December 12, 2003
I was trying so hard to imagine myself how i will bribe (for the first time of my life) the people at the airport not to buy the 200 dollar worth good-for-nothing government money, that I did not notice at all that this year it was all over. You do not need to do it any more. Great surprise!
Next surprise was to find out that the very helpful taxi driver who changed my dollars at the black market into the local currancy (Chyats) made a huge profit on me. :( Well, still it was more than the government would give at the airport. The money that looked so small in dollars, was 3 huge fat piles in Chyats. I was worried where I will keep them... :)
On the first night, I went to eat at a supposedly Indian restaurant, where I sadly noted that "here we go, kingu. back to Nepalese food again... on silver plates". But I got the chance to see the blackest man in my life. A south Indian man whose skin is more black than the blackest African' s skin! I also walked to the nearby lit-up Sule pagoda. Ad there it was. The biggest cockoroach I ever saw! My heart must have stopped for a moment 'cause I nearly stepped on it...
I saw two not very interesting pagodas outside Yangoon before I went to Swedagon Paya. Since the Burmese is a great warrior nation (the dictatoric upper class always got the people to go in wars in spite of their Buddhist beliefs) at one point in history they went to Ayutthaya, Thailand and took everything that was movable. So what is left of it can be seen in Swedagon Paya, Yangoon. Truly amazing, it is! You can spend hours looking at the people chanting or at the different colours of gold affected by the sunlight. Especially during sunset. (I have sooo many pictures of this place to show later!) It was difficult to leave this thousands-of-pagodas place.
Next day I traveled to Khyaiktho (I have problems with spelling, because you see many versions of latin spelling for one word) which has just recently been opened for tourists and where you can see the sacred Golden Rock standing on its edge, supposedly been held up with Buddha's single hair. On the way up you see many traditional medicines such as the protected Black Bear's foot or skin, or Toucan beaks along with snakes, plants and all possible forms of worms... Yuck!
My monk friend, next to whom I happened to be sitting in the bus, was very concerned about my well being, so he invited me for breakfast and asked with his very poor knowledge of English where I intended to sleep, etc... (Of course, monks in this country seldom pay for things, since to touch money is prohibited for them.) He was genuinely nice, so I promised to visit him in the school where he teaches Buddhism to novices. (And found out later that it was not possible, because so many things changed through my travel in Myanmaa!:)
With my Austrian friend (an engine driver who is rather intelligent and travels a lot) we took the bus next day to Bago (or Pago, whichever you prefer). And it was here where I started to feel I am in Heaven! When I was going around town visiting the different pagodas, monasteries and nunneries the people on the street were laughing at me with a warm smile on their faces! They were simply happy to see me, I was told. Whenever I stopped they would come to me, ask me my name, my country, etc... The girls wanted to take photos with me and they put flowers in my hair and Tanaka (originally a kind of white tree powder against sunburn, but today it is more used for beauty) on my face. They invited me to their village and for lunch, dinner or tea all the time. I was a curiosity with my white skin. I think they would say I was beautiful even if I was the ugliest European. :) At the nunnery I had the special afternoon honeylike food with the nuns and I made my very clumsy first cigar at the cigar making factory. (Causing a reason for laughter among the girls, of course!)
My rickshaw driver guide was a wonderful man, a former teacher with a golden heart, who spoke excellent English, except for his habit of "Yes Sir!" instead of simply saying "yes". He took me next day to see the monks collecting alms' food at 5 30 am and seeing their ceremony of the end of year exams. I also had the chance to see the local ladyboys at work, where they have to communicate between the Nats (local spirits) and the locals to ask favours for good luck and so on. Two teak sculptures of Bats (half men, half Nats) whose love story is so famous in this country, I bought directly from a woodcarver in his hut (for less then 2 dollars each). I wached him make them skilfully.
On the long way to Kalaw I met a monk who had been ordained here in Myanmaa for some years now but he is originally from Oklahoma, US. He speaks Korean, Burmese and is very well read! We talked and I ended up going to a 10 day meditation retreat after my trekking and travelling in the very touristy Inle Lake area. (On this meditation experience I will write a lot more later under the "My Christmas Present To You" title! :) Now, let me tell you only this much: it is very hard work, but worth it. Seeing things as they are, no more really calms the mind down. You stop worrying about your body, not eating after 12 am, getting up at 4 30 in pitch dark, having breakfast virtually outside on the icy floor and sitting without moving for around 6 or 7 hours. Great self-disciplene, nice back muscles and unbelievable flexible yoga muscles develop as a side effect of this Theravada (yeah, the strictest!) school of Vipassana meditation. I have so much to tell you! (One of the nuns declared before my departure that she loves me so much as a friend. Since i did not do anything in particular I wondered why. She said: because you are lovable. As simple as that! :)
But let me go back now to Inle Lake, where i just missed the air ballon show of the year (live size elephant baloons and the like!) and where I saw one of the most beautiful boy in my life. He was a son of the long-neck Padang lady. He had the kind of slanted eyes that has an unexplainable effect on me. Kind of Mongolo-Tibetan. (Later in Burma I saw 2 more men with similar eyes.) This Padang lady was kind of shy. Unlike the other, who was living near the ruins of Indein, and was continually giggling during my visit. She was 61 and had her granddaughter with her, also wearing the rings. (The neck is not streched! Only the shoulders are pushed down and in case of medical emergency if the rings removed slowly enough the body goes back to original shape).
