bagan
the bus journey wasn't too painful at all: the ten hours of burmese karaoke were actually a lot more hazardous than the numerous bumps in the road. i arrived in nyaung u, about 10km east of bagan, at about 5am, headed straight to a guesthouse, and passed out in blissful silence.after coming too i realised that the warnings i'd gotten about the heat in this area were not exaggerations. it's absolutely searing, and you pretty much have to write off the middle of the day. given the telling off i already got from my gran in cal for having got darker this is particularly essential for me if i want to avoid another ear bending next month. still, in the late afternoon i got up and went for a bit of a wander and saw a few of the stupas close to the village (as well as getting chased by a dog trying to protect his pregnant special lady friend: not one of my most dignified scrambles!) i also had to duck into one of the monasteries for a while to escape a sudden downpour and had another run in with some burmese monks, who were again remarkably cheery. i spent the evening chatting to another traveller (yo katie) and the bloke who ran the indian restaurant we were eating at (he has a remarkably sad story which i may recant if i remember too at some juncture where my entries aren't so open to scrutiny. actually there's a few things i'd like to say that i can't, so i'll make a catch all summary of my disquiet towards the way things are run here when in mumbai).
i'm not a great one for early mornings, so getting up at 4.30am the next day was a struggle. i jumped on the bike i'd rented, a sturdy indian hero, that, whilst very functional, has the same effect on your posterior as a few weeks at prep school: sore bums all round. bagan consists of a huge number of stupas, of varying shapes and sizes, dotted across a plain by the irrawaddy river. if you cycle along from nyaung u under the stars, various buildings loom out of the darkness from the side of the road. it's quite an eery sensation, as limited visibility means you don't see these large structures until they're right in your face. the first couple almost made me fall over with shock. at about 5am i reached sheshandaw paya, the highest temple you're allowed to climb, scrambled up the unneccesarily steep stairs (crazy buddhists!) in the dark , and sat myself down. getting up early has never been so worth it. as the sun inched up in the east, turning the clouds on the horizon a furious red, the plains of bagan revealed themselves in their true glory. as it got lighter and lighter, more and more temples (there are over 3,000 in all) became visible, dotted all over the vista. anytime you looked up the sun was continuing its natural firework show, slowly transforming from a crimson glow to a fuller yellow. i was completely alone on the terrace, surrounded by the singing of the waking birds and a truly spectacular view.
eventually a couple of japanese tourists arrived, so i hopped back on my bike and, pausing only to check out a few of the stupas, i headed back for breakfast and a nap. in the afternoon, i wandered into the archaeolgical zone to further explore some of the individual temples. at bagan, it really is more about quantity than quality. whilst the view across the plain is truly stunning, even the big draw stupas aren't that impressive in their own right. furthermore, as it's low season, i was often the only foreigner around, which meant i was the focal point for all the touts and crap sellers (all of whom seemed to be obssessed with my live strong band, and are constantly trying to swap it for paintings and the like).
sunset at sheshandaw was an altogther more depressing affair, as the top of the terrace was packed with noisy tourists. i closed myself off into a little bubble, and the sun dipping into the irrawaddy was beautiful enough, but all i could think about was the blissful solitude of twelve hours ago.
myanmar's quite a small place and, partly thanks to government restrictions, has a fairly well mapped out tourist circuit. it also consistently throws up more interesting fellow travellers, and less dross, then most other places i've been. special note goes to mark, a frenchman who hates the french (don't we all!) and is thus moving to yangon for good to teach at l'alliance francaise, katie, a very safe english grad from ucla, and uri/ dan/ stu, good lads to have a quiet beer myanmar with at any time. waiting for it to get a bit cooler, then heading off into the less well known southern plain to check out some of the less visited temples. it's another 4.30am start tomorrow, but this time to get the bus to inle lake (why so early? bastards!)
posted by bicrom @ 6:44 am
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