Myanmar -- Land of Enchantment

Today we sailed down the Yangon River away from Myanmar, leaving behind a country that stole my heart.  I can't wait to come back.

Myanmar (renamed Burma by the British who colonized it) is a fascinating place.  After being under British control for many years, Aung San united the people and fought for independence.  He was assassinated just before Myanmar was released from Britain's grasp in 1948.  His daughter, Aung San Suu Kyi, continues to serve as a heroine and inspiration for freedom.  Held under house arrest for some 15 years, she has only grown in popularity and prestige, and today she is free and an elegant voice for democracy in a nation that is just recently allowed free elections. 

Myanmar opened its doors to the outside world less than three years ago.  What a privilege to visit this nation right now in its history.  Yangon (or Rangoon), the large port city where we docked, is generally underdeveloped and rather dirty.  There is no McDonald's.  People sell meats, fruit, clothes, and supplies outside on nearly every street in the city.  Women and girls wear a beige-colored paste on their face which comes from a local plant and is supposed to help keep one cool..  They need it.  It's about 95 degrees during the day, and the sun is intense.  

But in a place that at first blush feels uninviting, there is tremendous beauty.  It is in the land... and most of all, the people.  Along the streets, people cheerfully yell their greeting: "Mingalarba!"  They start beaming when we return the greeting.  They do not usually push us to buy their products, instead sitting quietly while we look at their wares.  

At first, we couldn't figure out why the men's teeth were often red and black, but we learned that it comes from chewing betel nuts.  My children found this habit gross, yet fascinating, particularly when our cab drivers would open the door at a red light and spit out a red liquid onto the street. I read an article in the local newspaper about a new campaign to educated people on the detrimental effects of betel nut chewing.  The dentists must be behind it.

Our first day in Yangon was hot and sweaty.  We wandered the streets for a while before visiting the reclining Buddha statue.  Imagine Buddha in Vegas, and this temple is what you'd get.  This is a giant, and I mean GIANT, statue housed in an open-air warehouse-like building complete with neon lights and lots of gold.  Gold is a big thing in Myanmar.  And if you think the reclining Buddha has a lot of gold going on, wait till you see the Shwe Dagon Pagoda, an enormous, sparkling, gold complex built high above the city and full of small golden spires surrounding one gigantic gold pagoda.  We walked around the complex for a long time, taking in the sights and running into good friends from the ship.  We also met a couple of monks, who asked to take pictures of our kids and ended up telling us about their life.  We shared smiled and hugs across the cultures and langauge barriers.  At one point, we were taking pictures when about 10 Burmese women armed with brooms came marching toward us in a line.  The Broom Brigade literally swept through, only to be followed by another Broom Brigade a few steps behind!  Kerry said it was like a broom zamboni. 

We have learned a few good tips on this trip, and one is to find the parks in every big city.  We have done this in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Vietnam, and it has often changed our perspective of the cities.  What started off as only hot, crowded, frenetic, and polluted... turned into green, quiet, cool, and shady when we hit the parks.  Yangon was no exception. Right behind the Shwe Dagon Pagoda, we stumbled upon the People's Park, a sprawling green oasis in the middle of the city.  Inexplicably, there was an airplane in the park.  Then we saw two swinging bridges hung up high between three trees.  We all enjoyed swinging and jumping on them.  Then, just as the sun was setting, we followed the sound of music to an enormous area of fountains where kids were playing in the water and couples snuggled together on park benches.  It was magical. 

Burmese food is an interesting blend of Asian and Indian.  A typical Myanmar restaurant will have dishes prepared, then you choose what you want and they will immediately bring small bowls of different foods to your table, along with a big bowl of rice.  We tried pork curry, potato curry, cooked spinach, sweet and sour chicken, spicy meatballs, naan, a chicken broth soup, and other dishes.  We all liked the food and were grateful for a place to sit after a long day of sightseeing in the heat.

Our youth hostel was in a sketchy area but had a good vibe and a stellar review from Lonely Planet.  When we checked in, I learned a valuable lesson: in Myanmar, don't get a room with a bathroom attached.  Why not?  Well, the shower is often right in the middle of the bathroom, and there is no lip or doors around it.  Therefore, the water just covers the entire floor of the bathroom, and then it flows out of a hole cut in the corner of the room.  It makes for a wet and slippery floor when you're done, and in the case of Kerry and the boys' room, a mold and mildew fest.  I don't think their bathroom ever dried out.  The bottom third of the wooden door was saturated every time someone showered, and it was covered with mildew.  I saw black "something" all over the corners of the room.  I could have sworn it was mold, but Kerry insisted it wasn't.  Anyway, the boys didn't seem to mind this minor inconvenience, and Sydney's and my room was thankfully mold and mildew free! 

But what the youth hostel lacked in bathroom hygiene, it made up for in spades with personal service!  A family from our ship was also staying there, and their daughter turned 16 the second day.  When she came down for breakfast, the staff of the hotel (a group of 5 darling young Burmese girls) excitedly came out, holding a beautiful birthday cake with 16 candles!  They had seen her birthdate on her passport and gotten a cake the night before.  One even made a lovely homemade card they all signed!  I had never seen such a thoughtful expression from a hotel!

