A Stroll to Nearby Temples It rained all morning, strange for this time of year. In the afternoon the sky remained overcast and the air cool. It was good weather for walking. These pictures are all of scenes closeby, places we walked to and probably nothing on a tourist's itinerary.         
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The Irrawaddy Although we have been close to this legendary river since we arrived in Myanmar, today was the first time we saw it. That was at sundown, but let's start the narrative at the beginning of the day. Yesterday I finished my prescribed antibiotic, but I wasn't well yet, not by a long shot. Time for a doctor. We trotted off to Bagan's Global Care International Clinic, its name grander than the building itself. But I got to see a doctor who spoke good English, took his time to listen to me and made a very competent impression altogether. I left with a bagfull of medications, including antibiotics. I don't know what's in all those little yellow, white and blue pills they gave me, but I'm taking them all, no questions asked. Both Janos and I were relieved to have things under control and in the evening I felt up to a walk to the banks of the Irrawaddy. We got there at dusk, as the sun was setting. When the river came into view, we gasped. It was a splendid sight.     Bagan We flew out of Mandalay yesteray and now are in Bagan. This should be a highlight of our trip. Also known as the Land of a Thousand Temples, the ancient kingdom of Bagan in Myanmar is symbol of Burmese religion, history and culture. Towering above the plains of Mandalay and cradled by the Irrawaddy River, the treasures of the ancient kingdom of Bagan have survived for centuries. Once a major power in Southeast Asia, Bagan is home to over two thousand Buddhist temples standing as symbols of Burmese history and culture. That's a lot of temples. We'll be happy looking at a few. For our first day and to get acquainted with the lay of the land, we got in a tuktuk and had him drive us to some of the major sights. There were lots of people at the temeples we visited, mostly locals it seemed, we didn't see a lot of foreigners. They livened up the scenes of old stones.          Making money offerings at the temple   Our tuktuk driver and Janos in the rearview mirror  Road construction - the workers are always women. Tar poured over crushed rock - bacbreaking work.  A Burmese marionette Mandalay Niether Janos nor I has ever been to Myanmar. There would be so much to discover and explore, and we have so little time. Our decision was to limit ourselves to Mandalay and Bagan for the time we have left. To quote W. Somerset Maugham: "Mandalay has its name; the falling cadence of the lovely word has gathered about itself the chiaroscuro of romance." The same would apply to the Irrawaddy. The names have drawn us here. To make a long story short, when we arrived I was fighting a severe respiratory infection which the flight here hadn't helped. Since our arrival I have been confined to our room for the most part, fortunately in a comfortable hotel. I went out with Janos twice for meals, otherwise I have rested in bed. And since my health is even more important to me than all the pagodas of Mandalay, I shall not do much sightseeing here, if any at all. Our flight to Bagan is tomorrow and I am hoping to be in good enough shape for the continuing journey. The two times I went out I snapped a few pictures.  View from our room on the 7th floor - it's a sprawling city.  I ordered congee - rice soup - in the room and it was lovely.  The streets are wide and the sidewalks narrow, not meant for walking. You walk in the street with the traffic. Only after I took the picture did I see the sign "Mixagrip", would it help me?  We went to a Chinese restaurant down the road and had jiaozi (sort of like Chinese ravioli) for lunch.  The girls were busy peeling garlic and ginger. They were very shy and embarassed but said yes when Janos asked if he could take their picture.  Condiments provided at every table - plenty of garlic!  We didn't eat the raw garlic, and we didn't have any of this either.  Construction going on across the street - the scaffolding looks a bit iffy. Another Day at the Temples of Angkor There will be no history, no background information on the temples of Angkor here, just a few pictures from the many that I took this morning. The visual impact of these temple ruins is powerful and that's what I tried to capture. Of course the history is fascinating as well, but I would have only been able to scratch the surface. What my blog doesn't show from my experience of the temples are the many tourists taking selfies at every photo-worthy spot, nor do you feel the heat or the fatigue from the bone rattling one-hour tuktuk ride to the more distant temple in the last two pictures. We thought that the distance would keep the mass of visitors away, but when we arrived we saw many big buses in the parking lot... We often hear ourselves saying, glad we were here eleven years ago.        |