Conclusion
I’m back in Yangon after another murderously bouncy sleeper train. It seems hotter than before. Or maybe I just got used to cooler temperatures, I don’t know. But it feels different.
Not just because of the heat, either. I’ve been here for only four weeks, but as I walk around town there are noticeably more Westerners around than when I first arrived.
The atmosphere on the streets is different too. Money-changers are fewer in number. Vendors are openly selling posters of Aung San Suu Kyi right on the high street. The talk of elections actually seems to be coming to something.
William Hague is in town, talking to the leaders about coming in from the cold, dropping in on Aung San Suu Kyi for a spot of lunch.
All of a sudden, it seems like the world is coming to Burma. So should you?
That’s a question you have to answer for yourself. Everybody who comes here has obviously answered in the affirmative, and when you speak to them about it, generally they’ll have an argument explaining their decision.
So here’s mine.
Yes, the government are an extremely unpleasant bunch. And yes, if you come here, some of your money will inevitably find its way to them. If you just can’t countenance that, fair enough. It’s a valid position to take. Don’t go.
But consider the ordinary people. For the most part they’ve been abandoned by that government. Left to scrape by on their own while the gangsters live high on the hog and the outside world looks the other way.
They deserve better. They deserve to trade and co-operate and communicate with the rest of us, just like everybody else does. The best way to make that happen is to go there and spend your time and money with them.
And anyway, if they can’t get their hands on tourist dollars they’ll have to look elsewhere for income, and inevitably that’ll only drive them even deeper into China’s pocket.
Also, consider the information the media have fed you about this country over the years.
Yes, the junta are a bunch of inept, paranoid, thieving brutes. But sadly that’s hardly unusual in this world.
Yes, they imprison innocent people because of their politics. America has Guantanamo Bay. But you go there.
Yes, they have been known to use child labour. So has China. You buy their products every day.
Yes, they use their army against their own people to quell insurrection. So did the UK for decades. The world approved.
Yes, the domestic media is heavily censored. So is Thailand’s. They get seven million tourists a year.
So why, in a world of tyranny and corruption, are these guys singled out for the pariah treatment? Why not, say, Cambodia, an utterly corrupt state which still has done absolutely nothing to bring the leaders of the Khmer Rouge to justice? People flock to Angkor Wat, why are they warned off Bagan?
Is it because Burma doesn’t play the West’s game?
Now they’re starting to, let’s see what happens. Maybe they’ll be advertising the place on your TV before long.
So you know what I think. You can make your own mind up. But if you’ve read through this blog, I’ve a feeling I know what you think too.
My time here is up. I head to the airport in the world’s smallest taxi as the sun sets. My head spins with thoughts of all I’ve seen and done over the last four weeks. The beauty and kindness I experienced is overwhelming. But I feel like I’ve only scratched the surface. I have to come back. By the time I do there’ll probably be cash machines and McDonald’s. Change always brings bad with the good. I hope they get all the good they deserve.
Maybe I’ll see you there one day. I’ll be the sweaty white guy on a bike.
Stickin’ it to the Man
The following story is entirely fictitious and bears no relation whatsoever to any real events.
Ahem.
Once upon a time, there was a village high in the mountains. This village had a chief who was very young, but very wise, and he was respected all across the region. We’ll call him Shwe.
Now the time came for the heads of all the villages to gather and talk. The leader of the big town was in charge of proceedings, and it was his job to tell them of the orders from the government which they would be expected to carry out.
“Shwe, you must send a man from your village to join the army”, said the big chief.
“I’m sorry”, said Shwe, “but I cannot do that. We are peaceful people, and we have no brave men to fight in the army.”
“Nevertheless, you must send a man to the army, or pay 500,000 kyat instead.”
“And what is this money to be used for? Show me the market where men are bought and sold and I will give you the money to buy a soldier.”
The other village chiefs cheered in unison.
“Shwe, you are inviting a lot of trouble for your village. Please think carefully about what you are saying.”
“So be it. You will get no money and no soldier.”
The meeting ended. Shwe went back to his village. They never did give up one of their sons, and they never paid a single kyat. And whatever Shwe might say, his village has at least one very brave man.