The next day, we headed to the airport for our flight to Bagan.  What was supposed to take 45 minutes took almost 2 hours in the taxi!  Yangon traffic is something else!  Fortunately for our driver, he had lots of time to open his car door and spit his betel nut juice out onto the street.  We almost missed our flight but came running into the airport just in time with our backpacks flopping on our backs.  At the gate, they loaded all of us onto a bus to drive us (literally) 30 yards to a waiting plane.   We were waiting to take off when they announced over the loudspeaker not to worry, but that we would return to the terminal to be more comfortable while we waited for a minor inconvenience to be corrected.  "I think the minor inconvenience is that the left engine isn't working," Kerry noted after noticing that only the right propeller on the plane was turning. "Every good pilot should be able to fly with one engine," he said, but I guess they didn't think today was the day for that.  After being driven 30 yards back to the terminal, we watched as a ladder was brought out and a technician armed with a wrench began working on the left propeller.  About 30 minutes later, the propeller began turning, while belching out black smoke.  I said to Sydney, 'We've got good news and bad news."  Ultimately, they shuttled us the 30 yards back to the plane, and we took off without incident to Bagan.

Now Bagan may be the hardest place to describe on our entire adventure, but I'll try.  It is a hot, dusty, plain in the middle of Myanmar.  Palm trees dot the landscape, and pink, red and orange bougainvillea grows everywhere.  The climate is dry like a desert, so the mornings are cool and the afternoon temperatures hover close to 100.  And this is the cool season.  But what Bagan is known for is Buddhist temples.  Somewhere between AD 1000 and 1300, someone decided that Bagan should be the place for temples.   At one point, there were 10,000 of them!  Today, there are about 3,000, and they cover the countryside.  The scenery is truly awesome, and if you catch it at sunrise or sunset, you are rewarded with an otherworldly view.  People who wouldn't normally get up at zero dark thirty, get up before dawn in Bagan.  And it's worth it every time.

The modes of transportation in this town range from taxi, to horsedrawn carts, to large open pick-up trucks, to unbelievably crowded public buses with people hanging off the back, to bicycles, to motorcycles, to our personal favorite, E-bikes.  E-bikes are electric bikes, somewhat like a moped.  There is a wide range of quality, as we discovered.  Our hotel rented E-bikes with varying degrees of power and reliability.  We later found a place down a dirt road that rented newer, more reliable bikes, which you will soon understand, was much appreciated.

Now hypothetically speaking, what if I told you we allowed our 11 and 13-year-olds to rent their own E-bikes in a developing world country?  Would you think that we:
a) are the coolest parents,
b) are the worst parents ever, or
c) have lost our minds. 
This is a rhetorical question; no need to email me your votes.  

Well I can tell you that, hypothetically speaking, if we were to do such a thing, it would raise us to "rock star status" in our children's eyes, and quite possibly set them up for the most exciting experience of their lives.  At least for Charlie, who, hypothetically speaking, might have yelled at the top of his lungs while flying 25 miles-per-hour down the road on an E-bike, "I'm going to get a motorcycle when I grow up!" And later, "When I die, I want to die on an E-bike!"

Speaking of dying, if I told you that three out of the five of us crashed our E-bikes -- when our wheels got caught in the sand... and we had to drag our daughter and her bike out of the path before two water trucks rumbled by... and I crashed only because I was videoing with my I-phone while driving, hypothetically speaking, of course -- would you think that we: 
a) are reckless and irresponsible,
b) are even worse than the worst parents in the world, or
c) beat the odds and came out ahead of the game. 
Again, keep your votes to yourselves.

Well, as I mentioned, our hotel had less than stellar bikes, and we discovered this the hard way.  We decided to spend the first day getting the lay of the land, so after visiting temples at sunrise, we sped all the way to the farthest village north (Nyaung U) to do some shopping at the local market.  There, I lost track of the others, and stood in the fish aisle -- watching flies swarming on the large fish carcasses in the mid-day heat -- waiting for the others.  A local man at one of the stalls saw that I was looking for someone, and he finally got my attention and pointed, as if to say, "They went that-a-way."  How did he know who they were?  I guess our family stands out a little in Myanmar.  Anyway, I couldn't find my clan for a long while, so he and several other Burmese began looking for Kerry and the kids for me.  Finally, the first guy came running up to me and was pointing way down a little street, and sure enough, Kerry and the kids were shopping down there.  The warmth of the Burmese people is amazing.

