11-10-19 - Day of local experiences
/Day 147. Kyle & Leanne joint blog. Bagan, Myanmar.
Today we rise again early as that is what they apparently just do regularly in Bagan. So far we have had two wins with the last tour guides so we are really excited about today’s tour organized by a local nonprofit with relationships with the local villages. Kyle and I decide to let the teens sleep in while we go out for a romantic sunrise viewing over the pagodas.
Our tour guide is Thandar who is both a tour guide but also the co-founder of the non-profit that creates the local experiences. The money spent by tourist in an area does not benefit the local villages and residents so Thandar created this program as a way to facilitate interactions between tourists and locals and for the villages to financially benefit. It is a wonderful cause and we are more than happy to support it.
We set off on a long dark ride through the windy dusty roads of Old Bagan. The road suddenly becomes so slim it looks as if the van barely can get through. Angry banana leaves slap at the windows on both sides. We park in the middle of a wooded area and get out of the van and start through a muddy dark dirt path. We are now walking and it is still pitch black so we have to follow Thandar’s bobbing flashlight through the woods with eerie looking temples surely not on the tourist map arising out of nowhere on both sides. It was full-on Blair Witch Project and Kyle was expecting some malevolent force to come exploding out of one of the temples. Thandar jokes that she’s actually kidnapping us but neither of us laughs. After Moses’ comments yesterday about the snake vipers in the area, Leanne is also freaking out since she wore flip flops.
We finally arrive safely in a clearing and notice 10 other tourists already staking their claim on a makeshift dirt hill that maybe ten times the size of a pitcher’s mound. Kyle and I plop ourselves in what we think is a good viewing position. The crowd is silent, perhaps mediating and we notice that we just brought the average tourist age up by 15 years.
As we pano around, we realize what a magical place we are in. Within a few hundred yards, we are smack dab in the middle of about 30 visible pagodas - from golden to red brick to gray. The sky brightens from black to rose pink to bluish yellow and soon the balloons are popping up in the sky from a distance. We will stay another 30 minutes snapping photos of these massive beautiful bright flying machines above us. It’s not quite the excitement of being in one, but a heck of a lot cheaper. We try to spot Moses’ balloon in the sky but to no avail. Kyle can barely see his phone even with glasses let alone a face 250 meters in the sky.
On the ride back, we decide to see just how famous our new Dancing with the Stars celebrity friend Olvier Cottone is by asking Thandar if she knows of him. See becomes totally animated (especially given the pre-sunrise hour we started out) and tells us all about him and his background. Thandar has confirmed that Olivier is the real deal. She tells us that even though his not from Bagan, he speaks fluent Burmese and has perfected the traditional Myanmar dance. She proceeds to tell us that many locals believe he was Burmese in a previous life and although reincarnated as a Frenchman, he has found his way back to his homeland in Myanmar.
We go back to hotel for breakfast and teenager collection and head back for a day of more unique experiences. First up, we go to an organic rice farm in a nearby village. We meet the family of eight who live on and work the farm. Thandar acts as our translator since the farming family does not speak English. We are given a tour of the farm and go right to work in the rice fields. We are taught how to cut down the rice stalks and pile them in the field as we go. John, Corey & Justin grab their machete devices and start whacking away. They make quick work of rest of the field we are in and we move to the next field where the Kyle, Leanne and girls take their turn before the boys take back over. After the rice cutting, we enjoy a snack of farm grown bananas with the family.
Next the eldest male on the farm grabs a pot and big machete blade and climbs ~7-8 meters up a tree and starts hacking a fruit on the palm tree open and a juice comes flowing forth into his pot. He shimmies back down and comes over with the pot. We assume it’s a coconut juice the family can enjoy after our session in the rice field. However; we soon learn that it is a very potent liquor. Kyle and Leanne try some but the elder farmer keeps repeatedly telling Thandar to warm us that it is very strong. Apparently there is concern that with the size of the pot, we would not be able to perform the rest of our farm work if we lingered too long enjoying the “fruits” of the farm.
Next we get to remove the rice from the stalks by a manual process of whacking the rice stalks on a bamboo table. The rice explodes everywhere and falls onto the tarp below us. Everything on the farm is manual labor; no machines or automation. We walk through the farm to see bananas, papayas, lemongrass, tomatoes and even pomegranates growing. The farmers are so incredibly hospitable and happy to host us today and we learn we are the first Americans, or tourists for that matter, they have hosted in this way. They give us a ride to the village on an ox cart and our daily adventure bucket is already full even though it’s only 11 am.
