fare, and actually, it’s been quite some time since ice cream has been on our menu at all!

Continuing our trip tradition, we’re in bed quite early.  Most things—except perhaps the night markets—shut down early.  Light on the streets is minimal, and an unexpected quiet descends after sundown.  We’re also up early, although with a mosque next door with prayers beginning before dawn, that's a given.  After breakfast, we decide to head to the southern part of the city, to check out the Mahamuni Pagoda—considered second in importance after the great Shwedagon in Yangon.  The hotel quotes what we consider a gouger's price for a cab there, so we hit the streets.  On 84th street(one block over), we are swallowed up by the hordes of people getting in and out of rides to and from the central Zegyo Market.  After a bit of back and forth, we manage to get one of the touts to understand where we want to go, and this appears to be on his vehicle’s route, so we hop in to the back of the truck, and begin the wait.  A monk hops in, a youngish woman with shopping, we move up a block, wait again, meanwhile feeling a little off from the air around us.  Finally we make our way to within a couple of blocks of the pagoda, and hop out, deciding that this wasn’t the “express”.  Heat is beginning to intensify, dust swirls in the dry streets, and the customary smells of diesel, food interspersed with wafts of sewage are dulling our energy somewhat.

Shoes off, we’re in the pagoda complex, but unfortunately I’m feeling unwell.  The main Buddha is accessible only to men, and they are busy plastering his thighs and calves with tiny squares of gold leaf—the traditional offering.  It’s another impressive complex, but I find a shady place to rest, while Andres follows  groups of beautifully dressed and made up children who have been brought to the temple to undergo a ceremony for monk (and nun, we assume, since there are girls) novitiates.  The come with their families, bearing the traditional gifts and shuffle from place to place.  We subsequently discover that most Burmese do spend some time as monks or nuns, but this time can be very short—as in a week—or can last a lifetime.  There is always a way back to secular society. There are evidently a number of steps in this process of becoming a novice, and these children seem rather young, so we're not positive about what we're seeing, but from the scraps of information being thrown our way, it's the best we can make out. We do have to let go of our remaining plans for the day as I’ve taken a decided turn for the worse and need to just get to the hotel.  An easy truck ride back and I spend the afternoon in bed—; I think I’ve eaten something that doesn’t agree with me.
 
By the next day I’m far better, and we return to the Pagoda so I can actually see it up close.  We are lucky to catch an “express” and are in and out of the place having seen everything we wanted: the golden Buddha, the various prayer houses, the small library complete with hundreds of cassette recordings(?), and an area with statues that were originally pillaged from Angkor Wat in present day Cambodia.  I rub the statue’s belly, anxious to add to my positive energy for healing that particular body part!  Andres is working on his knees!

From here we walk through some of the backstreets where teams of workers are making metal gilded decorations of the sort we often see on pagoda roofs.  Packs of dogs and scrawny puppies lie in the sandy streets, monks scurry about with their begging bowls, and as we enter through a newish looking gateway, we discover some sort of recycling center for cardboard.  Eventually a man stops us on the street and says “Jade Market” while pointing down a narrow but heavily travelled street.  I’m still expecting an actual structure/building, but we are suddenly surrounded by motorcycles parked 4 and 5 deep and are beckoned into small covered alleyways where we begin to see a wide array of jade workers.  Initially it’s the cutters of big rough stones, then polishers and cleaners, and a bit further down we appear to have stumbled onto the set of a Chinese gangster movie.  Hundreds of men(I think we saw maybe 5 women doing this work) sit a small tables while others wander from table to table showing and we assume, trying to sell their wares—mostly rough stones.  They are silently checked with special lights, and while some must be accepted, we basically only see firm head shakes of rejection.  Never a word exchanged.  

The stakes increase deeper into the market where these same jade appraisers types are looking over small cut and polished stones that look “jewelry-ready”.  Interspersed we see narrow corridors where men lounge and watch TV, huge pool table areas, and plenty of eating and drinking areas where plenty of women flit about serving the men.  The whole thing is surreal, and honestly, a tad intimidating.  Not much in the way of smiles here.  It seems to be run by the Chinese, and we’re told that most jade in this area of the world comes through this market in Mandalay. 

