Myanmar is the kind
of place that grows on you - slowly at first, even tentatively. At least for
me, maybe because there were many things I did not expect. First of all - the
weather was fantastic! A bit hot but not humid during my 25 days. Second, I thought
that because it seemed to have opened so slowly to tourism it would be rough,
less developed, perhaps with more hardships than other South East Asian (SEA) countries. But Myanmar, rich in agriculture & other resources, &
situated between China & India is in a position to grow its economy
rapidly. The vast stretches of road work now underway is incredible & is
making much of the central & southern regions more open. New cars &
big rigs are signs of an emerging wealth. The north however,
remains a bit of a mystery & in many areas travel can require a special
permit or be inaccessible to foreigners. Talk of the conflicts with the
Rohingya Muslims, the most recent, where hundreds of Rohingya were killed and
raped between October 2016 and February 2017, is just about non-existent.
It certainly seems that the average person is not well informed or at least unwilling to discuss the situation. One can
assume the limited news is to hide human rights abuses. This horrible situation
& the treatment of the Rohingya places such a dark stain on what otherwise
seems to be a peaceful nation.
Myanmar offers many
surprises and many inconsistencies - but the constant is the pervasive
influence of Buddhism.
Myanmar is a land of
thousands of Buddhist pagodas and even more monks. The pagodas are tucked in
each neighborhood & stand out prominently on hilltops & ridges
throughout the country. The monks can be seen everywhere - especially in the
mid-morning when the streets are full of the monks seeking alms. Shops &
households freely & without hesitation give to the monks -it is just
expected. All young children are given the opportunity to experience the life
of a novice by joining a monastery. Most
of the children will spend only one week in the monastery but there is no time
limit on how long they can stay. During this time they learn the Buddha's
teachings & ways of a good & productive life: honesty, faithfulness,
respect, compassion.
Mandalay
My first stop was
Mandalay - such a beautiful, romantic name.
I spent my first day on the back of a motorbike taxi I had hired to take
me to the major sites within the city. We stopped at all the well-known and so
many lesser known pagodas that the distinctions between them became a blur. The driver was determined to give me a good tour and to fill my day so that we
could reach the last pagoda on a prominent hilltop just in time to watch the
sun setting at 6 pm. Riding on a motorbike is such a great way to sight-see, I could get a feel for the rhythm of the city and all the various neighborhoods and
business districts. We passed the marble masons who cut hundreds of look-alike
Buddha statues without protective gear and so covered, head to toe, in fine
marble powder each and every day. We rode through the large crowded city
wholesale produce & flower market that sells restaurants & street
vendors all that they need for the day's business. We made our way to quiet but
ancient monasteries tucked away under sacred banyan trees where resident monks
quietly attend to their daily routines.
Mandalay a small
city trying to build rapidly in spite of poor roads & infrastructure. I was not expecting modern multi-storied
malls crowded with shops and shoppers looking for electronics and the latest
sports clothes - especially when outside there is a distinct smell coming from
poor sewage lines along the city streets. Many of the streets are poorly developed and often
just partially paved and yet… And yet there is a comfortable order to it all
unlike the craziness of cities in Vietnam and even Sri Lanka. The traffic is
orderly - drivers keep their cars and motorbikes within the lanes and actually
stop at traffic lights! The speed of traffic is calm, there is relative quiet
in the streets since horns are just tapped when necessary rather than blaring
constantly. People walk comfortably along day or night.
Unlike some SEA
countries, street food snacks are not
common but little sidewalk restaurants
and tea shops are everywhere. If you are going to eat something - the
expectation is that you will sit for a while & enjoy your meal - what's the
hurry? A typical lunch or dinner meal is a multi-course production of small
plates surrounding a generous plate of rice. A bowl of soup, one or two plates
of veggie, some salad greens, and a plate of chicken, pork, or fish curry.
