Burmese Days- Mawlamyine

Kinpun to Mawlamyine - Day 6

Mawlamyine is the capital of Mon state, and was the first British Burmese capital of the country in the mid 19th century. Is the third largest city in Myanmar, population almost 300,000 and sits on the banks of the Irrawaddy. It inspired both Orwell who lived here and Kipling who wrote the famous poem "Mandalay" here. Mawlamyine is called Moulmein in English, and the opening lines of his poem are:

"By the old Moulmein pagoda
Lookin' lazy at the sea
There's a Burma girl a-settin'
and I know she thinks o' me"

Travel day. Down to the bus station with the hotel bus, which we managed to cadge instead of waiting at the unreliable pickup truck stop; Burma's answer to local buses. The bus station turned out not to be a bus station, just a bus stop at the side of the road. The bus was an hour late, Asia style, so I took a few snaps and mucked about with the camera to pass the time.

The trip itself was uneventful. I got tucked into "Burmese Days". It was a bit squashed for the first hour until we managed to get two seats each. We bought samosas and apples through the window at a bus stop from the ever-present Burmese smiling girls. All fried food in my experience in Thailand and Burma uses cheap oil that sticks to your mouth, moustache and fingers. Wet wipes are always a great thing to have.
We arrived one hour ahead of schedule. We got onto a rickety piece of shit three-wheeler with a small flatbed and metal seats to take us to the guesthouse. We passed some of the most decrepit old colonial buildings I have seen so far and through a shoddy, sparse neighbourhood. For once, our guesthouse wasn't there and we continued right down to the bank of the mighty Irrawaddy river. Score! The guesthouse itself was a bright blue old colonial building with a massive balcony on the first floor. We were shown our room and it was the most bizarre room yet. No windows,  tiled blue walls like a hospital and weird curved corners.

Power tower - we had to improvise coz the plug sockets were shoogly

We had our own bathroom though. We passed some pretty grim rooms on the way, little box cubicles with only one netted high window to the corridor. It was pretty clean and had aircon, so it was going to do. The sink had a blue tube that carried the water to a hole in the wall. Not a particularly nice place to hang about, but then we shouldnt be hanging about in the room anyway, right? We cooled down in the aircon for a bit and watched a bit of...well you guessed it. After that we crossed the road that separated the guesthouse from the actual river and walked for a bit, soaking in the peace and quiet of the Irrawaddy. It was still light, and we went to a restaurant hanging over the river for dinner and had delicious squid in oyster sauce for Bob and a prawn dish for me. We watched and photographed the sunset, the first I can remember for a while. Nice.

The river is dirty, but this is SE Asia after all. After dinner we set out in search of the beer garden, about a mile along the bank. We met a Burmese Muslim along the way who was hanging in the shadows. He stopped us and said he would like to practice his English, would we talk to him. We said yes, so he got on his motorbike and we met in the beer garden 10 minutes later. The beer garden wasnt a garden, but it did have ice cold beer on tap, the first I have seen in Burma. Score! We lapped it up and talked to the dude whose name escapes me...it was something like Abdulissah. He was an aspiring writer having completed English Writing at a Burmese University by the tender age of 20. He talked a bit about this and that and listened to me and Bob yap. He earned $2 a day as a painter (houses, not artworks) and couldnt afford beer, so we bought him some. He refused at first but we insisted. He had Indian roots and very dark skin for an Indian, and was considering crossing the border to India illegaly to find work. He said the Burmese dont like Indians and he was having a hard time finding any other job. All in all he was a nice guy, perhaps had a little chip on his shoulder. He got a little vocal about the government later on after 3 beers and Bob was getting tired, so we called it a night before Bob fell asleep or our new friend  got himself arrested for dissidence. He invited us back to see his mum, but we politely refused. We walked home and came upon a billiard and pool bar we had clocked earlier, which looked open for business. As basic as it gets, it had a high roof with mildewed walls and no toilet. But the beer was cold and the tables in good condition (10ft by 5ft tables, full size snooker?). We were home again :) We played for a while, then the place started to fill up quick so we thought we would do the polite thing and give our table up to the locals. 58-35 is the running total for pool games for me and Bob so far. Thats really just a note for me. After that bed, and sadly the last episode of our downloaded Trailer Park Boys...