After the stifling and baffling market, we make a stop at a nearby airy looking food/drink place, and after refueling begin looking for the Shwe In Bin Kyaung Pagoda, one that is made of teak and known for its fine carvings.  A couple of wrong turns and a lady calls from across the street, gestures that we need to go around the block, and we finally find it.  It's truly a peaceful respite from the dizzying madness of Mandalay’s streets.  A lone cat dozes in the upper terrace prayer room, while an elderly monk sweeps the grounds.  Another couple of tourists join us in marvelling at the expertly carved doors and eaves.  Time and poor air quality are eating at the artistry, but their beauty still shines through.  We sit on a bench soaking up the atmosphere of the grounds, enjoy the peace and quiet so lacking in the city outside the gates, but finally make our way to the hotel to escape the encroaching worst heat of the day.

Later on we watch the local Indian population as they open their chapati stands, taking to the streets to see what we come across.  We meet a young street entrepreneur who takes advantage of our passing by to gauge our interest in an out-of-town excursion.  We agree to meet him in a couple of days to visit the outskirts of the city, visiting Inwa and Sagaing, another old capital, worth visiting for its many stupas and pagodas, and to make the trip to see Myanmar’s most famous bridgeway, across a lake in the town of Amarapura. Having exchanged necessary information, we continue on our way past the central market area to the Ein Daw Yar Pagoda.  A couple of wrong turns, but we finally locate it, and take a turn around the main pagoda.  We’re surprised by how quiet it is, but it’s always a treat to be in a sanctuary of quiet.  By the time the sun sinks into the smoky darkness, we have found somewhere to eat something, and then head home.

 We’re up early again and wander into breakfast as the sun is rising.  It’s nice and cool on the street, and most shops are still tightly shut.  Vehicles are sparse on the streets, so it seems a good time to do some walking toward Mandalay Hill.  We first come to the immense quadrant that is the Mandalay Palace grounds.  It a good couple of kilometers long on each side, and completely surrounded by a moat which is at least 100 meters wide.  We are walking along the southern edge of the area, which has the first bona fide sidewalk we’ve encountered anywhere in the country.  The water makes the air feel quite fresh, so we’re walking at a good clip.  About half way along this southern side, we are approached by a cab driver who speaks impeccable English, and in short, talks us into hopping a cab to the bottom of the hill.  He prides himself on telling jokes, which initially are quite clever and well-told, but when we finally arrive at the bottom of the hill, his humor turns off-color, so we’re glad to be out of the cab and trekking up the 40 minutes of stairs to get to the top of the hill.

Evidently there are just a few true-blue nutcases who take this walk, and for a reason.  The odd assortment of shops and dwellings, sleeping dogs and cats, lack of much in the way of visible people, --just the deafening blaring of their televisions behind bamboo plaited mat walls-- all add up to a feeling of a place that is abandoned.  There are perhaps three other people we encounter making the walk from the bottom.  There are periodic stops along the way for the standing, pointing Buddha, the woefully ugly cracked and peeling concrete pagoda, the under construction pagoda, and then as we begin to hit the upper levels, more people appear, and at the top we can admire the hazy and uninspired view.  I feel like we can check it off the list, but that this is one bit of tourism that is a combination of misinformation and overselling.  

We tramp down the many stairs back to the lion flanked entranceway and then visit a handful of neighboring pagodas and monasteries.  Since most have no English names listed anywhere, I find some in my guidebook: the place with the huge Buddha carved from a single massive piece of marble, the white pagoda with endless rows of stupas, the white pagoda with rounded stupas and so forth.  It’s a guessing game, with an occasional bit of help from a local who’s busy selling paintings, bells, postcards and myriad other souvenirs.  We find a few beautiful sounding chimes which we buy from a savvy young woman who speaks quite good English and is so happy with her sale that she promptly paints my cheek with a thanakha—the pasty colored stuff that locals smear on their cheeks, foreheads—, well, faces—both for beauty and allegedly for sunscreen—leaf.  It smells faintly of sandalwood, and brings more than our usual share of smiles from locals. 

The heat has risen to a few degrees short of suffocating, so it’s downtime for us until later in the afternoon, when we decide to take a look at the gold pounders of Mandalay.  We first hop onto a shared van, but the tout is so busy looking for business that after a respectable wait we finally jump off and walk.  We cross the railroad tracks, pass endless tea shops, motorcycle repair spots, and small businesses, but still haven’t come across the rhythmic sound of gold pounders.  Mandalay is the country’s center for the making of small paper packets that hold the offerings of gold leaf sold all over the country at temples for adding to the Buddha—usually his calves or legs—as that’s all most can reach.  It’s a substantial part of the offering/donation that people make at temples, and as a result, it’s an important enterprise here.  We expect—wrongly--, to find rows of these small shops, where young men pound booklets of bamboo paper with tiny morsels of gold between each sheet into gold leaf.  Our ears help us find one of the workshops, but honestly, I feel like I’ve stepped back about two thousand years into some sort of slave compound.  The men pound for hours, probably make miserable wages, and look like sweat-glistened slaves out of Gladiator—the movie.  One quick look and we’ve seen enough.

