Burmese Days Part II: Inle Lake

We continue our story of Burma fleeing Yangon's swelter and head northeast to Inle Lake, a shallow mountain lake nestled in eastern Shan State. A short one-hour flight brought us to Heho airport from which we took a taxi to Naungshwe the principle town on the lake's north end. We were so relieved to be in this mountainous region, where the weather was significantly cooler and the pace equally easy.

Our first day we took a tour 'round the lake via motor boat a visited various tourist focused handicrafts like textile weavers and metal smiths. In the textile shop we took a brief tour of second-generation hand-built looms.

At the entrance this woman demonstrated lotus fiber spinning. The lotus stems are harvested from the lake's waters, exude a spider webby substance that's stretched and rubbed with dampened fingers forming a single strand of fiber. The finished material is similar to hemp in appear appearance and like linen, softens with repeated washings.

We soon learned that while the motor boat was a lovely means of conveyance, it was also very much about pandering to tourists and their wallets. We went on an exhausting loop, from shop to shop doing our best to maintain levels of polite appreciation. Business has been slow, and we couldn't shake the air of desperation among the business owners and the subsequent guilt that came with not purchasing their goods. Rather than finding escapist leisure we were self-conscious of our relative privilege.

There was a flip-side to the tourist consumerism and they were decidedly our favorite bits. Above is a shot of the lake's floating gardens. In a feat of horticultural engineering farmers created a fertile floating bed (a combination of lake sludge and living plant material) to grow vegetables and of all things; tomatoes.

After lunch of fried fish we traveled up an inlet to visit Indein ruins. We moored the boat and walked a stretch to reach the ruins. The way included a long columned corridor lined with evidence of Burma's tourist heyday, a veritable gauntlet of consumerism; abandoned. It was an eerie experience in the context of the thriving surrounding jungle.

The combination of ancient cultural foreignness, crumbling stupas, and the jungle's slow reclamation made for an Indiana Jones vibe. It was an odd feeling really, a generic Hollywood familiarity of a place I had obviously never been....too much Dr. Jones I suppose. It's easy to see how a site like this gets looted, evidence in many head/faceless buddhas as it lies unprotected, uncordoned and yet refreshing as we had the freedom to walked around graveyard of ancient structures. Pretty rad.

Back on the boat amidst the thunderclouds


A couple days after exploring the lake, we spent a day with a hired guide who took us up to a jaunt up into surrounding hills to Pa-O villages. I managed to speak with a few of the villagers

like these grubby guys

and this grandma.

We continued on the trek to a site of meditation caves. Our guide sits at the entrance where the roots of a bodhi tree can be seen growing out of a naturally occurring skylight. Below the skylight on a dais sat the head monk of the monastery, swaddled in maroon robes shallowly puffing a hand-rolled cheroot. On the wall to his right, a life-sized crosslegged skeleton painted in black and white, a reminder our impermanence. Bathed in blue smoke we chatted with the phongyi about the merits of shallow smoking and received a blessing for our donation. An otherworldly experience to say the least, we emerged from the portal-like confines of the caves leaving behind an ancient stage complete with stupa, skeleton, gilded buddha and a faded parasoled phongyi.

After 5 days of boating, exploring caves, renting bicycles to chase hot springs, villages, therapeutic Burmese massages, we moved on to Mandalay the ancient capitol of Burma, but first we had to get there...

Burmese Days: Yangon


A brief history lesson.
In 1989 the military government decided to change the country's name from Burma to Myanmar as a means of expunging remnants of colonial rule. While the U.N. recognizes the name change, many international governments, including the U.S. do not, with the belief that acknowledging the changes legitimizes the government and their authority. To add to the confusion, names of cities and streets have also been renamed resulting in interchangeable namesakes. Political reasons aside, I call the country Burma 'cuz that's what my folks call it. So with our Burmese visas in hand, Edo and I flew into the capitol Yangon, the city formerly known as Rangoon and the place of my parent's birth.

This is the a shot of the taxi we took from the airport. Notice that the driver is situated on the right side of the vehicle like cars found in the U.K. and Japan, which is well and good, but the roads are designed like those in the States for left-side drivers. Baffling. Needless to say, I learned to admire the passing scenery rather than focus on our driver's maneuvers. (A little research has revealed that Russia and Afghanistan have similar driving arrangements; go figure.)

We stayed at a guest house called the Three Seasons, run by a warmly assertive 'auntie' who on our arrival welcomed us with breakfast. For 20 bucks, our room included air conditioning, a private bathroom, breakfast, and hubba-hubba-bordello-hued curtains.

Yangon was blistering.
After breakfast we made the mistake of walking downtown, melting the entire way. We experienced heat in Bangkok, but the heat here was punishing. We were the proverbial ants, frying in the intensified heat as our clothes clung, sodden with sweat. The stagnant air made the heat inescapable yet the locals were resilient; brows dry. Electricity is spotty at best and nonexistent during the day. Windows are kept shuttered, darkening interiors to a psychological cool as folks wait for the mercy of the setting sun. Others use hand fans, waiting out the heat drinking small cups of hot tea at low-lying tables. By evening electricity may return with enough time to fix dinner and possibly stay on through the night, powering fans and air conditioners; only to promptly shut off by morning.

Back to the sweltering post-lunch heat of Yangon's streets, we found my Poppa's house.

My Momma's was simply too far of a trek in the armpitty heat and by that point we got the feel for the old 'hood. We retreated to our hotel room for air conditioned relief and ventured our later to take in Shwedegon Paya, the Momma-of-All-Pagodas.

The holiest of Buddhist pagodas in Burma, Shwedagon is situated on a hill where it can be seen from anywhere in Yangon. There are four approaches, one for each of the cardinal directions, we came up from the south up a long covered stairwell and emerged to this:

We had dinner at Kandawgyi Lake where I took the ubiquitous tourist sunset shot, Shwedagon is on the left.

I left Yangon ambivalent; glad to witness my parent's humble beginnings yet eager to move on; appreciative of a simpler way of life while missing the conveniences of my privilege.

I Cannot Explain

Reporting from Bangkok, Thailand. After eighteen hours of sharing refrigerated recycled air with hundreds of people on board several planes and obediently providing correct documentation here we are. But for all of our good behavior yesterday we were denied. The Myanmar Embassy rejected Edo's visa application with this, "Go to Washington DC and apply. I cannot take your application. I cannot explain." Huh?!

As I stepped up to the window for my turn, I overheard the clerk speaking with another in Burmese. Apparently, the clerk found it highly unlikely that Edo was a 'student' at his age and therefore refused his application. In very broken Burmese I reassured him that Edo was indeed a student. Surprised that I understood his sideline conversation our friendly clerk bombarded me with questions of who I was visiting, the purpose of my visit, who Edo was, where the people I was visiting lived...an onslaught. With a look of deep suspicion he begrudgingly gave us another application to fill out; a form detailing our past work history. With our new forms filled out, we were informed that our application needed to be approved by higher-ups and that our visas were not guaranteed, i.e. you're not going to Burma. I asked to speak with the boss but he was in a meeting. right. Luckily Bossman appeared and I did my best to charm him. I explained Edo was my 'friend' and that we were visiting my 'cousin' who owns a photo shop in Yangon.

It worked.

We pick up our visas on Monday.

Huzzah, to Burmese bureaucracy!