Burmese Daze

Mengalaba and hello once again from sunny Mandalay. Yesterday, on a
slow ferry down the Ayerwaddy River (where I had spent the night
sleeping on the deck floor in the not-much-class "Deck Class"), the
first glimpse of Mandalay Hill from the river triggered a wave of
nostalgia. Although I still have five days out here in Asia, this
marks the end of strange new places and the beginning of retracing my
steps back to familiarity and eventually, back home.

The past two weeks in Myanmar have been, among other things, very
photogenic. Unfortunately, with my computer locked up in Bangkok (I
do miss it) I'm unable to easily share photos. You'll just have to
wait.

Despite swearing to myself that I would never trek again after Everest
(Base Camp), less than two weeks later I was lacing up the boots for a
short three day walk in Eastern Burma. If trekking in Nepal is the
prime rib of the hiking world, then trekking in Burma is...well,
something much cheaper than prime rib (God I miss steak). That wasn't
a bad thing, since there's a bit more "pressure" in the Everest region
with the altitude and tough days and costs. Here, the grades were
tame, the patchwork of crops on the hills colourful, villagers were
friendly, there was a good trekking crew, and we slept in quiet
village homestays. Did we sleep well? No, because homestay is
actually Burmese for "sleep on a wooden floor until the roosters
outside wake up at dawn".

The trek brought us to Inle Lake, a favourite traveller destination
and certainly worth the hype. Basically most of the villages are
built on stilts along the marshy borders of the lake, so instead of
roads of asphalt (or more appropriately, dirt) you have waterways as
the main method of transport. We boated past a school ending for the
day, a virtual flotilla of narrow canoes with kids in uniform paddling
home like it's the most ordinary thing in the world. It may not sound
exciting, but it was relaxing and really interesting. One day,during
an extremely pleasant boat ride back across the lake at sunset (our
driver pausing as we passed by fishing boats to get iconic fisherman
silhouette photos of course), I had a flashforward to the snowstorms
and darkness waiting for me in Canada. Can hardly wait to get home.

One horrifically uncomfortable bus ride later (thought I suspect I am
becoming a bit of "bus softie" after so many months cycling) we
arrived at a temple site called Bagan. I haven't even Bagan to
recount some of the great puns such a spot offered up. We biked out
to the first temple we saw, snapped some photos of the Buddha statues,
and I was about to chalk the whole thing up as over-rated until we
ascended a narrow, steep, unlit flight of stairs to the temple roof.
From there the scope of the site became clear, with the forest and
fields in all directions pierced by thousands of pointed temples of
all shapes and sizes, some as big as castles. It was a cool spot to
explore for a few days, but I did reach a point near the end where I
decided I never wanted to see a Buddha statue ever again. Seeing how
the trekking promise held up, it seems likely that there's still hope
to save my soul or whatever seeing Buddha statues does for you.

Not one to waste time with the end in sight, a
plane-train-bus-taxi-boat combo took me up to the north and through a
bit of a far-flung region. I think that one deserves some more
writeup, and certainly once I'm safely out of the country.

As always, the people on Myanmar are wicked and extremely friendly and
surely the highlight of the trip. One of my favourites was the old
guy who rented me a canoe to paddle around along the shores of Inle
Lake. I got back to town, and wasn't he waiting there with snacks and
tea. We talked about his family and work, and then on the walk back
we stopped for shots of rice whiskey. That's pretty par for the
course here, though not always the rice whiskey. Sort of related,
they do have local draught beer everywhere which is sort of out of
place but of course incredibly welcome.

Tonight, one last bus ride back to the principle city of Yangon for a
few days trying to procure a decent tailor-made shirt and a debate
whether to buy one of the male sarongs that are so popular here.
After that, there's 12 final hours in Bangkok that are getting busier
and busier. The next time you'll hear from me I should be somewhere
in the limbo of the five airports that will bring me back home. If
anyone needs any high-quality lacquerware or Buddhist oil paintings,
this is the time to let me know.