Again, dark is slowly descending, we take in a bit of the nearby night market(84th street moving south from 26th), which slowly infiltrates the road, stands springing up in the middle of the road, on the sides, and forcing anything not part and parcel of the market to move on or out.  Another forgettable meal and we’re ready for bed.

The night isn’t kind to A., as he’s taking a turn with some nasty stomach bug, and by really early morning we’ve determined that he can’t make a day trip we’ve planned on.  He’s weak and constantly in the bathroom, so I have the hotel call our driver-to-be and cancel, asking him to stop by for a tip for his trouble.  Our last day is definitely a lie low day.  A brief trip to a local pharmacy for some medicine and a stop at the market for some bananas.  As it’s early, the vendor has no change and offers the bananas as a present(his words).  A nearby shop gives us change and we return to give him the pittance he’s waived.  He is all smiles!  I run a couple of errands so we’ll have some stuff with us for our all day boat trip to Bagan the next day, and although I’m disappointed to miss the day trip, we catch up on reading and resting.  Tomorrow to Bagan!

As always, click the links for pictures.

 https://goo.gl/photos/xody9UZdCb9iirPx7

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ARRIVAL IN MANDALAY

We make the journey from Nwaung Shwe to Mandalay in a mini bus/van, accompanied by four locals, a couple of students based in Singapore—an Italian and an Austrian—who are in Myanmar for their break(not sure what season that one would be!), and for a few hours, the remaining seats are empty.  Our driver is a self-proclaimed race car driver, but we comfort ourselves with the notion that he has the fortune of having his steering wheel on the left—so at least he can SEE when he’s overtaking!  Like our trip the previous day, it’s slow going on a lot of stretches, as we’re heading up into the mountains before dropping back onto the wide central plain of the country.  Sometimes we’re in a caravan of ten overloaded trucks and passing is all but impossible(thankfully, we think to ourselves).  The countryside is a tapestry of small fields, many of which are slowly being tilled for the impending planting season.  The earth is turned into hulking masses of hardened clay, turning and iron laden red as we move further north and west.  We drive by an actual bus that appears to have made some miscalculation and has landed head first in a field.  An army of people stand by as an ancient truck with a towing cable and hook is readied to pull the vehicle back onto the road.  My guess is that this will take a substantial part of the morning.

We take a sudden and unexpected break in a nameless town where we can use a toilet and buy some snacks—although we do neither this time.  It turns out there is a caravan of vans from the same company headed to Mandalay, something we discover after three others stop at the same spot.  The local women and girls are busy hawking whatever wares they can outside the snack place, but there are few takers.

A scant thirty minutes later we’ve stopped again in what turns out to be the town of Kalaw.  Previously a hill refuge for the British due to its agreeable climate, it has now become a hub for beginning a 2-3 day trek down the mountain to Inle Lake, something we decided to forego as we’d imagined far more intense heat for the all day walks.  A young couple from New Zealand joins the bus and we’re off with demon-like speed.  The next part of the trip is the most serpentine and mountainous of all, and there is a steady stream of mostly crawling traffic.  When we reach the valley, the road straightens and speed is the name of the game once again.  Honking incessantly—the norm here—we tear down the potholed road, rolling and bumping around the bus.  Suddenly we stop again, and our driver meets up with a colleague whose driving back to Inle Lake, and for reasons we neither understand or care about, they switch places, and we breathe a misguided sigh of relief, thinking things will slow down now.  Not really!  This driver is equally maniacal—albeit equally affable!

The lunch spot is a dismal spot with passable toilets way in the back of the compound under the tamarind trees, but the food definitely looks dodgy, and after checking around the kitchen area we give it a miss, just sucking down some more bottled water.  From here on the drive becomes steadily more urban, even though we really have no clue as to the name of any place we’re coming through. One final stop when another van from the company appears to have phoned our driver, and shortly we have pulled over so he can help them with a flat tire.  When we start to see the occasional English lettering/words, we know we’ve reached Mandalay.  This is confirmed by the fact that there are actually road names, a particularly helpful feature in Mandalay, since this more predictable grid with numbered streets does help one navigate in the pandemonium.  If you’ve read and are expecting anything like Kipling’s poem Mandalay, basically a sailor/soldier’s wistful recalling his good old times in the Far East, and his especially fond memories of the women, drink and lush green of the tropics, as he wanders the wet grey streets of London, then today’s Mandalay is going to take some getting used to.

