Thyra Travels: Myanmar 2019: Almost Couldn’t Leave

After a full month in Myanmar, I reluctantly hugged my travel companion, Andrea, goodbye and boarded the plane to Malaysia. Oh Myanmar, how I miss your good energy. I have never before experienced the pure kindness that I did while I was in the country. Both Andrea and I are constantly messaging each other grumbling about people being rude and missing Myanmar.

Yangon:

We flew into Yangon at night and immediately noticed two things: the deep voices of the men and that they were all wearing skirts. Because we are so ~go with the flow~ at this point, we had done little research on the people. We soon learned about these two points. The deep voices, along with the red teeth, come from chewing Betel nut. It is extremely common in Myanmar, and I relate it to something similar to chewing tobacco. All over the country you see red stains on the pavements, from locals spitting out the concoction. To the other point, Myanmar is still very traditional and the majority of men (and women, but women wearing skirts is not very different) wear an article of clothing called “longyi” which is a sheet of cloth fashioned into a skirt. After a few weeks in the country, each of these things became very normal to us.

After a few days in Yangon, we quickly realized the complete lack of tourists or westerners in general. Everyone curiously stared at us and if you smiled at someone they would always enthusiastically smile back, with a huge, genuine, eye-reaching grin. We were enchanted with both the city and the people, but unfortunately I was sick. I remember spending most of the day in the bed with a bad cold for a few days and only going out a little to go get food or walk around Chinatown. We were there during Chinese New Year’s and the place was PACKED.

After almost a week, we decided to finally move on, but Yangon would remain one of my favorite places in Myanmar.

Kyaikto:

One unsuspecting morning we left on a four hour bus to Kyaikto. We had booked a so-called “normal” bus and didn’t think twice of it, even though I had read you should always take a VIP bus. When we got on the bus, we found out why. To put it short and sweet, in Andrea’s words, “I don’t think I have ever been this hot in my life”. WOW that bus was a furnace. No AC, and little relief from the wind – I almost passed out once or twice. I can’t imagine someone who hasn’t been in Asia for a long time and isn’t used to heat in that bus. Luckily, the burmese people are extremely kind, which kept our spirits high and positive.

We finally arrived to our destination and as were were taking the pickup truck to our hotel, a random white man appeared (we still discuss if this was a ghost or not). He told us that the golden pagoda, AKA the whole reason we had come, was under construction and completely closed. I remember hysterically laughing out of disbelief. We spent the next days in luxury at our expensive hotel, which had the nicest people we met in Myanmar. I will never forget the manager, running everywhere with his little walkie-talkie on his hip.

Inle Lake:

After a quick stay back in Yangon, we took a night bus to Inle Lake. For me, this was one of the worst bus rides ever, my cold hadn’t gone away and my throat has never hurt that much IN MY LIFE. Andrea, the nurse, promptly put me on antibiotics once we arrived. Inle Lake was much more touristic than anywhere we had been, but we had some of the best soup of our trip there. We spent a day touring the Lake, as we had heard many dazzling experiences of it. But…I am no stranger to lakes and it was not anything special, at least for us.

Mandalay:

Another night bus trip later, we arrived in the infamous Mandalay. Before learning more about Myanmar, Mandalay was the only city name I knew in the country. We did not do much in Mandalay, Andrea was now the one who was feeling under the weather. We toured the city, walked around, and ate indian food.

Bagan:

Bagan is close to Mandalay, so we could take a day bus. The bus was hot, once again, but nothing as bad as the bus we had taken earlier in the month. We were so excited about Bagan as literally every person we had met told us this was the best place in Myanmar. Bagan is famous for the more than 2000 temples around the city. Sunrise and sunset tours are very popular, as well as renting an e-bike and touring the temple grounds. We went by ourselves, touring for almost two straight days the vast temple grounds. It reminded me of a cheaper, smaller, and much less touristic Angkor. Although very beautiful and worthwhile, we didn’t feel the need to stay more than a few days. With the bike, you can cover the whole grounds fairly quickly – and the town itself is expensive and touristic. We decided to go to the beach (the best decision we have ever made).

Ngapali Beach:

To get to the beach, we had to take a day bus to Yangon (Andrea’s vote for worst Myanmar bus trip) and then another night bus to the beach the following day. We stayed one night in Yangon, we aren’t that strong to do two bus trips in one day. After 24 hours, we arrived to the beach. BLISS. We had five full days and one half day. We spent the time like this: wake up, eat breakfast, go to beach, read, ocean, sun, lunch, read, ocean, sun, shower, dinner. Quite possibly one of the best weeks of my trip. We had zero obligations and zero motivation. I read like five books, reading six to eight hours a day. Leaving was HARD.

I am a lone wolf again, exploring Malaysia until meeting my brother in Jakarta. When I am alone, I tend to wander around more – I am up to at least 10 km a day again.

T