Next stop, we visit the home of peanut farmers. Most of the family members are working on the farm or selling at the village market but the elder parents are there to greet us and serve us fresh ginger peanuts they have farmed. We meet a twenty year-old woman who is paralyzed in the legs because her family could not afford the medical treatment that would have saved her legs. The village had rallied and raised money to buy her a sewing machine so she could become a tailor but the village had no tailor and thus no-one to instruct / train her. Thandar reached out on Facebook and found someone who trained her remotely online. She know can help support her family as the village tailor.
Next up, we visit a bamboo workshop where we learn how bamboo is used to create beautiful lacquerware, a local pride and joy. Quite different from our previous “how things are made” stops where the Smiley Sales Guy materializes out of thin air and lures Leanne into a purchase we didn’t know we needed; this stop is an authentic learning workshop with no sales professionals lurking in the shadows.
We learn how to peel the layers of bamboo with our toes and a knife which is far harder than it looks. We learn how to wrap the bamboo into tight spirals that make the rings from smaller to larger than form the bowl when placed together (definitely easier than peeling the bamboo). We are shown how to smooth sand the inside of the bowl with a machine that requires a good bit of coordination pushing and pulling the lever that makes it spin with one hand and lifting the sander up and down to smooth the bowl. We ask how long it takes to smooth one bowl and the local responds, “for me 15 minutes, for you very, very long time.” Afterwards we rest to a snack of fresh peanuts and palm sugar from the tree which was awesome. Kyle notes that he is going to have to scour Los Angeles for this local treat. We conclude with Leanne buying a bowl we really didn’t need but the family is thrilled thus proving sometimes the best sales-person is no sales-person at all.
Lastly, we stop by a village house to meet a 76-year old woman smoking a hand-rolled cigar from a bowl. She’s a local character and certainly a hoot. We politely decline to join her in smoking a cigar but get some great pictures.
Already we are feeling today’s trip is about as authentic and genuine as they come. We immersed ourselves into a Myanmar village that wasn’t just trying to appease a tourist bus. We must note to find more opportunities like this.
But wait, there’s more. We eat lunch at Weatherspoon’s in downtown Bagan (loved their Myanmar tomato salad and coconut rice). We ask Thandar about life pre and post 2011 and she says the biggest change is mobile phones and access to the Internet which were scarce before 2011 and have become prevalent in the years since. She shares a similar concern about tourism which the recent decline in western tourism.
After lunch, Thandar lead us to more “off the beaten path” temples. She has arranged a local artist to teach us sand painting. The whole crew gets into their own artmaking and choose the animal associated with the day of the week each of us was born. That day is the day in Myanmar you are supposed to worship at the temples. During the painting session, John sings an opera song for the artist and Thandar who are honored and impressed.
Next we head to the monastery where we are to have a mediation session with a Buddhist monk. We enter a temple and instructed in how to meditate by Thandar and the monk. We are to do a ten minute mediation session with the monk. We assume the position and commence our mediation. Apparently, we need more practice and training as our fidgeting and squirming results in the session being called after five minutes. Actually we need a lot more practice as the monk does two meditation sessions of 1-2 hours per day. The monk is enthralled with John’s height and takes several pictures of the contrast in heights. We also meet the monastery’s Abbott.
Our last event is a boat ride for sunset on the Irrawaddy river. The clouds open up in one spot looking otherworldly as the sun streams through the makeshift gateway to heaven. As the darkness descends over the sky and river, we see the bigger temples come to life as they light up the night sky. We are still in the boat and witness light lanterns floating up in the sky to celebrate tomorrow’s light festival.
Our boat stalls in the middle of the river but the boat captain is on it. He has a flashlight out trying to the find the unlit dock in the dark. As we get closer to the shore, a local on another boat jumps into the water and wades out up to his neck to pull our boat into the dock slip. Yet another act of kindness and service bestowed on us by the Myanmar people.
We bid farewell to our new friend Thandar and wish her good luck in her social enterprise ventures. We head back to the Heritage Hotel which have loved. It’s “pack night” as tomorrow we leave this magical country of Myanmar.