In the best tradition of Asian cities, the assault of the senses is instant and full-blown.  Traffic is chaotically but functionally swirling at each and every intersection, people are everywhere, dogs lie perilously close to traffic, bus touts yell over the constant noise and claxon of the stream of vehicles and smoke belching motorcycles.  The air is thick with the dust of the dry season, the smells of cooking and garbage, but despite this chaotic scene, people wave and shout hello, children smile widely, many still relatively unused to seeing much in the way of Westerners.

Mandalay is the country’s second city, considered its cultural capital.  Like Bago, it was a royal capital for a while.  It is also home to Myanmar’s largest contingent of descendants of Chinese, as well as sizeable groups of Indians (descendants from those who were here during the British Raj) and Muslims. 

The downtown area where we stay in a clearly rather new—possibly Japanese—hotel, is a mishmash of the usual street and sidewalk commerce as well as the occasionally recognizable small bank, endless rather tired looking eating establishments, hotels that vary from a sort of Communist prison block style to glass and steel.  Like in Yangon, as the day heats up, so do the unpleasant smells of virtually open sewers.  They’re essentially covered with concrete blocks, but plenty are broken, and walking on the sidewalk—when that’s possible, means walking over the sewerage and water canals. Not conducive to working up any kind of appetite!

There is purportedly quite a bit to see, so we head out to find something to eat and work out a plan to see as much as we can fit in during our 4 day stay.

For pictures around town click the link.
https://goo.gl/photos/Ls4goaZRnhLhFpxA6

INLE LAKE & SURROUNDINGS

Several days near and around Inle Lake

We take a short flight north to the Inle Lake area from Yangon.  It’s another 30 km taxi ride to reach the town of Nyaung Shwe, which will be our base while we explore the area.  After settling into the hotel we spend some time getting our bearings by wandering around town.  We cross the canal that ultimately leads to the lake.  It is packed with the long boats that take locals as well as tourists to various points on and along the lake. Numerous boat drivers approach us clamoring for our business.  After checking around town, asking around and confirming that there is rather a range of prices, we happen upon a widely smiling man who introduces himself as Moe Wine and he gives us a very fair deal and promises to pick us up at our hotel jetty early the next morning. 

The morning is surprisingly cool, and a low thick fog hugs the town.  We put on pretty much every layer we’ve brought and we’re off after a substantial breakfast.  As the canal(about 1.5 km) opens into the wider lake, we catch our first glimpse of the famed fishermen, who appear to do a balancing dance on their boats with their large net baskets.  It is a bit of lake poetry for which we slow down.  They pose and wait for tips.  The day continues with a stop at the floating gardens—these are tomato gardens, staked with bamboo onto floating islands which can rise when the lake water level rises during the rainy season. From here we enter the byways of the lake where stilted bamboo dwellings and resting stations for the farmers dot the lakescape.  First stop for the day is the floating market which appears to have morphed into a tourist market and is presently on land—although we’re told this, too, changes when the rainy season arrives.  There are stops at a family silversmith business, a lotus-fiber weaving business which sells its wares at staggeringly high prices—even for foreigners—, a cheroot rolling factory, a small boat building enterprise and then the requisite pagodas. 

As we leave the first pagoda having had a simple lunch of avocado salad, large  rain drops begin falling.  By the time we pull into the so-called Jumping Cat Monastery, a beautiful teak pagoda renowned for its monks of old who trained the many monastery cats to jumps through hoops(!), the rain turns torrential.  We take shelter in the pagoda, checking out the lounging monks and the gently cared for prayer areas.  There is an odd assortment of shops around the complex—and there are indeed legions of cats, but no more tricks or leaping from this feline generation.  In a light drizzle, and an occasional drenching, we boat back to the hotel under umbrellas.  It’s a good first look at the area.  We hope to check out a more traditional and local market the next day.

The markets around the lake rotate on a 5 day schedule, and the hotel confirms that the market we hope to see is indeed the following day.  We arrange a tuk-tuk(basically a motorcycle with a small covered truck bed behind it for passengers) to make our way to the Maing Thauk market.  We arrive early and meander around the stalls, returning the easy smiles that seem to be the universal response to our just looking in any given person’s direction.  We watch the ladies preparing betel nuts packages, and are starting to take more serious notice of just how many people actually chew the small leaf-wrapped bundles, and how truly dreadful many people’s teeth are as a result.  We are also getting better at ignoring the rather vile habit of projectile blood-red spitting associated with this very local habit.  A few hours gives us a solid look at the market scene and we’re off to check out more of the Nwaung Shwe.

