As we drove by there were pagodas and temples everywhere to be seen, to the left, right, in front and behind!
The first temple we stopped was one of the top to be seen
and as we went inside we both were horrified! It was the tackiest temple; with
its market stalls inside the temple, an electric sign and repainted with awful
gold paint this has to be the worst temple we had seen by far! We couldn’t
understand why you would want to ruin such a piece of history!
As we left, we hoped this would not be a disappointing trip…
to our delight we carried on driving until we saw a pagoda with a few people at
the top; as we climbed the steps we here greeted by the most incredible view of
our trip. We couldn’t believe we were finally seeing the view that we had
researched over and over and it was totally mesmerising! With hundreds and
thousands of different shaped and sized temples/pagodas, the mountains and
lakes behind them made this scenery one of the best I have ever seen!! Pictures
do no capture how unbelievable this place was, and to think hardly anyone has
been or even knows of this place!!
Not wanting to leave we decided we’d come
back for sunset for one more look!
Once we got to the bottom we decided we’d head for a drink
in
‘Old Bagan’ and ended up at a vegetarian restaurant; here is where we
discovered tamarind sweets! These are little sheets of sugared tamarind and
they were wonderful! They were meant for good digestion so were given after a
meal in some places; most people would just have a couple however we devoured
the bowl until there none left :-/ they were just so moreish!! ;)
We hopped back onto our scooter and headed off to ‘New Bagan’
to find some more fantastic views; as doing so we realised we had a puncture!
Thinking it best we headed back to the hostel when a local shouts to us… he
offers us to go to his village down a dusty road into the forest and his friend
will fix the tyre for us 1000 khat a puncture (60p) myself feeling a little
apprehensive, Steen tells me to hop on to the back of the man’s motor bike and
he will follow with the wounded scooter… Well if we got murdered it would have
been his fault!! ;)
We arrive at the man’s village which is about 6 bamboo huts
under some trees and he invites us into his home and offered us green tea while
they fix our scooter.
Khaw’s home was literally a hut with a high floor for
their combined living/bedroom while the kitchen was on the mud with a table and
wooden benches. The hut was dusty and all utensils rusty, however, it was his
home! When talking to Khaw, we find out he has a wife and two children who live
with him along with his father, we talked about how much Myanmar has changed,
what they do on a day to day basis and he showed us (and sold!) his paintings
that he sells for a living. When looking around we couldn’t believe this was
their home and it absolutely made you appreciate everything you have in
England. These people were seriously poor but also seemed very happy! And Khaw
wasn’t even the poorest as he had a slow cooker and a kettle!
The bike took a little while considering the man was using
old tools and a little pump but once he’d finished he said there were four
punctures… 4000 khat. At first we thought, that’s a bit more but then came to
the realisation this was only £2.40! £2.40 to fix a puncture on a scooter!
As we said goodbye, we realised this experience we will
never forget.
Khaw to my right with one of his sons and the couple who fixed our scooter... the guy looks a bit odd in this picture!! :-/
Khaw's sons, they were very cute.. when we showed them their photo they were so excited! We hadn't even thought they probably have never seen a photo of themselves before!
The puncture put us behind a little so we headed off to have
some lunch (with the best deep fried onion and sweet chilli sauce) and after
failing to get to the big temple we’d previously been to due to a fee (which we
hadn’t realised we needed!) to a quiet temple to watch the sunset…
When the sun had set a young man came round the corner
called Lin Lin and started talking to us. His English was brilliant and we had
about an hour’s conversation with him finding out he lived in New Bagan to go
to university while his parents and 6 younger siblings lived in ‘Old Bagan’.
Although Lin Lin was studying English with a plan to move to England, he
explained as the course is very expensive he had taken a year out to hopefully
earn enough money by selling his own paintings to go back for his second year
in 2014. His course cost £500… £500! We would spend that on a sky dive or a
weekend away, but to Lin Lin it was a whole year of education. Just another
realisation how poor this country is! Knowing how much it would mean to him we
decided to buy two paintings for $20 which he later explained was the first
money he had taken in two weeks! Just £16 in two weeks! Imagine that! As we
went our separate ways we wished him good luck and Steen took his email to find
out how he was doing when we got home.
When we went out for dinner (a lovely Indian with a whole
bowl of tamarind sweets!) We thought back on our incredible day and knew this
would be a story we’d tell!
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