The World’s Biggest Book

Though it sounds so romantic, the actual road to Mandalay not much chop, I am afraid.

We have moored at the closest point we can reach before Mandalay. Unfortunately, the river is so low at this time, that the captain cannot navigate between the rocky patch just before the end of our journey. They spent a lot of time showing us the satellite images of the stretch, perhaps worried that we don’t believe them.

So, this morning’s itinerary comprises a bus trip – on the road to Mandalay. It’s a two-hour trip on bumpy roads, with suicidal motorcycles and the odd cow getting in our way. When the road opens up we are on a four-lane highway with two toll stops. Our bus driver overtakes the two stroke trucks in the overtaking lane, and is in turn, overtaken in the spare lane on the other side of the road. And on the verge is another car overtaking on the gravel. Driving in Myanmar… Not for the faint-hearted.

At one point we hit a traffic jam and seek out the source: a herd of about 300 head of cattle is traversing the intersection, overtaking the cars and veering off to the right.

Our sights today include the ‘World’s Biggest Book”. And before you conjure up visions of some ginormous tome that needs six people to turn the pages…. This is a huge monastery with slate tablets inscribed in Sanskrit. Each slate is housed in a small white-washed temple, and there are thousands of them built in a square around the central temple.

We also get to see gold leaf being made – by hand of course. Young men spend all day hammering out a metronome rhythm bashing the gold until it is a micron thick. Then it gets stuck onto a Buddha in a temple. They get paid good wages for Mandalay, presumably so they don’t get tempted to pocket some of the leaves: must be some fake Buddhists around.

Our next stop is a temple carved entirely out of teak and adorned with thousands of representations of daily life. I can only consume it one carving at a time, the whole is too overwhelming to take in.

Gold inlay ceiling

Hallway

Buddha shrine

Carvings on the window

By this time, a lot of people are tired of taking off their shoes, so they sit outside and don’t come in: they miss the gold inlaid decorations in the cool dark interior.

Our lunch is at the Mandalay Hill Hotel – so glad we aren’t staying here – it’s a giant hotel too much like all the others around the world. But I am grateful for the toilets, and the buffet lunch is tasty. I’ve had so much food over the last week, I will need to go off to a monastery and beg for my food for the next month.

In the afternoon….

We squeeze in an extra stop at a bronze casting workshop, but the heat from the brick furnace in the middle of the compound is too intense to tolerate for long. So off onto the bus again and the two-hour ride back to the boat. By the time I am back, I am so exhausted I can’t even keep my eyes open for the Mandalay Cultural Group who are aboard for our amusement after dinner.

Princess Panhwar Rhythm

Hubby and I are so exhausted by the bus trips that we made the last two days, we decide to stay put, rather than another 3-hour return trip to another monastery and a silver shop ready to part us from our money. Seen one pagoda or silver smith, and you’ve got the picture…

So, we settle into the rhythm of our Princess; rise at 7 am for croissants and coffee on the sun lounge where we can watch the rhythms of the locals washing their clothes, their children and their teeth.

We are left wondering how their clothes are deemed ‘clean’ considering the colour and constitution of the river water, where unidentified ‘bits’ float past and the mud swirls up from the muddy banks. Watching a youngster brush his teeth and wash his mouth out, brings out the worried microbiologist in me. I must trust that their constitutions are used to it, and at least he’s brushing his teeth. Me – I’d be in bed for a month with some noxious infection.

The Princess invites us to breakfast on the ‘main’ deck – closest to the water. We are treated to a smorgasbord of choices: fresh fruit, toast or croissants, local soup with noodles or omelettes. Our favourite waiters are Linn and Ko Ko, who serve us on the starboard side (right hand if you are facing the front, for you landlubbers), greeting us with cheeky grins and fresh coffee as soon as we sit down.

Once we are stuffed to the gills with food, we waddle up two flights of stairs back to the sun deck to put our feet up and rest them. I disappear into the air-conditioned lounge (or “longe” as our tour guide says) to sort and edit photos, read one of the books left behind by other passengers, and treat myself to a barista café latte. The book repository is surprisingly good – I manage to find a novel that suits my tastes, not just bodice ripper romances. Every now and then, I dash about with my camera as something catches my eye – a floating bamboo raft, a flock of birds, kids splashing in the shallows.

Lunch is served from 12.30; barely minutes after my stomach has digested breakfast. Four courses are set before us at the door, delicious visions to tempt our palates, and widen our expanding girths. Appetiser, soup, salad, main course and dessert; all beautifully presented and dangerously delicious. Our journey includes free beer or wine with lunch and dinner, and our daily selection is a good choice of French white and red wines, different each meal.