Our remaining days have us taking a day’s walk(trek) into the local mountains with a couple of young guides, the younger of whom is a sort of apprentice who’s English is almost incomprehensible, but whose smile is utterly disarming.   We walk up to a Buddha riddled cave, passing through different Danu and Pa-O villages, meeting monks whose greatest thrill seems to be taking their picture with us and then asking if we have Facebook(!), but there is little way for us to differentiate the peoples we encounter as today they virtually all wear the traditional Myanmar longyi, as opposed to their more traditional dress, at least in this area.  Higher in the hills poverty is dire, and the guides confirm our perception.  Most people appear to make some sort of living from chopping wood, as the fuel for cooking and heating is all, by necessity, wood.  The hills are not just dry from the fact that it’s the “cold” season, but they have been, and continue to be systematically denuded, with no viable alternative appearing at present.  There is no electricity, although we do encounter random solar panels, and even one that is hooked up to a TV dish.  On our way back downhill we stop for a simple lunch, largely prepared by our two guides, with ample platters of fruits, a few cookies, a truly delicious bowl of Shan noodles, and plenty of tea. Further down the mountain we stop in at a monastery for about 40 boys, where a monk is presiding over some sort of downtime for the kids, who sit in a clump all watching TV—quiet as mice.  We leave a small donation and slowly head back into town treating the guides at a local tea shop before parting ways.

Our final day in the area we decide that despite our having lost count of the number of Buddhas we’ve seen, we want to forge ahead and add another 8000+ in one visit, by making our way north to the smallish town of Pindaya, famed for its hillside caves adorned with Buddhas.  We have again made arrangements for a taxi ride for the 90km haul.

Our driver Maw Maw is quite talkative along the journey, although in all honestly not everything he says is entirely comprehensible English.  He has a couple of go-to topics—specifically the innate evil of using chemical fertilizer, and in a completely different sphere, the fact that he wants to teach English as a volunteer to his fellow Burmese when he becomes too old to do anything else—.  He, like many of the Burmese we can communicate with, is big on doing things of merit, and he waxes quite eloquently on the topic.  He seems to be a walking talking advertisement for the way of living like a true Buddhist.

The road is in appalling shape, dangerously narrow, with rutted, low shoulders, and undergoing all sorts of repair and perhaps widening in places.  There are few cars, but quite a number of small, heavily laden trucks, reams of motorcycles, and ox-carts pulled by hefty oxen, so going is rather slow.  Along the way we encounter veritable chain gangs of women repairing the road.  They are all ages, and doing seriously heavy labor, pounding larger rocks into smaller ones, carrying pans on their heads full of these stones, then distributing them along the roadway by throwing the pans full of rocks onto the surface while other women then redistribute them to sort of even the surface, and throw pans of concrete dust on the rocks.  This is not gravel, but half-fist sized rocks.  Maw Maw maintains this work provides a tiny supplemental income for the family.  The women earn about $3 a day.  Most also help farm, so adding to their backbreaking work.  For us, the scene strikes us as alarmingly close to slavery.

We arrive in Pindaya before the major crowds arrive, and the driver insists we book a table at the local restaurant that caters to tourists, engaging in a lengthy and incomprehensible discussion about which table he wants us to have so that we’ll have a good view of the local lake.  He seems pleased when we leave and then drives us to the half-way point from which we begin the walk—barefoot, of course—to the main entrance of the cave.  On entering, the Buddhas are everywhere, all sizes, high in small niches in the cave, rows and ledges everywhere, some beautifully lit, others shimmering golden in the shadows.  It’s nothing less than overwhelming.  Beyond the opening is an area called the “maze”, and from here the cave narrows, one goes deeper and eventually the temperature and humidity rise markedly and one reaches the largest cave.  There are donated Buddhas of all sizes from all over the world, a whole wing dedicated to the many mudras(hand gestures) of the Buddha, some made of bronze, others of a sort of ceramic.  There is also a stupa to add gold leaf to.   It’s nothing short of a kaleidoscope of Buddhas and positively mesmerizing. 

We slowly make our way back down, enjoy a simple lunch(succeessfully garnering a good table), and then stop by small family business that makes Shan paper from the bark of the local mulberry tree from which they ultimately make lovely paper umbrellas and other goods.  A couple of young women show us the whole process, while one of their sisters paints traditional designs on a large parasol on the patio.  Beautiful craft work indeed.

