Advertisement
Published: January 5th 2007
Edit Blog Post
A visit to Myanmar is like traveling back in time. Some aspects of life here compare to that of 100 years ago in England. My memories of Myanmar include pagodas, monks, stray dogs and cats, dusty bumpy potholed roads, cyclists, packed pick-up trucks, beetle juice, more pagodas, sunsets, petrol fumes, walking past pigs and chickens to reach a squat toilet at the back of a restaurant, egg and fruit breakfasts, cute kids, oxen, breaking down, more pagodas, feeling like a celebrity, football, farming, seeing rivers used for bathing and washing clothes and as a toilet, manual workshops, more monks and even more pagodas. Also, the Burmese people are the sweetest people you are ever likely to meet.
And now for a boring day by day account.
After arriving in Yangon on Saturday 16th Dec, we soon realized that we didn’t have enough US dollars. There are no ATMs, credit cards are not accepted anywhere and they only accept clean, crisp US dollar notes. We found a hotel that took our credit card and passport details to give us $500 each although they charged about 15% commission and it took 3 days. On Saturday afternoon, we decided to hire a
Petrol Station
Top shelf petrol - bottom shelf diesel taxi for 15 days. The hire included a driver, an English speaking guide and all petrol and road tolls. They also helped us plan our itinerary so that we could get to see as much as possible in this time. It also meant that we had to change our return flight to Bangkok from 27th Dec to 31st Dec.
On Sunday morning we set off to Kyaikto to see the ‘Golden Rock’. We stopped on route at a cemetery for 27,000 British servicemen lost in the Second World War. After 5 hours in the car we arrived at a village called Kinpun, which was like our ‘base camp’ at the foot of Mount Kyaikto. A packed truck took us most of the way up the mountain and left us with just a 45 minute walk to the top. All this effort to see a large golden rock balancing on the edge of the mountainside. Darkness was falling as we took the packed truck down the mountain and we held on for our lives as we rode the 40 minute roller coaster down the steep, narrow mountain road. Walking around the village that evening, we stumbled across a funfair (illegal).
There were a number of different ‘casino like’ games where even young children were throwing money on what animal the pictured dice was going to land on. Everybody there was very interested to see us (2 westerners) and we almost felt like celebrities with everybody staring or coming up to us to use what little English they knew. The ‘big wheel’ captured our attention so we decided to go on it to the delight and applause of everyone nearby. Health & Safety was clearly not an issue and we were spun around on this wooden framed wheel by 6 guys who clearly enjoyed seeing the fright in our faces as we realized just how fast they could spin it. That was enough fun at the fair so we found a bar (packed with locals) to watch Everton Vs Chelsea. Everyone was sitting focused on the game until we sat down and then there attention turned to us. It was a strange feeling knowing that most people were looking at us as we watched the game but one that we would get used to.
On Monday, we drove back to Yangon, stopping in Bago on the way. There was not
too much to see in Bago aside from a couple of pagodas. On Tuesday morning, we picked up our US dollars and so were now able to leave Yangon and start our trip. We drove for 6 hours to Pyay, a small town where we stayed overnight before another 7 hour drive to Bagan on Wednesday. We went for a nice dinner at an outdoor restaurant by the river. There was a traditional Burmese puppet show and other entertainment on the outdoor stage. Thursday was spent looking around numerous pagodas before watching the sunset. We were up at 5.30am on Friday to watch the sunrise over Bagan. The rest of the day was spent looking at more pagodas before watching another sunset. On Saturday, we left Bagan for Mandalay. After 5 hours on the road, the car broke down and so we left our driver and went the final 2 hours with our guide. After a brief tractor ride and a bicycle taxi, we sat on the top of a packed pick-up truck for the final 90 minutes of our journey. Once in Mandalay, we headed straight to the football stadium where Myanmar were playing Myanmar under 21s in the
final of a cup. The standard of football was surprisingly good and it was an exciting 3-2 game with a sending off. Meanwhile, our driver had fixed the suspension on the car and had met us at the stadium. On Sunday morning, we took a boat along the river to a place called............................................................ (to be continued).
Advertisement
Tot: 0.042s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 7; qc: 24; dbt: 0.0225s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1mb