Thank God for those stairs and the often-steep climb up the river bank to our daily sightseeing appointments – I am climbing up and down so many times each day it’s the only thing keeping me from a coronary.

Our travelling companions, who are late back from their trip up to Sagaing hill, are greeted on shore by the daily retinue of staff lining the path to the gangplank; on hand to make sure no-one goes A over T on the way down. Arriving on deck, each one gets a spritz of hand sanitiser, hands back their cabin card in exchange for their keys, accept a cooling (orange) wet towel that smells of some exotic flower, and traipse to their cabins, removing their shoes and slipping into the slippers provided. I am assured by the other photographers that the panoramic view from the top was again obscured by the haze of smoke. And silver gewgaws I definitely didn’t need.

Since it’s our last day before we disembark (not de-ship, as some might say) our afternoon is spent gathering our worldly goods from where they are scattered about the cabin. I have several items that really shouldn’t travel back home with me: a pair of white shorts that had a damaging encounter with an orange towelette given to me as I returned to the boat after one of our excursions; two cakes of thanaka, (the tree paste that the locals spread over their cheeks as sunblock and all-round beauty product) and a pack of local chewing gum that hasn’t made the cut. I wave them in the direction of the ladies washing on shore, and after their enthusiastic nods, fling the offerings down at them, managing not to hit anyone in the head. The little gap-toothed girl splashing about in the shallows is particularly pleased about the chewing gum. There: I hope I’m giving them something that is of value to them, and trust that the lady can pound out the wicked stains on the rocks of the river and have the shorts clean enough again.

By 6 we are invited to a farewell by the crew on the sun deck. The furniture is all arranged in a circle and we seat ourselves as they serve fruit punch and canapes. Then our ship manager, Goran (from Jamaica – no just a joke, it’s Serbia), re-introduces us to the entire crew, from our prosperous captain down to the boys that wade through the water each day to moor the boat and lay out the gang plank for us. Like I do at times, I feel compelled to do a public thank you (exhibitionist that I am). Not only have they all been genuine in their affection towards us, but my observation of the crew when they are not on show has shown me a real ‘family’ feeling between them. When we aren’t around, the boys get on the banks of the river and play football, not required to come to attention when we arrive back after our excursions. That, to me, is the best commendation to the way the Princess Panhwar is run. Rather than shunning me for my egotism, many of my fellow travellers take the time to thank me for my little speech. Well, I just had to, didn’t I?

The crew then sing us a farewell song in Burmese, and after all that we stagger down the stairs back to the dining room for yet another four-course meal, with Ko Ko and Linn having saved us a seat. I only manage appetiser and dessert.. Probably should have left the dessert, but hey – I am on holidays, and I’ll have plenty of time to let out my clothes when I get back home.

The next morning, after our breakfast we say our last farewells, hugging those crew members that feel comfortable with it. The captain takes me in a big bear hug, probably because I asked to be piped aboard on my first day and kept up the saluting. And then it’s one more hike up the river bank and we trade our travelling room for travelling to a room on shore.

Monks and the curious Art of Naming

Being a devoutly Buddhist country, monks are a dime a dozen, but one does have to be careful about “fake” monks. These are the ones that walk about with their begging bowls asking for money. Monks never beg; people donate. I am assuming these fake monks make a tidy business out of the devoutness of the Burmese who will give generously to any wandering monk. Similar things happen in India with fake saddhus. The real ones have renounced worldly pleasures and wander about relying on the comfort of strangers. Fake ones pose for you and then demand royalties for their image. Tut Tut.

from nl.dreamstime.com

I guess it’s easier to become a fake monk than a fake saddhu. just shave your head and wrap yourself in maroon and saffron and buy a silver bowl. The chap to the left has had to put a lot of effort into it!

REAL monks would never ask for money; in fact, they never beg. As they do their morning rounds with their bowls, the houses they visit immediately donate whatever they have cooked up. In fact, the villagers prepare meals with the monks in mind so there is enough to go around.

Contrary to common belief, the monks are not vegetarians. As was explained, it makes sense: since they rely on donated food for their meals they could hardly say no to a donation of chicken curry with rice. The monks eat what they get. Well, I just learned something new.

Many families send their children to the monasteries for at least a few years. Partly due to their devotion, partly because the children get an education, and sometimes because the parents are too poor to afford to keep them. Our guide Ye Minh told us about his introduction to the monastic school when he was a little boy. He wanted to go because whenever his family visited on special days he would get yummy food to eat and the monks were always kind and gentle. So, he was very excited to be sent to be a novitiate at the age of six.