Last stop is the local market which we happen to have hit in the (also) five day rotation.  Strictly a local affair, there are endless ominous looking sweets, and we are offered some semolina cake, which is quite tasty,  There are jewellers, mat makers, mechanics(?), and even a wing of seamstresses.  All the fruit and vegetables vendors are outside the covered market, doing their best to shade their wares from the punishing sun.  Same slow ride home with a predictable reprise of Maw Maw's favorite talking points!

On Sunday we’ll be taking a mini-bus/van for the day long trip north to Mandalay—about 7-8 hours climbing through the mountainous Shan state back down to the large central plains of Myanmar.

Links below are to photos!
https://goo.gl/photos/DmT7XDQQ4nShQa8FA
https://goo.gl/photos/CxMEP9eer8KR6bhZ6
https://goo.gl/photos/afead5RC3DfBZDqf8
https://goo.gl/photos/vPgtECyQj4iVRNwx8

BAGO (previously known as Pegu)

 Touring Bago

On Sunday, we hired a driver/”guide” Zaw Zaw, who picks us up punctually and takes us on the 80 km drive to Bago.  We’ve been told a wide array of things about the town—from it being a provincial but peaceful little backwater to that we should simply skip it--so we're truly wondering what to expect.  We have foregone the longer trip to the famed Golden Rock—a precariously perched gilded boulder that purports to be held in place by a few of the Buddha’s hairs—so, it’s going to be Bago.  The early morning traffic in Yangon hasn’t yet ramped up to full pandemonium and we make good time getting out of town.  We stop in at the Allied cemetery about 45 minutes out of town—a beautifully appointed green area with the names of more than 37 thousand British contingents that battled the Japanese during WWII.  It’s a stark reminder of the misery of war as well as the sweeping hand of British colonialism.  Represented are groups from all over Burma, India and Great Britain and even far-flung Nigeria and other African colonial outposts.

Back on the road we get stuck in the congestion of morning markets in a couple of nameless towns, but eventually reach Bago, which is neither provincial, nor quiet, and seems to us like a large piece of Yangon was plucked up and transplanted these however many kilometers away.  We crawl along what seems like the main artery, daily life(despite it being a Sunday) in full swing.  Unlike Yangon, which prohibits motorbikes in the city limits, here endless lines of motorcycles swerve around the streets—.

Zaw Zaw tells us which places he’s including on the itinerary—number one stop, the old Kanbawzathadi Palace.  Originally built in the mid 1500’s it was soon burnt to the ground, so what we see is a completely new rendition, rebuilt perhaps 25 years ago.  The remains of some of the original teakwood columns are all that’s on display to show what might have been, unclear as that is to anyone not of the archaelogical persuasion.  The new structure seems a tad Disney-like and there are virtually no visitors except a group of clowning monks, who are taking selfies on a cannon by the palace exit.  They are excited to have us be in a photo with them!

Zaw asks if I’d like to visit the Snake Monastery, as there is a huge python there and he seems unsure that I’ll be comfortable with this alleged reincarnation of a Buddhist abbot.  I’m game, though, so we travel along a monumentally pocked dirt road where monks have dressed up with giant paper mache heads to beg for donations to keep up their local road.  Zaw says the government doesn't touch this road as it belongs to the monastery.  At the monastery we climb the steep stairs to the structure where the enormous apparently female snake lies dozing, watched by a chanting caretaker monk.  He takes each person’s donation, places the bill on the already sizeable pile in one of the snake’s folds, and bursts into –for us—an incomprehensible chant.  The snake appears to be deeply asleep.  Certainly a novel sort of sight at any kind of temple.

Back on the road to Bago’s signature pagoda, the Shwemawdaw.  Not as imposing as Yangon’s Shwedagon, it is nevertheless impressive, gilded in some places, painted in others.  It sports a number of different small hut-like buildings that house astrologers.  This pagoda  has routinely been hit by strong earthquakes, and one such piece of fallen stupa is now a shrine in its own right, thin smoking sticks of incense sticking out of it like pins in a pincushion.

After lunch at a restaurant that clearly caters exclusively to foreigners, we also visit the Hintha Gon Paya, a pagoda known for its frenetic music and dancing—done in a room in the cage-like lower level of the pagoda.  The upper level shows the numerous depictions of the two hintha birds Buddha allegedly saw before making some prophecy about the future of Bago—which was one of the three principal kingdoms of times past.  Then on to the immensely popular fairground atmosphere of Bago's Reclining Buddha, to another pagoda unusually built with tiers of white and gold, and finally the site of four large seated back-to-back Buddhas. 