After shopping, we decided to head back toward our village (two villages away) around 1:00 p.m., which as we discovered is when the day really begins to heat up.  But that wasn't a problem because we had our E-bikes, right?  We started off zipping down the road, and the kids did a masterful job navigating traffic circles, busy roads, and sand on the edges of the road that made for very tricky riding.  Suddenly and hypothetically speaking, Charlie got a flat tire.  I dropped his key in my pocket, we left his bike by the side of the road, and then he jumped on the back with me.  Then, my bike died.  Incidentally, when an E-bike begins to lose its charge, it loses it fast.  Just FYI.  So I dropped my key in my pocket, we left my bike by the side of the road, and Sydney rode behind Charlie on his bike.  I will never forget watching them ride away with Sydney screaming, "I don't trust you, Charlie!  Not for a minute!  I'm going to dieeeeeeee!" 

We were now down to two bikes.  I watched Kerry and Austin speed off on one, Sydney and Charlie on the other, and I began the rather warm, sunny walk toward our village (about 4 miles away.)  Somewhere along the way, I checked my pocket, and I only had one key in it.  I could have sworn I put both keys in it, but at this point, I wasn't sure of anything.  So, I turned around and began retracing my steps -- in the brutal heat and sun of midday in Bagan.  I retraced and retraced, then got lost, came to a deadend, backtracked, and retraced some more.  Finally I saw in the distance an old couple bent over something on the side of the road.  As I approached them, I said, "Have you, by chance, seen a key anywhere?"  They said, "It's right here!  We were just discussing whether we should pick it up or not!"  Incredible.  What an answer to prayer!

With key in hand (actually now safely in my backpack -- NOT my pocket), I again began the trek back to our village. About 15 minutes later, I was passing a road-side stall that looked like an information booth when out popped Sydney and Charlie!  WHAT?!  I asked what they were doing there, and they said that Sydney's bike had died, so Kerry left them there while he and Austin went to get help. They had been waiting 45 minutes when I arrived.  Ironically, several people had asked them for directions thinking they were manning the tourist booth!  I had a package of lollipops that we had bought in the market, so I suggested they try selling them in the booth.  They set up their wares (just like all the other roadside booths in Myanmar), and before long two guys from France rode by on bicycles.  The kids were yelling, "Lollipops for sale! Only 100 kyat!"  The guys yelled back, "That's too expensive," and they began bargaining and laughing.  The guys ended up pulling over, and the kids were thrilled when they got out 200 kyats for 2 lollipops.  Then they asked if we had water for sale!  I told them we just had a half empty bottle, which they happily shared.  We invited them into the shade of our booth, and we learned they were pastry chefs from the South of France.  I told them about couchsurfing and invited them to come stay with us in Washington, DC.  We exchanged emails, and they said they would come see us one day.  (The way things are going, I wouldn't be surprised if they're making pain au chocolat in our kitchen one day soon!)  Just about this time, Kerry and Austin pulled up in a taxi to find us all eating lollipops with our French friends.  Incidentally, Kerry's bike died just moments before reaching the hotel.  Mental note -- don't rent E-bikes from our hotel and always buy extra lollipops.

The next day, we rented E-bikes from down the road and headed out for another adventure.  This time, Kerry was behind a woman when her wallet came flying off her scooter.  He pulled over to pick it up, then went flying after her to try to return it.  She was too fast, however, and he came back with the wallet.  She was a tourist from France, and we now had her national ID card, credit cards, and cash in various currencies.  Kerry went to a nice, nearby hotel to see if she was staying there, then asked the manager to try to contact her through her credit card company and notify the police.  We have been praying for her and hope she got her wallet back.

The rest of our time in Bagan was spent taking the E-bikes down tiny dirt paths to see where they led.  We would stop at temples and explore hidden passageways that led to dark stairwells where we could climb up for the view.  Bats squeaked and chirped on the cool dark ceilings.  Back on our bikes, dry, dusty land stretched as far as the eye could see.  An old woman worked out in a field, with a skinny white cow beside her.  Small 13th century villages with open-air thatched roof houses were tucked in among the temples.  We saw people grinding sesame seeds using a cow walking in circle and turning a wheel.  Golden spires sparkled in the sunshine.  Bagan truly felt like a fairy tale.

Mid-day we would return to our lovely hotel to swim in the beautiful, but surprisingly freezing cold pool.  One day we ran into our good friends (including Connor, who is related to our neighbors, the Riemans!), and we invited them to join us for a swim.  We all enjoyed a wonderful, relaxing afternoon. 

Our last morning, we were up before 5:00 a.m. for our final sunrise adventure.  If I told you, hypothetically speaking, that we rode E-bikes in the pitch black darkness without any streetlights... and Sydney forgot her glasses... and we dodged buses, cars, and pedestrians that we couldn't see until they were dangerously close... would you think we were -- oh, never mind!  We returned to a temple we had visited before and while lots of people were on the first level, we were the only ones who knew about the hidden staircase that led to another level, so we climbed up higher than everyone else and watched the glowing red orb of the sun slowly rise through the dusty air of Bagan.  Moments later, a dozen hot air balloons rose with it and floated effortlessly above the temples on the plain.  Bagan -- I hope I can come back to see you again one day.  Until then, the images of your surreal beauty will stay in my mind forever.