Spoon up just a bit of each to put on your rice & then use your fork to
scoop food onto your spoon to eat - slow & easy. Complimentary green tea is
always available at the table. Tea shops serve green tea or the sweetened
strong tea with milk (sweetened condensed milk is the best!); small plates of
fried treats like samosas are placed on the table & you'll be charged just
for the items you eat. Or you can order up small plates of seasoned noodles or
spring rolls - all delicious.
Fortunately for me I
was able to join up with a couple of Peace Corps Volunteers that I had met
while I was training in The Gambia in May 2015. Jess and Tyler had recently completed
their service and were traveling SEA before returning to the USA to
start their Master's programs. We had kept touch on Facebook and since we were
landing in Myanmar within days of each other we teamed up for a week or
so. Jess is a foody and found the most incredible places for us to eat. She also set us up in a cooking
class in Mandalay. I had never taken a cooking class - though so many people rave about
them. It was really a terrific experience - a full day of shopping in the
market learning about all the produce & spices, an extended break in a tea
house to taste numerous small plates, then on to a rustic setting in the country
outside Mandalay for our class under a palm leaf terrace. We made such
delicious dishes - incredible flavors with relatively few spices! My favorite
then & throughout my travels in Myanmar was Tea Leaf Salad - made from
lightly fermented tea leaves, tomatoes, garlic, onion, chili pepper, oil, and
covered with chopped peanuts! The day ended with trip to another hilltop pagoda
to see yet another sunset. 
Bagan
Bagan is an ancient capital
on an expansive plain along the Ayeyarwady River. It is famous for its more
than 2,000 remaining Buddhist pagodas that were constructed between the 9th and
13th century (there were over 10,000 pagodas & monasteries at one time).
The pagodas were built by the wealthy to honor & receive "merits"
from Buddha; a little down payment for a more enjoyable reincarnation. Jess & Tyler were a little under the
weather - so I rented an electric powered motorbike to tour the area; a great
way to see the major pagodas & yet veer off on to little roads to see the
smaller ones. The most interesting pagodas were the ones that still have
remnants of the original Buddha statuary and murals & it was a treat exploring to find the ones that had these treasures.
Jess & Tyler had
planned to stay about a week & then to head south to volunteer in a
charitable organization through Workaway.
Since I was ready to move on after a full day & 2 nights in Bagan I
left early one morning for the highland area of Kalaw in central Myanmar.
Kalaw
It was wonderful to escape the hot dry plains for the cooler mountains - time to put on long sleeves, long pants, & fleece. The major attraction of this
region for tourists is to trek 2-3 days from Kalaw to Inle Lake & pass
through the villages & farmlands of several ethnic tribes. I opted for a
2-day, 1-night, 20 mile trek & it was just about right. Fortunately the
paths were not wet or too steep so my thin little travel shoes were good enough
(I abandoned my heavy trekking shoes long ago in Jordan). The trek was well
planned so that our cook - could meet us with perfectly timed meals
along the way. We spent the night on mats on the old wooden floor of a hilltop
monastery - with of course - another perfect sunset view. Our group of 6 travelers included 3 young
Israelis (who had just completed their 2-3 military service & were taking a
typical trip to Asia as a reward), a Czech woman in Myanmar for volunteer work,
& a 50+ French botanist & organic farmer. It was a great time getting
to know each other & learning so much about their lives & travel experiences.
Inle Lake & Nyaung Shwe
We reached our
destination, Inle Lake & our lunch spot, just in time for a torrential
rain. There was little choice so after lunch we climbed into our small,
motorized, wooden longboat & took off for the 2-hour trip across the lake
to the town of Nyaung Shwe. Fortunately the boat had umbrellas that we
tucked ourselves under & even better, the rain came to an abrupt end about
30 minutes into the trip. There are small shops & fisher families living
along the lake & they have created an amazing way to farm by creating
floating gardens. The shores of the lake have a rich supply of a type of water
plant & on top of that, farmers will scoop up sediment from the shallow
lake bed to pile on top of these plants until finally there is sufficient soil
to plant a great variety of veggies.