We’re particularly happy to have chosen to take this particular excursion with a driver as it’s close to dark when we finally arrive back in Yangon, and we’ve had another full, interesting day.

Pictures at the link: https://goo.gl/photos/nttmQGSqYSejAaCj6

YANGON

In and around Yangon....

It’s barely two and a half hours flight from Singapore to Yangon, but it is rather like a time-warp.  One day in the 21st century, the next in a timeless combination of medieval religious complexes surrounded by the madness of serious traffic gridlock, populated by burgundy clad monks who wander barefoot all over town, very much connected to the world around them via their cell-phone screens.  It will clearly take more than a few moments to wonder how all these—and many more--- pieces fit together to make the emerging puzzle that is Myanmar.

We taxi into town from the airport through endless traffic jams.  The mid-morning heat is oppressive and stifling.   Gilded pagodas peak out between the ramshackle rain-streaked buildings while nonchalant stray dogs doze at the dusty roadsides.   Crowded buses zigzag through the tangled traffic.  It takes us a while to notice that while cars have their steering wheels on the right, they aren’t driving on the right!  Tiny eating stands spill out onto sidewalks everywhere while the smells and colors of the city and its sprawling life force assail the senses.  The easygoing, smiling people appear oblivious to the madness swirling around them, just getting on with the business of the everyday in their rainbow of brightly colored traditional garb.

Our hotel is a small oasis just down the hill from the great Shwedagon Pagoda.  Foolishly, we decide to wander to the center of town in what is punishing heat.  There are no visible road signs anywhere, and everything else is in Burmese script, so our rudimentary map is close to useless, and after a couple of hours, during which we spy the Martyrs' Memorial, one of the main entrances to the great Pagoda and a do a stint of walking along Kandawgyi Lake, we find a cab and head downtown to the Sule Pagoda, which is smack in the center of town.  After exiting the taxi and successfully crossing the various spokes of roads all leading to the Pagoda, I discover I’ve lost my sunglasses.  On the first day?? We remove our shoes and head into the pagoda, watching the locals perform their various rituals, praying, and simply visiting and snacking in the shaded prayer houses.  A man approaches and much to my surprise and delight it is the cab driver!  He’s brought my sunglasses!!  Seems like a good omen for the trip.  Yes, I’m falling right in step with the beliefs that seem to pervade around me. 

After leaving the Sule Pagoda we  take a look at the blinding white and imposing City Hall from the outside.  At our back lies Mahabandoola Garden, a square with a big obelisk, but it’s cordoned off as there appears to be some impending ceremony.  Turns out it will be Union Day on the following day. We wander further down Maha Bandoola Road amazed at the absolute hordes everywhere.  When I stop to take a brief look at the map, we are stopped by a woman who speaks excellent English and before we can remotely object, she ushers us off to a local tea shop for tea and samosas, and, not surprisingly, to offer us her help and services.  She appears to be some sort of interpreter, also speaks Japanese, and is clearly a wealth of information both trivial and essential.  She regales us with the story of why Aung San Suu Kyi always wears a flower behind her ear, tells us we should skip some of our intended stops, and wants to take us to some Portuguese outpost south of Yangon.  Eventually she settles for taking us to a small hole-in-the-wall travel agency which quotes us a far more expensive price for the outing we want to make on Sunday to Bago.   We part friends, though, and after a bit more half-hearted wandering through the sweltering downtown we return to the hotel. 

On Sunday we eat breakfast early and then wander down the street from the hotel to the eastern entrance of the impressive Shwedagon Pagoda, definitely the city’s main attraction.  Even the several block long entrance-way which is comprised of a bazaar-like, covered, extra wide stairway is shoe free.   One crosses a street, the walkway—lined with ever more shops, exploding with all manner of religious paraphernalia and offerings—, continue up with still more of the same, until an airport-like screening machine flanked by entrances for men  and women, and then the ticket booth for foreigners.  Locals do not pay to go in.  They do their part with their regular donations at different points around the immense Pagoda complex. 

The Pagoda is shimmering gold, surrounded by more than fifty small pagodas, and countless prayer houses, each of which has its own collection of sitting, standing, and reclining Buddhas, all sizes, all with differing hand gestures, and many of them have sprays of multi-color neon flashing lights around their head, providing an almost fair-like atmosphere.  The very reverent pray, but there are hordes of people wandering, chit-chatting, talking on the phone, picnicking, and taking photos, both family portraits and the ubiquitous selfies.  It’s a little bit like being at a Buddha festival ground.  Bells are being rung, and there is a high-energy feel to the place, although paradoxically there is a note of dignity and seriousness as well.  The central pagoda is awe-inspiring, huge, high and meticulously maintained.  Surrounding it are so many different structures that it’s difficult to really keep anything straight.  Buddhist priests and nuns roam alone and in groups, and we’re surprised at the range in ages.  By late morning it becomes too hot to wander comfortably on bare feet, and after some lunch and afternoon downtime, we return in the late afternoon to witness the effect of the sunset and the singular beauty of the complex at dark.  Nothing short of mesmerizing.