Mawlamyine Day 7

Up at 10, we got out into the street to find breakfast. I was a little sensitive to the heat today due to ahem beer consumption the night before, so we decided to have an easy one today, a wee trip to the internet cafe and plan the rest of our time here. Between 10 and about 14 here it really is uncomfortable to walk the streets, the heat is stifling. Especially with a hangover. We had a crap breakfast at a "Delifrance" (!) which of course was not a real Delifrance, but they had ripped off the sign pretty well. Was a really bizarre little place, garishly painted on the inside in yellow with lovehearts everywhere, and one curious wall-painting of a Cupid, face down in a pool of his own blood with an arrow in the back of his head. Somebody had written underneath "He's been dead since he day I was born". Weirdness.

Bob's shite breakfast face

Nonetheless, a nice change to see a fresh looking place instead of the general theme of mildew and concrete. We found out later in the day that our guesthouse served an included breakfast on the huge balcony on the first floor. They had failed to mention this at check-in, the bastards. Also they have nice rooms upstairs with teak flooring etc, not the dungeon we have been living in. I think they were fully booked, but nonetheless, bastards.We were directed to an internet cafe where we reached back to home via the usual mediums of facebook and email. Internet was sloooow. After that we melted home to grab the laptop and headed down to a restaurant we had clocked the day before to chill and so I could write this diary. Later on the Belgians showed up and we gabbed a bit and planned to spend the next day on the Island of Ogres together. A few beers were had, then the Belgians headed off and we stayed for one more so I could keep writing. A couple of games of pool and it was bedtime and Monty Python. It didn't cut it.I miss Trailer Park Boys already.

Mawlamyine Day 8 - Island Of Ogres

A peaceful breakfast on the balcony with a view of the lake, was interrupted by the guesthouse owner, who handed out laminate postcards of the Shwedagon pagoda. He told us a curious tale. 9am on a morning after a full moon, which has several significances in the Buddhist calendar, a bunch of people saw 3 monks fly over the Shwedagon pagoda. Right. Apparently our host had met the monks and he produced pictures of the monks (with their feet firmly on the ground), who were dressed up in what looked like velvet burkhas. Anyway, after this speech he launched into another, this time about the nature of Buddhism itself. It was a good speech, I imagine much rehearsed, and I recognised some of the phrases from previous encounters with Buddhism. It was a warming thing to hear at breakfast time. I could feel that 10 year old urge to go to a retreat bubbling up again. He handed out a pamphlet about Vipassana meditation retreats, in India, and talked a little about the ones around Mawlamyine. There are a couple there and they both offer free lodgings and food, the real thing, none of this monkforamonth bollocks. Apparently Burma is the place to go for meditation retreats. If you ignore the massacre of monks in 2007, of course. The belgian couple went to visit one of the meditation centres and got contact details for one in Yangon too and even a dude in Switzerland, which I now also possess.
Anyway after all that we met up with Mr. Kai, our guide for the day, who also works in our guesthouse with his twin brother, Mr. Anthony. We head out with the belgians and a taiwanese girl north along the river. We hadn't been up this direction before. It was a rundown neighbourhood that turned into a sprawling market, the chaos getting thicker with every step as we approached the dock. There was people everywhere, selling and transporting goods. We crossed 3 boats to get to ours which was jampacked, but Mr. Kai led us up to the deck and we got a bench put up for us in the shade right in front of the bridge :) Just like back in the Raj.

Bob and our belgian buddies, Thomas and Chloe, at the front of the boat

It was a beautiful day, and the views from there were stunning out across the lake, with palm trees on islands on one side, and in the distance hilly terrain speckled with golden stupas.

Two impression of boats on the Irrawaddy...the holiday shot...

...and the reality shot. Yuk.

Mr. Kai explained that Ogre island (Bilu Kyun) is so called because of its original inhabitants who were extremely ugly...and cannibals. They were wiped out a long time ago by an invading tribe, and the island is now inhabitated almost solely by the Mon people (yes, another language!). Thank you is "Dangoon-a". Its an interesting island because of its cottage industries, which is why we came.
The boat ride was cool, scenic and peaceful..perfect. As we approached the dock we could feel the energy from the other side of the shore bubbling, people milling about anticipating the boats arrival. We were greeted by the now familiar site of kids waving at the sight of our white hides. A jetty spanned wide mud banks where boats were lined up.

I think this part of the Irrawaddy is tidal, its not far to the sea from here. Once we had squeezed our way off the boat amid the usual bustle we were bundled into a covered pick-up and headed across the island.