Into the hills
My companions for the trek are the bearded French-Canadian, and a French woman who was also in our carriage and spent most of the journey being talked at non-stop by a mad monk. And our guide, of course. Who tells us we’re particularly lucky, because tonight the village is throwing a party for the local nat, or spirit (Burmese Buddhism’s an odd hybrid that also features a large number of minor deities left over from before the rotund fella caught on).
“What’s the occasion?”
“Today we are presenting the nat with a gift of a horse”
“Why a horse?”
“The nat asked for a horse”
“Asked for it?”
“Yes, it spoke to a monk in a dream and said it wanted a horse. So we are bringing an image of a horse to the village shrine today”
“Righto”
Bang on cue, two flatbed trucks drive past filled with young people. “Those people are from my village. They’re going to get the horse now.”
We set off at a gentle pace through paddy fields being ploughed by one man and a buffalo. Gradually the scene changes from open fields to steep hills and valleys, and the vegetation changes constantly. They grow a lot of different stuff here, and still more grows of its own accord that they find a use for. The fruit of one tree’s used to make soap. Wild cotton is used to stuff pillows. They can make soup out of pretty much anything.
I ask about opium. “Twenty years ago it was all over, but not now”. From the smile he gives me, I suspect it’s still around if you know where to look.
We walk through villages with tiny, ingenious hydroelectric dams. These villages are the home of the Shan people. “I am Palaung”, says the guide. “My people always live at the top of the mountain. The Shan live in the valley.”
Despite living peacefully side by side and cooperating in all kinds of ways, the two groups speak entirely different languages and claim different heritages. The Shan are part of a larger group spread across Thailand, Laos and southern China, and their language is related to Thai, whereas the Palaung claim to be outcasts from the Khmers who were chased from place to place till they finally came to settle on the hilltops of Shan State. The story goes that the king in Amarapura gave them tea trees to plant, as the land they inhabit is ideally suited to growing them but not much good for anything else. They grow the finest tea in the land to this day.
We stop for lunch in a Shan village. A man offers us some water to drink. “I have my own, thanks”, says the French girl. I suggest it would be polite to take some anyway, since he’s offering.
He pours her some. She drinks it and splutters. Uproarious laughter all round. “Medicine water”, says the man. Rice wine, like sake, but quite a bit stronger.
The japester introduces himself. “I am Mr. Bean.” Everybody in Hsipaw seems to be Mr. Something. We have Mr. Charles the guesthouse owner, Mr. Book, Mr. Food, Mrs. Popcorn… And now we have Mr. Bean. Turns out it’s nothing to do with Rowan Atkinson, he’s just a bean farmer. He’s a guide too, accompanying a lone Mexican girl, who is going to the same place we are.
Mr. Bean notices the bearded Frenchman. “Osama! You’re not dead! I’m going to call the Americans and tell them you’re hiding in the mountains of Myanmar! I’ll be rich!”
Under the table where we sit is a very large pipe made of bamboo. From its side juts a branch into which the smoking material is inserted. Quick as a flash, “Osama” spots it and mimes firing a bazooka at Mr. Bean. Laughs all round again.
For another three hours or so we walk and listen to our guide tell us about life here. We learn a great deal - the man is a mine of information, and speaks very good English. For example, despite what you’ve heard, democracy is alive and well in Burma, just not at a national level. This village, and presumably many others, elect their chief on a regular basis. However, in an interesting twist, you can’t run for the position - it is thrust upon you. The village elects its chief whether he likes it or not. And generally he doesn’t, because being the chief means having to deal with the government’s diktats.
In the late afternoon, we reach Pankam, our guide’s village. Everyone is sitting along the roadside on the way in. “They’re waiting for the horse, not you”, says the guide. All the same, it’s quite the welcoming committee.
Our guide points out a very old man. “This is the oldest man in the village. He’s ninety-six. He still works, making baskets.” Sure enough he’s sitting on the base of a half-finished basket, weaving away. “When the horse comes, he will greet it and welcome it to the village.”
Our guide takes us on a walk around the village. The waning sun makes the already picturesque surroundings even more beautiful by providing some wonderful twilight.
Novice monks sit under a huge banyan tree like the one where Buddha gave his first sermon. It was planted when the village was founded and looks centuries old.