On our final day in Yangon we drag ourselves through the sidewalk breakfast crowds, complete with dogs of every sort, and up the large avenue to the Reclining Buddha, where we hold our breath as we navigate crossing six lanes of traffic without any lights.  Up the walkway we find the amazingly empty complex with its huge Reclining Buddha, who is differs from many of the others because of the soles of his feet, which carry representations of everything from living beings, to inanimate ones, as well as stars and planets. Quite impressive and apparently deeply meaningful, although we're not exactly privy to what exactly this meaning is!

In the mid-afternoon we head back downtown to try to absorb some of the frenetic energy and commotion that lies in every last visible crack and cranny of the colonial past.  The western side of Sule Pagoda has a distinctly Indian and Muslim population, while the eastern side is more Burmese. Each is riveting in its own way.  Every block seems to have its own "specialty"--we find the jewelry block(s), the fisherman net and other supplies block, along with painting supplies, rubber stamps, wrought iron work, and even stumble across the old Rangoon(Yangon) synagogue and its caretaker who claims there are only about 20 Jews left in the city but that they no longer have a rabbi.   We end the day in a lovely restaurant(Monsoon) close to the posh old Strand Hotel--so posh it no longer allows non guests to take a peek inside!

Click the link for pictures of Sule and Shwendagon Pagodas as well as the Reclining Buddha and central Yangon.

https://goo.gl/photos/zxEdtPcnVLqDXmwP8

https://goo.gl/photos/TcjjsYbXmLBkLwULA

SINGAPORE

SINGAPORE, Part 1

Half a world away from Denver, we landed in Singapore early Wednesday morning, after narrowly making  our connecting flight in San Francisco, due to high winds and stormy weather, something we’d managed to avoid on our home turf, never imagining the possibility for San Francisco.  It’s a long haul across the Pacific, but fortunately an uneventful one for us.  We stayed with friends in Singapore, making it possible to spend our first stop in the city—we return on our way back home—in the hands of residents, even if they are relatively new ones!
 
Our first day took us downtown into Fort Canning Park, where we walked through the shaded park until coming to the viewpoint over the Singapore River.  We made our way down into the Clarke Quay area, crawling with all manner of restaurants, bordered by a wall of glass and steel banking towers of the commercial district.  We ate, walking further along the river past the landmark Fullerton Hotel to the more open Harbour area, where some of the city’s signature buildings loom large and imposing on the horizon.  Most notable, the three towers with what looks like a  ship, dry-docked on its collective roofs, better known as the Marina Bay Sands, and the large lotus-like ArtScience Museum. We weren’t able to see the famed Merlion, symbol of Singapore(part fish, part lion) as it was being cleaned.  Perhaps upon our return.

Our second day took us to the lush tropical Botanic Gardens, perfect for a leisurely walk with the dog, and a stop in the eye-poppingly gorgeous orchid gardens.  Stunning colors and varieties in a labyrinth of emerald green paths with streams and waterfalls adding a layer of auditory peacefulness.  Later in the day, we took the efficient and wide ranging underground down into Chinatown, wandering the streets originally planned by the British, but then lost to, among other things, a large and apparently none-too-savory Red Light district.  Now, it is a mishmash of largely Chinese businesses, shops, endless reams of eating establishments, the imposing Buddha Tooth Relic Temple, complete with its grand hall for prayer, a museum about the Buddha, and a lovely rooftop garden with a giant prayer wheel.  With the celebrations for Chinese New Year coming to an end, roosters(it's the year of the rooster!) are everywhere, in all sizes and shapes. Celebratory foods, especially meats(Bak Kwa--thinly sliced slabs of salty sweet dried meats) still have customers of every ilk, lined up for a last chance to snack on this annual specialty. Garish golds and reds are everywhere, chains of paper lanterns festoon building facades and hang over alleys, so the large Indian pagoda we stumble upon is oddly out of place.  After a quick meal, we head back home, readying ourselves for our impending departure to Myanmar.

Check out the link below to see some of the photos from our days in Singapore.
https://goo.gl/photos/5FQRupuPeEdo9jep7