 It started as a bustling red-dirt village with horse and carts aplenty,  and then quickly opened up into vast paddy-fields, water buffaloes bathing neck deep in irrigation canals at the side of the road. Everyone we passed was staring, smiling or both. This is not exactly unchartered waters, Mr. Kai told us that there is a group of foreigners similar to ours almost every other day to the island guided by him or his brother. I think they are the only people that do trips though.
It was a bumpy, bumpy road, luckily they had put sandbags in the pickup to sit on. Our first stop was at a small village, it was hard to tell where the individual villages stopped and started, where a group of locals were involved in making various article from coconut fibre. They would soak the raw fibres in hot water first to make them easier to work, and then roll them together by hand to make short lengths of thin coconut rope. These were then rolled around taut strands of longer coconut rope to make doormats. You know the type, thick, brown and very coarse.

Don't miss the cool little lady looking straight at the camera

And there she is again!

and again :)

There was also ladies rolling coconut fibre into twine, which was then rolled into rope after. Chloe had a brave try at it.

Bye smiley coconut fiber peeps!

We jumped back in the pickup and Mr Kai whisked us off to the next stop,

Didnt quite nail this..opportunity missed

A real money tree. They were collecting for something but I cant remember what

the rubber band "factory". This place was quite surreal, the first thing we saw was hundreds of luminous rods set out all over the yard. They were all day-glo, artificial colours and it was weird to see those colours in this extremely rural and dusty village. 

We walked through this jungle of neon and reached the workshop at the back where there was a maze of pulleys, wheels and diesel motors.

We saw the process from start to finish. The village owns a part of a rubber plantation, which along with rice are the most prominent crops on the island. The rubber is extracted from the trees by slitting the bark about 3am, sticking a small metal chute in to the cut, putting a small bowl below and collecting the sticky white latex in the morning.

One woman sits with a stick and a barrel and mixed the solution, i presume adding this or that chemical.

 The mixture is coloured and another girl dips sets of six rods into the day-glo mixture.

These are set to dry in the sun and once dry are removed and taken to the pulley maze. The removed rubber looks like a kinky coloured condom for a horse. They are set up on to a chute and gravity slides them towards a blade which can be worked by hand or by the aforementioned motor and pulley system. Voila, rubber bands.

I never figured rubber band productions to be so colourful and interesting :) Rubber bands are everywhere here and Thailand, they are used to seal food bags you buy at the market and for god knows how many other uses. The amount of rubber bands and plastic bags you can accumulate from one takeaway purchase at a street stall verges on disgusting. We said our goodbyes and thankyou's and moved on to my personal favourite, the woodcarvers.We were lead into a beautiful teak house (shoes off if you please) and sat down in this dudes living room and waited for him to appear.

He produced some beautifully carved walking sticks and tobacco pipes. Most of them were stained a wine red. I couldn't resist and bought a dragon shaped walking stick as a present to myself on my 60th birthday and a tobacco pipe shaped like Lenin's head. Yes, you read right. Brilliant!

 We also bought another faux bamboo walking stick for an as yet undecided person. This guy and his son carved everything in their tiny workshop in the barn beside the house and then distributed them across the country for sale at some of the bigger tourist spots like Bagan and Mandalay. We got them at 2/3 sale price, so we were told, and my attempt to bargain the price was waved off. Felt good to buy them at the source, the money going direct to the artist, and potentially without goverment levys being involved.

We stopped for lunch and it was one of the best meals we have had, still Bobs favourite to this day.

After that we went to another, slightly less impressive woodcarvers house who did small items. We bought some nicely stained cigarette holders and pens.

Our time was almost up so we headed to the bus stop and just had time quickly to visit the house of two women who were producing snacks. The Burmese love their sweet snacks.

We were given some free samples and jumped on the bus. The bus was sta cool kind of Havana old-timer turquoise with a funky yellow finish round the dials and was easily the most stylish vehicle we have seen in Myanmar so far.

Shots from the truck

Back on to a different boat and this one wasn't as comfy as the first. We ended up at the stern, outside, but the captain started the journey by doing rings, so it was a weird game of musical chairs as everyone tried to keep out the blazing, shifting sun. I ended up in the sun for the journey. I always was crap at musical chairs.

Sweaty and drained, we dreamt of a swimming pool as we often do at times like these. As usual though, by the time we got back to the room, rammed up the aircon and had a cold shower the desire drifted. We headed down to the restaurant from the night before, met the Belgians and had whiskys and $7 prawns to celebrate a great day.

Back to back on  a rickshaw with a 5 cent Burmese cheroot in gob

We took them to play pool afterwards at the billiard hall, Chloe and me were Burma, and we tanned the Belgium/Scotland team 2:0, Chloe winning the second for us nicely and very drunkenly.