We’re shown a big water tank, installed a few years ago. “Before, we had water for washing, but not to drink. We had to walk 45 minutes for drinking water. the UN gave this to us. The government gives us nothing.”
Our guide takes us to his home, a wooden frame with woven-palm walls and a corrugated metal roof. If you took a checklist approach to summarising their standard of living, this place would seem like a hovel. It has no running water, no electricity, and we’ll be sleeping on the floor. But it’s a comfortable home, and this is not an impoverished family, just one that lives simply.
The horse is running late, apparently. The trucks that we saw earlier in the day are bringing it up the hill, and inevitably, one of them has broken down. Nobody knows when it’s going to get here, but everybody’s waiting patiently.
It’s well after dark by the time we hear the commotion. We head to the entrance of the village and they’re all there. The old man is front and centre, joking around with the young men looking after him.
I hear drums and horns in the distance. Then rumbling old engines. Soon the headlights appear, and a cheer goes up, first from the villagers around me, then from the people on the back of the truck. Poor sods have been on there since early this morning, they must be fed up to the back teeth, yet still they party.
The old man stands in the middle of the road. The trucks pull up in front of him. Everybody crouches in silent prayer. He speaks for a minute. A cheer goes up and the trucks roll into the village, with everybody singing and dancing behind.
Party time, then. We follow the crowd to the nat shrine. The horses (yeah, there were actually two of ‘em) are taken off the truck, blessed, and taken into the shrine. There is much drumming and dancing…
…For about half an hour. The party was disappointingly brief. Before you know it, people are sitting down for some nice civilised food (men first, then women), and making their way off home. Oh well.
We head back to our guide’s house. We’d all been hoping for a bit of a star show, being so high up and far from light pollution, but it’s cloudy.
“It’s going to rain, y’know”, I say.
“No way, it’s well into dry season, it just doesn’t rain this time of year”
“I’m telling you, I can smell it”
It rains. Hard. We’re sleeping under a tin roof. Marvellous.
Between the rain, a coughing child, and a cat that really wanted some company, not a great deal of sleep was had. We’re dreading the trek down in the morning, fearful that we’re hopelessly underprepared for muddy roads.
Turned out all right, though, and we sauntered down to Hsipaw via a quick dip in the hot springs feeling like we’d just shared something really special.
The slowest train in the world
And so to Hsipaw, the furthest-flung point of my entire trip. I’m taking the train once again because this one goes across the Gokteik Viaduct and some say it’s one of the most spectacular rail journeys anywhere.
I head to Pyin U Lwin’s train station, which looks remarkably like the sort of thing you’d see in a Home Counties backwater, only with a tin roof and an array of hawkers outside. In an unprecedented display of efficiency, the train’s already there, well before we’re due to leave. Of course, this is Burma, and nothing’s ever that simple. Presently it takes off. In the wrong direction. A bearded man comes over.
“That is the train to Hsipaw, isn’t it?”, he asks in a Quebecois accent.
“Should be, yeah”
“I hope it comes back because my bags are on it”
Turned out something was up with the brakes and they were rolling it into the yard for repairs. It came back in due course and we set off in the right direction this time. Reassuringly late.
It is a spectacular journey, y’know, especially when it twists down towards the viaduct. You’re best to sit on the left-hand side of the train, but even if you don’t you’ll get plenty of chances to see what you’re about to cross as it snakes and slaloms its way down the hill. As usual, though, Lonely Planet talks out of its arse, and the structure they portray as rickety and under-maintained is actually super solid and in no danger of crumbling into the valley any time soon, so thrillseekers will have to look elsewhere (ideally in another country altogether, there ain’t none here).
The rest of the track, though… Actually it’s a bit better than the Bagan bouncy castle, but at one point it lurches so violently that the luggage is dislodged from the upper shelf. The girl opposite me takes a glancing blow from her suitcase, and I get brained square-on by my backpack. It stays on the floor where it can’t fall any further.
We stop on the other side of the viaduct for a long, long time, waiting for an approaching train to pass through (almost all railway here is dinky single-track with the occasional passing place). I avail of the opportunity to go for an al fresco pee instead of using the train’s bog, which made the one in Trainspotting look like one of those Japanese ones that blow-dry yer bum. I find a nice banana tree to stand under, do the business, look up… Oh, hi.
