Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Burma Bound

I arrived yesterday in Yangon, Myanmar after a week of being “Shutdown in Bangkok”. It didn’t have anything to do with the current Shutdown Bangkok political protests. That was no bother at all, really more like a huge street party with a few political speeches that nobody was paying much attention to. No, my problems were more of the “acquiring visa” kind. The Myanmar embassy wasn’t the main problem, it was the Indonesian embassy that took a day longer than planned to do my 1 year visa. When that happened, I couldn’t get my passport to the Myanmar embassy in time for a visa before my scheduled Friday departure, and at that point pretty much everything came off the rails. The domino effect rippled through every flight and hotel reservation that I had meticulously arranged. Over the weekend I rebooked flights and hotels, and Monday I got my Myanmar visa in time to make it to the airport for my rebooked 2015 flight to Yangon. Except that there is no longer a 2015 flight to Yangon. The last one was the Friday flight I was supposed to be on. So I rebooked again for a 0715 flight the next morning and found a hotel close to the airport for another night in Bangkok. So yesterday morning, I left my hotel at 0500, checked in for my flight, went to the gate, got on the plane, took off on time, flew about halfway to Yangon and the plane turned around and went back to Bangkok! They were never really clear why, I suspect it was some sort of instrument problem and if they went on to Yangon they would be grounded there until it was repaired and there are no parts available. When we landed back in Bangkok, they kept us on the plane sitting out on the tarmac while some mechanics came out to look things over. The they loaded us on a couple buses and headed back for the terminal. About the time we got to the terminal, the buses did a U-Turn and headed back out on the tarmac and we re-boarded a plane. I’m not sure if it was the one we got off. Maybe that’s why the drove us around in circles for awhile. At any rate, that plane made it all the way to Yangon. If getting there is really half the fun, I’ve got a whole lot more fun in store for me for the remainder of the trip.

I was planning on taking the overnight train to Bagan this afternoon. I went to the train station yesterday afternoon to buy my ticket. The gentleman in the office said yes, there were berths available in the sleeping car for US$40.00. I pulled out two 20’s and gave them to him. He looked them over and handed one of them back to me and said that it was not in good enough condition to accept. It had been folded, so there was a crease in it. So I pulled out 4 more 20’s and told him to pick one. Nope, none were good enough for him. So I asked him if I could just pay in Myanmar Kyat since I had a nice stack of mint bills straight out of an ATM. Oh no, he said, you can’t buy a train ticket with Kyat, only dollars. So tomorrow morning I’m flying to Bagan instead because you can but a plane ticket with Kyat, no problem.

Today I hired a very nice young guide who took me all over Yangon to shoot temples. We would taxi to a temple, spend some time there then grab another cab to the next. Taxis are cheap here, the most expensive was about 4 bucks for a 30 minute ride. It helps to have a savvy local negotiate the fares though as there are no meters in the taxis.

Here are a few images from the day’s touring:

A 216 foot reclining Buddha (I only saw 2 feet).
_MG_2333

_MG_2363

_MG_2364

Lots of bells at the temples.
_MG_2371

_MG_2379

_MG_2386

_MG_2387

These are two of Yangon's famous Pink Elephants. They really do look pink, and you don't have to be inebriated to see them.
_MG_2404

_MG_2421

_MG_2430

The Buddha's LEDs add a modern touch.
_MG_2437

The North Gate to Shwedagon temple.
_MG_2443

_MG_2458

The Shwedagon Pagoda is 99 meters high and covered in 60 tons of gold. It also has a 30 carat diamond on the top. You can see Shwedagon form miles away, even at night. It's the most impressive Buddhist temple I've ever seen.
_MG_2471

No comments:

Post a Comment