Another Irrawaddy sunset

Mawlamyine Day 9 - Motorbikin

The day had finally come, we were going to get motorbikes. The plan was to drive 25km to the biggest reclining Buddha in the world at 170m long. We had tried to do a motorbike tour in Chiang Mai, but had to put it off twice due to me and Bob getting sick at different times.
I was apprehensive of renting bikes in Chiang Mai because of the heavy traffic (not compared to Bangkok, but crazy enough) and our collective motorbiking experience of nil. In Burma though, the roads are very wide with no lines at all, and the traffic is sparse, except in the middle of towns. The main hazards are potholes and animals, some roads look like the surface of the moon. The driving etiquette is simple. The biggest vehicle has right of way. You beep if you are overtaking close or if the other person looks like they might pull out. Slow to the right, and faster to the left. Easy. 100cc motorbikes/mopeds, so no chances of an accidental wheelie and embarrassing scars. Or so I thought. Bob and me had one each and Thomas and Chloe shared. Our first mission was to get to the Cinderella hotel just up the road, big backpacks and all.
We had decided to change hotels for the last night as our guesthouse was getting a bit too much for us. The room was a bit grim, but the worst was being woken up at 6am by the boys that worked there getting ready for the working day, hawking up massive gobs for an hour. Not a pleasant way to wake up every morning. Also I discovered one night trying to go out for a cigarette that at night you are completely locked in, the only way out would be to get to the balcony on the first floor and jump off. Cant remember ever being in a locked building before.
We set off, and the guide and me led the way and no sooner had we started we heard shouts. Bob had started his bike, revved too high in his change from neutral to 1st, lost control of the bike, drove straight across the road mounted the high pavement and hit the wall, the only thing separating Bob from the Irrawaddy. He was unhurt and had managed to stay on the bike. I was quietly angry. I was more worried about Bob getting hurt on a bike than I was about myself. So we set off, me very on edge. After that though, it was plain sailing. Thomas also didnt have much experience on a bike, so we were all newbies. In fact now I think about it, it was the first time I have ever driven by myself. In Burma on a motorbike, yaaas. Its alot more fun than driving in Switzerland, thats for sure! We all spent the journey getting to know our bikes. Stopped off at a "gas station" to fill up. A woman puts a jug in a large barrel of petrol and they pour it straight into the tank with a sieve. I lit a cigarette and took some closeup photos. The results were explosive. We dropped off the guide and drove to the highway, all the way to the side road to the buddha. The road to the buddha is lined with dozens of identical statues of monks, showing the way.

On the way we saw a massive unfinished "fat" buddha sitting behind a pond, an impressive sight in itself. More and more buddhist statues started to appear, a statue of a man on a high hill pointing at something we didnt know, pagodas here and statues there.

The first thing you see is the head. And its huge.

We climbed up to the buddha and explored its internals, which is one of the weirdest places i've ever been.

I think the various statues inside tell the story of Buddhas life, but inside was very poorly lit and the statues were very dusty. the pictures show the colours of the statues that the naked eye could not see. Some of the imagery was very graphic, with people being impaled, squashed, and generally tortured.

There was naked statue flesh everywhere, including an old lady showing her all. I wonder if this is why its so popular with the droves of young teenagers running about? Burma's equivalent of Hollywood and porn. I was surprised, in a country as conservative as Burma. There was four floors in all, and each floor was in a greater state of disrepair or unreadiness than the last. there were white and red clay unpainted statues and half-finished work everywhere. Various little peep-holes out of the body gave us a chance to see the excellent views down the valley.

Half of the whole place was a construction site. It was more like an unfinished x-rated Disney exhibit than a place of worship, didnt know quite what to make of it all.
We left to get outside and take a step back and appreciate the full size of the Buddha.

 It really is very impressive, and in a lovely backdrop of rolling hills and buddhist statues dotted about. The Budda looked a bit uncared for. The head is the cleanest and most complete looking part.

Spare Buddha eyes!

The arms are already very dirty and parts of his robes are missing. A sign at the bottom says work started in 2010, which explains why it is unfinished, but amazing that it could get so dirty in that time. If they cleaned him up a bit, completed it and lit the interior properly, it would be properly spectacular. Anyway, this is Burma.

After refreshments we headed off. The Belgians wanted to see something on the way home, so we split up and Bob and me rode home in the pre-sunset light. This was the highlight of the day, the wide quiet roads, which were in pretty good condition, the nice light and the opportunity to open up our pint-sized bikes! We made it back to the Cinderella hotel, the room was lovely with all sorts of complimentary bits and pieces, including fruit. There was working air-con, Wifi and a TV. Ahhhh such luxury was a welcome relief!

We settled on our beds and contacted home. We ate in the hotel restaurant with the Belgians that night. The service was impeccable, doors being opened for you, all bows and smiles. Class! Goodnight Mawlamyine.