This monster’s right above my head, sizing up whether to eat me as a snack or just wait for the next passing elephant.
We roll into Hsipaw eventually. I’ve now been in the country 22 days and spent over one and a half of them on a train.
Immediately I’m pleasantly surprised because it’s much warmer than chilly Pyin U Lwin (turns out it’s about 900m lower). An Austrian guy is just sitting in the train station and says he’s spending ten days there and loves it. Blimey. I only came so I could make the train journey. I’d been thinking of just turning round and heading back so I can squeeze in Inle Lake before I have to leave.
But they warned me this place has a habit of keeping hold of people. Shortly after getting to the guesthouse I‘m reconsidering that quick turnaround. An Aussie tells me he’s just come back from a two-day trek into the mountains and urges me to do the same. He’s been in the country before, done all the usual stuff, and assures me this is a far better use of my time. Hmm. Shall I stick around, then?
Is it true they’re really fussy about money?
Yes. It is easily the most annoying thing about travelling here. People are liable to refuse US dollars that are anything other than just-printed-this-morning perfect. Asking why usually gets you a lot of hand-waving about the government. Considering the state of some of the local notes which are passed around without a word of complaint it’s just head-bangingly illogical. But this is the way it is and you’re going to have to deal with it. If you find yourself carrying a large note you can’t shift it might really mess up your plans, considering you won’t be able to access any other funds while you’re in the country.
Do yourself a favour and avoid this issue ever coming up. Insist on brand-new money before you set off. Keep it in a sealable plastic bag to protect it from stray liquids. Put this sealed bag between the pages of a thick book and carry it around like that. Bring different denominations if you can - bigger ones get a better exchange rate, smaller ones are handy for paying for stuff as change isn’t always available.
I’ll give you an example of how irritating and stupid it can be. I was staying in a hotel (naming no names, but it was the Grace I in Pyin U Lwin) for two nights. On the morning of the second, I paid for the two nights using $50 (all hotels have to be paid for in dollars). They took the note and gave me my change.
Half an hour later I get a knock on the hotel room door telling me my $50 is “not acceptable”. The receptionist took it, but the hotel owner, a sweaty boggle-eyed creep in a brown leather bomber jacket, is turning his nose up. I have several super-fresh $100 bills in my possession, but I just don’t want to play their stupid game, so I tell them it’s all I have, thinking he’s just trying it on and will back down.
Silly me. A ridiculous farce ensues where all sorts of alternatives are proposed.
“Pay in kyat?’
“Don’t have enough”
“Small money?”
“Don’t have $50 in small money. Just take it, there’s nothing wrong with it”
“Maybe you could try to change it for small notes downtown”
“And what if they refuse it too? I’ve made a trip downtown for nothing, all because this fool won’t take perfectly good money. I have things I want to be doing today, running around indulging your whims is not one of them”
A motorbike is fetched and I’m taken downtown. The money is refused. I go back.
In the end, I scrape together enough “small money” so that I can pay for my first night, take back my $50, and check out. Yes, I had to find another hotel because of this insanity, and hope they’d take my note (they did).
All this nonsense because the note was, and I quote, “a bit dirty”.
The second hotel (Bravo, on the high street, should you be passing through) was better anyway, so balls to ‘em.
Pyin U Lwin
The best way to see Mandalay is in the rear-view mirror of a car speeding out of it. Today’s novel method of transport is the shared taxi, which is a lot more expensive than a bus but I get some legroom and the nice man drops me off right at the hotel.
I’m off to Pyin U Lwin, way up in the hills. The knackered old Nissan wheezes and rattles its way up the climb, and a little golden bell hanging from the mirror heralds every pothole. I’m expecting something a bit different here, not just because it’s higher and cooler, but because in colonial days all the Brits used to decamp here en masse during the months when Yangon got a bit sweaty for their liking.
The first thing I notice isn’t that, though. It’s massive military presence. This is where they train their soldiers, and as our driver pulls through the entrance to a military campus I start to get a bit fidgety. Surely they aren’t going to take too kindly to whitey being here? It seems to pass with just a few stares and we’re out soon after dropping off one of the other passengers.
Unsurprisingly, military buildings in this country are much shinier than what everybody else has to make do with. It’s all manicured gardens and clean stone and grandiose statues and I’m sure it fairly sticks in the throat of the general population round here. There’s an “army guest house” which looks like a five-star resort and seems to have more people tending the garden than guests.
