7/17 Bagan

7/17/2013: Bagan is a major tourist attraction in Myanmar and is often referred to as the "Angkor Wat of Myanmar." It doesn't come close to the big, impressive temples of Angkor, but it has an incredible amount of old pagodas scattered around a large swath of arid land. Apparently there was a long period where the current ruler of the day would have pagodas built to celebrate various events - his birthday, his mom's birthday, some anniversary, some Buddhist holiday, etc. The result was just an overwhelming smattering of pagodas plopped around the town of Bagan. The typical approach for tourists is to get a driver, a bicycle, or a horsecart and to tour around and explore the pagodas. I decided to go with the super-heavy bicycle, so I hit the road in the morning with a vague idea of what direction I needed to go.

I first stopped at an open-air tea shop, which seemed to be the breakfast spot of choice for the men of Bagan. I didn't have to order anything, they just delivered some tea to my table along with some samosas dripping with grease and a big hunk of crusty-looking bread that the server obviously had just snatched from the table nearby when it was obvious that the other guys didn't want to eat it. There was a women's soccer match playing on a small TV - I think Denmark vs. Finland, and I wondered if the few guys paying attention thought it was some game from another world, with a bunch of tall blonde ladies running around and actually playing a sport (I didn't see any Myanmar girls playing any sports during my time in Myanmar).

I continued on with my rusty steel bike and found the first pagoda, which turned out to be "renovated" and looked extremely new. I kept moving, pedaling through the loose dry sand on the road. For the next three or four hours, I just biked from one place to another and wandered around and climbed on some of the pagodas. The sun was very intense and I was already templed out, but I enjoyed the scenery and the exercise.

Goat herding near the temples

I kept moving, and ended up in Old Bagan around lunchtime. I stopped at a Myanmar restaurant, which had some Myanmar patrons, and ordered some Myanmar food from a girl that was skeptical about my actually wanting some Burmese food. I enjoyed the beef curry with rice, but the many pickled things that came with it tended to taste a bit like feet. I washed it down with some Burmese Coca-Cola and moved on, stopping briefly at a market to buy some rambutans.

After leaving Old Bagan, the heat and the heavy bike were starting to wear me out, so I stopped at a roadside restaurant and got some iced "lime juice" (pretty much lemonade). A Burmese guy sat down to talk to me, obviously trying to practice his English. He wanted to show me around the temple near his house, and I reluctantly followed him, knowing he'd eventually want to sell me something. He had an old lady show me around the temple, which is well-known for its elaborate fresco that depicts a classic Buddhist story. She carried an incandescent light bulb attached to a long extension cord the whole way around so that the walls were lit up enough for me to see the paintings. When I got out, my Burmese friend was waiting for me, and we walked around the rest of the grounds with him pointing out interesting things, including the "Burmese Rosetta Stone," which told the same story on it in three different languages. Finally he asked if he could show me his paintings, which looked exactly like the ones the guy had shown me the evening before, and I begrudgingly bought the least ugly painting for $6. 

My tour guide

 I finished my long bike ride in the afternoon, at which point I cooled down in my room for a while before returning to the river-side temple for another sunset view. I'd had my fill of Bagan and was ready to move on, so I arranged for a bus ride to Mandalay the next morning - my last city in Myanmar before returning to Bangkok.