Myanmar/Burma

Considering the history of Burma, I was a little bit sceptical and scared of going. But my husband assured me that everything is gonna be ok, so we go. And it was more than ok, it was great! 

I have friends who live in Mandalay and there's no direct flight from KL to Mandalay so we stopped in Yangon for 1 night. We arrived at night in Yangon so we couldn't see much.  We took airport taxi to our hotel "Grand Palace" and it costs $ 10. If you are going to Burma, note that no Credit Card or ATM in the country, so you have to carry cash all the time. They accept US dollar or Kyats or FEC. Our driver was asking us why we stayed in that hotel and told there aren't many tourist go there, only locals. Arrived at the hotel, where they mentioned they're close to the airport, which is not, and it looks like it's in a sketchy neighbourhood and most rooms were windowless. We saw the room and thinking "looks nice...", and we checked the bathroom and saw something different in their toiletries...Soap checked, shampoo checked, toothbrush checked, condoms checked? Hmm... Interesting we said. And after connecting the dots, it was a hotel for "short timer". Ew. I guess it's nice to know that they support a safe sex, but still, ew.

We wanted to go to this place call "Bagan" which is an ancient city located in the Mandalay region. There's also no direct flight from Yangon to Bagan, you have to transit in Mandalay. We stayed at "Sedona Hotel" in Mandalay,  a much better hotel than the one in Yangon :). The staffs were very friendly, helpful and it situated right in front of an old palace surrounded by moat, very beautiful. It is very close to Mandalay Hill, which is a must come place for sunset. Along the way, there are some nice temples to see. We really like this particular one, I forgot what it's called but it's a big pagoda surrounded by hundreds of little tiny temple fill with Buddha teachings. 

We decided to rent a car and a driver to take us to Bagan the next morning. It's only a 4 hours drive and it saved us $50 than flying. We enjoyed the view of Burmese countryside very much, the road was pretty smooth too.

Bagan used to be a kingdom, and during the reign of King Anawrahta (1044-1077), Theravaddha Buddhism was established and he initiated the building of thousands of pagodas. There used to be 10.000 pagodas but there are about 4000 pagodas and temples survived and still remain today. We arrived in Bagan at 11 am and it was already so HOT! They said it's summer time in Burma and in the day time can get to 40 degree! We walked around to see 3 temples and at 2 o'clock we gave up and went back to hotel to rest. It was burning, literally. No one is allowed to wear shoes in the temples and we have to walk barefeet all the time and the stone floor outside the temples burned our feet. All of the temples there were amazing though, the city itself is so amazing, thousands and thousands of temples. You can climb up to some of the temples and enjoy the 360 degree view. All temples, pagodas, and Buddha statues from different size, colours, and shapes! Most of pagodas also have beautiful murals inside, from different centuries, mostly are from 11 C-13 C.  We've been told by our driver (who is awesome by the way, who took us to some must see temples, other wise we wouldn't know and just wondered around because there's just too many!) Anyway, he told us to go to this one temple called "Ananda Paya" which is very famous for sunset. The sun was blocked by clouds when we got there but you still can see the beauty of the temples against the orange sky background, we were sooo amazed! But word gets around so this place is packed in the sunset time. But, it was worth it. Another famous temples was "Shwezigon pagoda". It's a big and beautiful pagoda, reminds me of some of the temples in Thailand and Laos, it looks very similar.

We only spent one night in Bagan and should've stayed longer but we had to go back to Mandalay to see our friends again, who just had a baby by the way, a cute one too! So who could resist that! It was really nice to see her again. I've known her when we were still living in Manado and worked together. Who would've thought that 5 years later we would meet again in Mandalay, Burma?

So we went back to Mandalay and spent another two nights there. Our friends took us to this really nice restaurant in a hotel called "Red Canal", a very nice and cute little hotel. Food was excellent. They served Indian food. Turns out there are many Indian people in Burma (mostly in the cities), they were brought by the British a while a go. We also went to U Pain bridge, which is a 100 years old bridge made out of teak.

We flew to Yangon early in the morning and our flight to KL was in the evening so we thought we could arrange a day tour at the airport in Yangon. There's only 1 travel agent at the airport but they do tours outside of Burma so we asked this guy who kept following us around offering his taxi. We made a deal, it was $10 per hour. Very expensive we thought, but everything cost so much in Burma, for tourist of course. All because they just open their country to tourism, so still less competitors, that's why hotels, transportation, still cost so much in this country! Our flight from Yangon to Mandalay was $US 460, using "Air Bagan".

We went to Shwedagon Pagoda", an enormous pagoda in the middle and surrounded by 4 other temples from each wing. Another beautiful temple. What I love to see is the roof of the temples, very detailed wooden carving, just beautiful!! And then we drove around Kandawgyi lake and we passed ASSK's house and then we hit the "Scott market". A huge market selling everything from beautiful Burmese crafts, paintings, food, clothing, you name it! But thinking of the $10 an hour charge for the car, we didn't spent too long at the market. And so, we went back to the airport.

Yangon, really reminds me of Indonesia in the old days, in the 60's I would say. Well, we do have the same history background. Our President got coup from their Generals, we were living under military suppression for a while, one president ruled for years and years. Even though both have different method but it's still the same motives. Old cars, man wearing sarongs and chew pan. These men love their sarong. We saw some guys jogging with their sarong folded to his stomach. Very interesting indeed.  

There are so many reasons to go to Burma, the people, the Crafts, the lakes, Bagan city, temples, rivers, etc. Burma is a country waiting to be discovered!