What are the chances to see a calendar about Budapest In Inle Lake at the Jumping Cat Monastery? Yes, the monk who makes the cat jump through the ring had Hungarian friends, who sent it to him. :) Other monks at the market were wondering around with a cheap camera and many times it happened they asked me for a photo with them. I saw silk weaving factories, bamboo umbrellas and fishing boats being made, as well as Intha leg rowers. (One of the girls living in these lake houses picked a lot of wonderful lotuses for me!) The counry's tomatoes are being grown here in floating gardens made of bamboo and seaweed. Very interesting. One of the most unusual round-shape-window Shan monastery is just around, so I walked there for the big surprise of the locals (a foreigner walking!?).
I visited numerous markets, with the ever present loud speaker chants of monks, to have a chance to photograph the different tribes of this region. Namely, the Palaung, the Danu, the Tangyo and the Pao. The Pao's do not like photos, nevertheless I have some pictures of them bathing in the river after market day in their black longis next to some water buffaloes. The other extreme is the Palaung. I had a chance to see a wedding ceremony in one of the villages I have been to during my trekking. They were very exited to see themselves maybe for the first time in pictures (i have a digital camera with me), so they kept on asking for more. I was only too happy to take the photos of the schoolboys and old ladies in traditional clothing with their funny wrinkled nose! (By the way, in this area of Myanmaa they seem to have all the possible fruits and vegetables. Just to name a few: avocado, papaya, green tea, rice, brokkoli, sesame seed flowers, potatoes, etc...)
After my meditation, I took the night bus to Mandalay. Again, I met wonderful and helpful people. Generally the hotels are not very cheap and everyone wants to make big money off the tourists but if you don't believe everything you always find a less expensive and more interesting way to see things. Since I was having a horrible bacterial bowel infection from the previous night?s bad food, I could only go for the afternoon to Mingun on the other side of the river to see what was left of the huge stupa after an earthquake. The bell that was supposed to be put in it and now stands next to it is the largest bell in the world. Maybe I was not so impressed because even after 5 charcoal pills I still felt very sick. The other places I saw in Mandalay were nice (eg the teak wood monastery or the largest book of the world in endless rows of stupas each having a marble stone full of pali writing) especially because I had a nice rickshaw driver again. He sang me the very famous and popular love song of Bagan and told me about his secret love before with a rich girl. By the way, did you know that Pali, Buddha's language, is one of the few important languages that has no written alphabet? It was an oral tradition only before they transcribed it to Thai or Burmese, etc..) The driver gave a present of incences when I told him I had done some meditation. :) "Welcome to my religion!" (Only it is not a religion at all but a very logical, expereince -based teaching. :))
After surviving the next night bus I was taken to a doctor where I recieved very expensive medication, they took me to a hotel where I was just sleeping or lying in bed for 24 hours without eating and forcing myself to drink sometimes. Yes, I was in Bagan and could not go out. Next day I was so weak I had to take a horse cart to see the Pagodas. Beautiful 11 and 12 century frescos, stone carvings, buildings and a poisonous snake. I enjoyed it so much when I got better I did not only watch the sunset but went back after a puppet show to watch the pew show's supposedly Buddhist teachings and the Myanmaa traditional dancing at the local pagoda festival (which is sponsored by the monks - they recieve so much donation they are quite rich in this country - and where the actors invited me to see the show from behind the curtains, since I was the only foreigner to watch it) and the sunrise, too!! Bagan is very very nice in full moon!!
Not so much the police in the next day, when they were looking for me because I did not know that I was not allowed to stay outside after 11 pm. Well, Kingu being tiglis I suppose... ;D
In Bagan there was a boy whom I misteriously kept meeting at the most impossible places during my 24 hour sightseeing. He was born in the same month as me, only 9 years later, and thought that we were twin souls, according to his Buddhist knowledge. It was a little strange.
1 hour sleep, then I went to see some more pagodas and took the afternoon bus to Yangon. Now, as a rule of thumb, whatever distance you travel by bus, it will break down once at least! It did so this time, too, thereby making my 15 hor bus trip into 17. Add to this the very low comfort of the bus filled with men chewing the horrible smelling betel nut, watching the loud and stupid pew show on video (yes, video. in each bus. life is much better standard here than in Nepal because here the people care about the roads, the pagodas, etc...even though the government tries to make everything impossible for them!) and smoking occasionally inside the bus. You now, I have developed a kind of theory during my travel about the importance of eyes. I think you can tell what kind of person you are talking to if you carefully look into their eyes. Intelligent, simple, honest or not, etc...
Just imagine my state of mind when I finally arrived to Yangon airport and they told me that unless I paid the 10 dollar airport tax here they would not allow me on board my plane and to leave the contry. Guess what, I was so tired I nearly cried. But I was lucky, too. I met this really polite, beautiful and kind air hostess who felt sorry for me and not only made his boss's heart softer to let me pay at BKK airport but invited me for lunch, too. She was very nice. (The whole thing happened because I stayed longer then I intented to, and since there is no ATM you can only use the money you bring in on arrival. Plus the doctor and the phone calls, since I had to pay even for receiving calls and Aravind from India and Ervin surprised me, were very expensive, so I run out of money at the end.) Undeniably, it was much more interesting this way! :)
Now I am back in Bangkok, having in fact performed a time travel of massive proportions. I jumped from year 1365 (according to the Myanmar calendar) to the year 2547 (according to the Buddhist calendar) and everything seems like a dream. Sitting here after receiving my second Hepatitis B vaccine along with a card that has my name and this year on it, I wonder if it has all happened at all... I hope so! ;))
I could write so much more about Burma but I suppose it's ok if I still have the chance to tell you some more things at home in person. :)
Wishing you all the best and thank you for your patience!
Love:
Tiglis