After a couple
nights in Nyaung Shwe
I headed south to explore an area around Loikaw that was recommended by a
British tour guide I had met in Bangkok on my way to Myanmar. Her specialty is
SEA & she was on her own exploratory trip, her 1st, with a friend to get to
know Myanmar better before she started leading group trips. Loikaw sure looked
like it was along a highway on the east side of the lake that leads further
south to my next stop of Hpa-An. Well - something curious about Loikaw - it may
be easy to get to Loikaw but it sure is not easy to leave Loikaw! I figured something was up when I found I was
the only foreigner traveling to Loikaw. It was a lovely 7-hour bus ride through
the mountains but I soon found out there were no bus routes continuing on south
of Loikaw as I had hoped. After a
short stay I ended up spending 26-hours to get to Hpa-An by completely
retracing my steps & heading well north of Inle Lake, where I came from before finally turning
south to my destination.
I can't really get
upset when these kinds of things happen. For the most part I have had great
success with all my travels & I have to expect that sometimes you just have
to go north to go south.
Hpa-An
The Hpa-An region
has beautiful green karst mountains along the river, great stretches of rice
paddies - some green, some ready for harvest, & lots of caves to explore.
Buddhist temples have been created in the larger caves - images of Buddha have
been carved into & out of the sandstone rock. The best experience though was
visiting the Bat Cave at dusk! Thousands of bats exit the cave right on time
and fly out in formation across the river and over a bridge where they finally
begin to disperse to feed on insects for their dinner. It was amazing - no
sound at all as the bats fly out of the cave - they have their routine down to
perfection.
Yangon
After traveling more than 1,000 miles over 21 days my last stop in Myanmar was Yangon & it was a
perfect place to end the trip. As with all the places I visited, life seems
productive in Myanmar but not too stressful. The businesses that benefit from
tourism: markets, restaurants & shops, are friendly & not pushy.
The
streets feel safe so being out after dark - when most of the towns & cities
come to life - is comfortable. Yangon has lovely sections of town with lots of
trees, parks, & water. The inner city is vibrant & streets are busy
with produce street vendors & sidewalk restaurants. It's a great city to
walk in & spot the colonial buildings &
temples tucked here & there (more pagodas!!). The finest landmark is
the Shwedagon Pagoda which is a spectacular complex of pagodas. The complex is
beautifully maintained & wide marble walkways comfortably accommodate all
the foreign & local visitors & devotees. Of course - one must be there
for sunset & I was among hundreds who come to stroll or pray at that time
& to watch the fading light work its magic on the golden domes.
The
streets feel safe so being out after dark - when most of the towns & cities
come to life - is comfortable. Yangon has lovely sections of town with lots of
trees, parks, & water. The inner city is vibrant & streets are busy
with produce street vendors & sidewalk restaurants. It's a great city to
walk in & spot the colonial buildings &
temples tucked here & there (more pagodas!!). The finest landmark is
the Shwedagon Pagoda which is a spectacular complex of pagodas. The complex is
beautifully maintained & wide marble walkways comfortably accommodate all
the foreign & local visitors & devotees. Of course - one must be there
for sunset & I was among hundreds who come to stroll or pray at that time
& to watch the fading light work its magic on the golden domes.
My goal was to exit
South East Asia before March & the coming of the really hot, humid weather
and so on February 25 I departed on another long series of flights &
layovers for northern India.
Myanmar… a few stats
from the 2014 Census, INDEX Mundi
Population (of 242
countries): ranks 24, over 55.7 million (USA ranks 3, almost 320 million)
Population density
(of 242 countries): ranks 117, 82 people per sq. km; (USA ranks 176, 33 people per sq. km)
Poverty (of 215
countries): ranks 56, 32% (USA ranks 127, 15% ), population below poverty line
Literacy (of 215
countries): ranks 122, 93% (USA ranks 45, 99%)
HIV adult prevalence
(of 169 countries) ranks 66, 0.6% (USA
ranks 62, 0.6% )
Life Expectancy at
birth (of 221 countries): ranks 168, 66 yrs. (USA ranks 41, 79 yrs.)