For the chosen child, there is a huge ceremony at the local pagoda, the children are decked out in glittering finery, made up to look like little dolls, boys and girls alike, until you can’t tell what sex the child is. They must be carried at all times, and have gold parasols to shade them from the scorching syn. The family accompanies them on a tour of the pagoda, and the kids are treated to sweets and generally treated like royalty. It’s a big thing becoming a monk.

So Ye Minh thought this was fantastic, and really looked forward to having his life in plush comfort at the monastery. When he was finally alone, he got a rude shock. Only two paltry meals a day, hard pallets to sleep on, and nothing but meditating and hard labour. The head monks proved to be hard disciplinarians, and within a day he wanted to leave. He got his moment when the head monk’s attention was diverted and so he scarpered back home, crying that he didn’t want to stay there anymore. His parents were mortified that he would spurn such an honour and told him they had spent so much money on getting him in, he was going to have to stay at least six months.

The little nuns have it worse, there is such reverence for the monks, it is not the same for the women: second class for them. The monasteries play a similar role to churches in the west in years past, acting as orphanages or schools for poor kids. Sometimes the children are sent to preserve them from trafficking or simply because their parents are too poor to afford them.

But don’t think the monks are stuck in the middle ages, no no, they are just as modern as anyone else in Myanmar, recording their tourist trips on their phone cameras, getting around in cars and motorcycles and as prone to selfies as any lay person.

In fact, some married men with families, when they’re over the family dramas, go and join a monastery to get away, visiting only from time to time. Well, it’s one way of getting peace I suppose.

As to children’s names: in Myanmar, the father doesn’t give his kids his name: in fact there is no such thing as a family name. Each child is given a name according to the day of the week they are born, chosen from a selection of names specific for that day.

Aung San Su Kyi is unusual because she has her own name, Su Kyi, but people also append her father’s name, Aung San because she is held in such high regard and her father was a hero.

Oo is the word for mister, so if we wanted to be formal, we could call our guides Oo Tun Tun, or Oo Ye Minh. For a woman, the word is Daw. I wonder if there is a man called La La, and then he would be Oo La La…. Oh dear, I couldn’t resist.

You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone

Within a short time of leaving our floating palace, we realise just how spoilt we were…

Our Ayarwaddy River View hotel is well situated by the river, just across the road from a sand depository. There is a constant line of boats depositing the river sand they’ve dredged up, and an equally constant line of tractor-truck conversions carting it away to the countless building projects all around the place. The delightful terrace on the fifth floor with views across to Mandalay hill is covered in a not-so-fine layer of dust which quickly transfers onto us. Our meal selections are not cordon, let alone bleu, so we already miss our sumptuous four course choices from the last two weeks. The stateliness of the spiral staircase is a little bit marred by the stained and worn carpet lining the corridor floors, and the air conditioning in the corridors is provided by the hot, dusty, smoky air from outside.

Traffic mayhem

Irrawaddy View

Plastic recycling

And though I complained about the blat-blat of the little two stroke boats on the river, our moving room was well soundproofed. Not so our room at this hotel. We are treated to the same noise all through the night, as well as what sounds like The War of the Dogs outside on the street.

But hey, the room is spacious, the beds are firm, and the bathroom is clean. What more do we need for one night.

The next morning we have a driver, Oo Aung Thu, to take us up to Pyin Oo Lwin where hubby’s ex is helping to edit a Myanmar soap opera. It’s an initiative of Aung San Su Kyi, who wants to inform the populace about legal rights in the country, which of course aren’t written down anywhere. So she cleverly decided to educate people via an entertaining watchable soap, in order to have some way of defending themselves against corruption, illegal land grabs, drugs and the like. The latest in the series about a legal rights lawyer defending victims of trafficking, rape and corruption is being filmed in the town in the hills, and we are on the way to visit.

Our road is a mixture of appalling and fantastic.

Being the main highway to China, it is clogged with trucks laden with watermelons and the like making for the border. Sections are brand-new split highway, and others are just being built. The road rises to 1000 m in hair pin bends and is a confusion of cars motorbikes, buses, trucks and bicycles.

We only have one night up here, and rescue M for an evening of fluent English conversation, a change from the baby language she must use for her Burmese work colleagues. They call her mum, and she is very highly regarded.

Pyin Oo Lwin is obviously a prosperous town, the roundabouts are beautifully planted with marigolds, and the houses still reflect the old colonial grandeur. For cocktails we go to the Kandawgyi Hill Hotel and sit on the terrace looking at the sunset between the trees. Dinner is at the Feel restaurant on the shores of the little lake (there is another lake – the big one.) The food is great, and the local red wine is very pleasant once it’s breathed a bit.