Steintore
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Steintore
Sun, 09.02.2014: Yangon −> Mandalay, sunny, 34°C
The alarm went off at 3-45am and 15 minutes later we got a phone call - a man saying "Monica, Monica!" He meant "Morning call"! We packed up and got down to the lobby at 4-25am. We had to wait quite a while and then Kelvin arrived saying that Daniel wasn't well and would get a later flight.
We got into a taxi for the 30 minute ride to the airport and then the 50 minute flight to Mandalay. From there it was another taxi ride to our hotel arriving at 8-25am. We checked in and agreed to meet at 11-30am for lunch and a whole afternoon of sightseeing.
Our room at the Royal City Hotel was quite big, very clean and had very clean beds, towels, toiletries and toilet paper plus free drinking water. We didn't have to ask for anything! We love Myanmar - it is soooo much cleaner than India!
After washing some clothes, we met up with the others and went to a local restaurant. The system here is different - you choose a main dish which is served with lots of side dishes, soup and rice. Nigel and Kelvin had main dishes - mutton and chicken. Cynthia, Kirsten and I were happy just to eat the soup and rice with the side dishes - green beans, potato noodles, broccoli with a kind of green leaf, plus tomato curry. The side dishes were served cold but I really liked the potato noodle dish. Every time we emptied one of the bowls with a side dish in it, it was removed and refilled!!
Our sightseeing trip was very interesting and varied. Our first stop was to the Gold leaf factory where men hammer what look like leather books containing approximately 100 bamboo papers with a small amount of gold (one hundredth of a gram) on each page. They have a timer system, turning the "books" so that the gold leaf is spread out thinly.
I tried picking up one of those hammers - oh boy they are really heavy - and these men sit there all day hammering!
The gold starts off in 32 gram pieces which are smelted in a pot in the fire, then put through a wringer (I kid you not!) and this process is repeated 15 times until the gold is pliable enough to be spread out on bamboo pages. These are then cut, hammered and cut until there is the right amount of gold on each page. Each page costs 50 US cents (500 Kyat).
The bamboo are chopped into thin stalks and then soaked for 3 years!!! Then they are shredded, spread onto a large board, dried for one day, cut into pieces, and pressed to make it shiny.
We were given a free sample of gold leaf which was put on our foreheads between our eyebrows, like the Hindu red spot. Unfortunately it faded off.
Gold leaf factory in Mandalay
At a carpenters factory we watched large chunks of teak being elaborately hand carved - one door panel takes 2 months. The art is passed down through the generations - there are no schools or formal training.
At one of the many marble cutting factories, we watched huge blocks of marble from the Shan district and northern Myanmar, being cut, sculpted and cleaned. One large Buddha takes 2 months and costs $1500 US - cheap for the size and the amount of work. They take orders of you fancy one for the back garden!!
We walked through a fascinating market where we could enjoy wandering around without being hassled and then went to the Grand Palace, originally built as a royal apartment for King Mindon who died inside it in 1878. Since then it was destroyed by fire and rebuilt.
Factories and market in Mandalay.
We climbed the 116 steps of the tower for the views and then drove up the 760ft Mandalay Hill to see a Buddha Temple and the sunset along with crowds of tourists!! Where did they all come from?
After a stop at a large supermarket for supplies we got back to our hotel at 8-15pm. What a huge, long day. We said a big thank you to Kelvin - we had really enjoyed the day even though we were dropping on our feet!
Mon, 10.02.2014: Mandalay, sunny, 34°C
I had to get up in the middle of the night to switch on the air conditioning as it was too hot. So when the alarm went off at 6-30am, neither of us were properly awake. On the way up to the roof top restaurant for breakfast Kirsten tripped on a corner step and spilled her tea! Nigel tripped on the same step going down! Then Kelvin was late because he didn't get a wake up call! We're quite a group!
At least our driver for the day was awake and he took us to the longest teak footbridge in the world - U Bein Bridge is 1.3km long with 1600 pole supports. We took a short ride in a paddle boat halfway along it and then walked to the end and back.
U Bein Bridge
It is used by monks who cross it after working in the fields to get to the Maha Ganayon Kyaung monastery for their food. There are 1400 monks in this monastery. They get up at 4am, meditate, breakfast at 6am, study and then collect their lunch between 10 and 12 noon. There will be no more food until breakfast the following morning. Unfortunately it's quite a tourist attraction.
Each day it costs $1400 to feed them - all from donations. We went into the kitchen to see vast cauldrons being used to prepare the food. They were stirred with paddles!
Lunchtime at Maha Ganayon Kyaung monastery.
We drove up to Sagaing which used to be the capital of the Shan Kingdom. There are uncountable white and gold stupas on a series of hills and numerous pagodas. We went to see three of them. The first was a very large fat one!
As we were driving to the next pagoda, we stopped to take photos of a procession of girls and boys who were going to become nuns and monks. The girls were dressed up as angels, sitting in carriages pulled by bullocks and the boys were riding on horses. Curiously the boys were wearing lipstick and make-up! Buddhists in Myanmar have to go to a monastery or convent twice in their lives. Usually they go for the first time before they are 20 years old.
Then we walked steeply up to a pagoda that had seven sitting Buddhas at each compass point. There were some dark passageways to explore but one had a stench that seemed like a recent fart. We blamed Nigel but it turned out to be one of two dogs - we saw them later and one of them farted again!! Yuk!
Sagaing Hill
Our third pagoda had a viewpoint across the whole area and our last stop was at the Maha Myat Mu Ni Pagoda in Mandalay to see a 13ft high, 2000 year old seated Buddha that has so much gold leaf on it that it looks "knobbly". This is where all the hard work of the men at the gold leaf factory ends up. People buy the small patches of gold leaf as an offering and stick them onto the Buddha.
It had been another long day and we found out that the reason Kelvin had overslept was because he had been trying to organise another guide for us. Apparently Daniel, the original guide, no longer wants to work for Starfish and this left Kelvin searching for a new one. When he failed last night, he stayed up until 2am printing out information we would need for the various sightseeing stops today. He's more exhausted than we are, poor guy!!
