Myanmar

If you know anything about Myanmar (formally Burma, formally Japanese territory, formally Rangoon), you know that it's had a rough history between the population and who was in charge. It's only been a few years since Myanmar came out from under a rather nasty military dictatorship that, among other things, kept it's economy and culture from growing at all. Consequently they are still in the very early stages of getting used to hosting foreign visitors. This was the one country that I really hoped to get a glimpse of culture relatively untouched by Hollywood and the global culture. I was not disappointed.

We arrived to our second band. This one, not a brass marching band but instead a group of local musicians with a traditional dancer performing minor acrobats as the ship slid alongside the rough concrete pier next to a small cargo ship. There was no port facility of any kind and as it turned out, we were an hour's bus ride from the city of Yangon. The river we had motored up was not deep enough to accommodate the M/V Explorer, so this was as close to the city as we could get. From here you had to take a bus.

We weren't cleared through Customs until nearly 1600 and even though I was slated to get up early in the morning to go to the airport for a trekking trip, I wanted a chance to see the city. So I piled onto one of the three waiting busses and headed off to town with a small group of faculty and staff. The ride in was very rural, passing brown fields that look to have been recently harvested. We were in the dry season, and things were very brown and dusty. All along the road we saw bicycles and small motorbikes along with a few cars. The numbers of cars steadily increased as we neared the city. Off in the distance and sometimes right along the road we saw numerous bright gold-colored pagodas of Buddhist temples. The country is something like 80% Buddhist and the spires, towers and statues of the Buddha became a common sight throughout our time in country.

We were dropped off at the City Hall, an old colonial building from the time the British ruled the country. Directly across from this very stodgy British building was a giant pagoda, painted white with a bright gold minaret. There were people on foot everywhere and the city was alive with folks finishing their work day. We wandered away from the center block and walked along the tight narrow streets soaking in the culture. Shops were busy and street vendors selling cooked food crouched on the sidewalks along the busy streets. The city was full of life and the long stares we got as we passed by was a bit of a testament to the fact that they don't see a lot of white faces, even in the "big city".

We eventually found our way to a local restaurant where a couple of the waiters had about thirty English words along with a menu that had some English as well. Two of our group, Ariana and Olivia took over the menus and quickly the beer and food began flowing. The food was quite good, kind of like Vietnamese food but not quite so spicy. We had fried rice with bits of barely identifiable seafood, a chicken curry dish and several things with noodles and vegetables that all looked similar but tasted different from each other. We spent a good hour and a half eating and passing dishes back and forth so that everyone could try everything. By the time the evening was over I had at least three beverages and a very full tummy from a lot of great food. The bill? About five bucks. Hard to beat.

Following dinner, four of us found a taxi and headed up to the Shwe Dagone temple outside of the city. This is a large Buddhist temple which has been built, added on to, and rebuilt for I don't know how many centuries. We arrived at the temple, took off our shoes and took a four-story elevator to arrive at the top of the facility. At this point it was well full-dark and the temple was lit by bright spotlights allowing the main pagoda to be seen from all over the city.

It's difficult for me to put into words what this place is like. I grew up in the Catholic church which has it's fair share of pomp and circumstance. Walking through a large cathedral can be an impressive, awesome experience. High Mass, with it's swinging incense, pounding organ music and brightly colored stained glass is a feast for the senses. The Catholics have nothing on the Buddhists. This place is like a Mardi Gras parade on acid. Spotlights and street lamps lit thousands of Buddha statues sitting among ornate towers, temples and spires. Spinning and whirling neon lights illuminated the back of statue heads while blinking christmas lights strobed out of sequence with each other from multiple rooftops. There were people everywhere, kneeling in front of statues, reading aloud from scriptures, and pouring water over the heads of statues that represented days of the week in which the person was born. Lines of candles and burning incense

Full Moon over the Shwe Dagon pagoda

surrounded the entire walkway around the central, twenty-story high pagoda. We walked around the giant pagoda (clockwise, always clockwise) and gawked at the spectacle of the place. It was amazing. I was lucky enough to be with a Professor of religion, a Professor of Buddhism and a Professor of Art History so the entire visit was one long series of me asking "what is that?" and getting the full history and meaning of each little detail. I think I earned something like three college credits before the evening was out.

We stayed until they began ringing the time-to-go bell at 10 p.m. We then made our way back to our shoes which took some doing - this place is a maze. and got back outside to find a taxi. We reversed our course and got back to the City Hall to catch our hour-long bus back to the ship. I was set to leave first thing in the morning for a trekking trip in the north part of the country. This trip will be the subject of my next post. We're back at sea now and it's mid-term time so I'll continue to post our Myanmar adventures as time allows. Hard to believe that we are at the half-way point already! Till next time…