I check into my hotel and go for a walk. What a weird town this is. The English influence is clear - bits of it have a garden city feel to them, all pretty gardens and low-rise buildings and trees and space. There’s a tin-roofed Anglican church, for goodness’ sake.
But you can see China’s tentacles being wrapped round it, too - we’re getting near the beast here, and the usual Yamahas and Hondas are heavily outnumbered by Chinese facsimiles from brands you’ve never heard of.
But as well as all this there are stacks of Indian and Nepalese people about, so all in all it’s your standard Burmese mash-up, really.
The town’s unusual character is evident in the food, too - I ate an honest-to-goodness cheese sandwich at the utterly Westernised Golden Triangle (look, don’t judge, it’s been a long time). There are Indian sweet shops and a couple of burger bars.
And it’s bloody chilly at night.
After losing a morning to hotel-related idiocy I decide to visit the National Kandawgyi Gardens just out of town. And what a curious place it is. It’s an immaculate British-style botanic garden with just the slightest Burmese twist.
You could easily forget where you are were it not for the small pagoda in the middle and the locals carrying on as they always do. Young monks play on a see-saw.
A boy’s second birthday party erupts into a food fight straight out of the Three Stooges.
Groups of teenage boys sit around, singing and occasionally even rapping. Groups of teenage girls spot me and ask me to pose for photos with them. All the usual, really.
It made for a thoroughly pleasant and frankly weird few hours. If you ever pass this way, make sure you pay the gardens a visit, because it’s as big a dose of WTF as you’ll come across on your entire trip, in a country piled high with it.
Mandalay
Mandalay is a dirty, polluted, charmless dump of a place. If you’re planning a bit of time there into your trip, don’t. You are misguided and you will kick yourself. Whatever romantic notions you have of the place will be mercilessly crushed by the reality. You may have to pass through it to get somewhere else, so make sure you do it as fast as you can, because you will not want to hang around a minute longer than you have to.
I wouldn’t normally be so disparaging. Most places have some sort of appeal if you look for it. But really, it’s just not there. Get out ASAP.
Also, it has caused Speedy Gonzalez to be running around in my head shouting “Arriba! Arriba! Mandalay! Mandalay!” and it’s ANNOYING.
Burmese Beatz
I need to talk about music here for a minute.
One of the consequences of being a pariah state is that you have to manage on your own. While this is obviously detrimental to trade and national prosperity, it does have the effect of preserving your culture from external influences. Globalisation’s just sailed right past Burma, and the big brands that spend ten times more on marketing than they do on products are nowhere to be seen here, except as very expensive special imports.
This is also true of music. Big international acts don’t seem to have much of a presence here, with a few inexplicable exceptions, such as Justin Bieber.
However, that’s not to say that Burmese popular music would sound alien to your Western ear. Oh no. It’s just the same, only sung in Burmese. And when I say just the same, I mean that there’s a fair chance you won’t immediately notice they’re singing in a tongue you can’t understand. Because they’re doing it in an American accent.
WHY?
Better than this, though, I heard one song which had a bit of a dancehall-ish middle eight, featuring a short Burmese rap delivered in a Jamaican accent.
And the songs themselves often sound very familiar. Not to the extent that they’re a straight rip-off - which I suppose makes them more original than a fair bit of what fills the charts in the West - but they always sound a bit like that song you can’t quite put your finger on.
The national canon does seem rather limited, though, because I’m already becoming familiar with much of it. Partly from the obligatory bus karaoke, partly from snatches heard walking around, but mostly from guys singing on street corners. I’ve never known a place like this for young men just sitting around strumming guitars and singing songs with their friends. It happens everywhere you go, to the extent that many a cafe has a guitar or two hanging up for people to pick up and play.
I really like it.
Bagan
I don’t want to write about Bagan. Is it spectacular? Yes. Should you visit? Of course. But I don’t want to write about it.
Sorry.
No sleep till Bagan
A hard-of-hearing taxi driver that has to stop and ask the way to the railway station? That’s a new one.
He didn’t find it, either. And even though I knew exactly where it was and how to get there, I couldn’t give him directions due to a) the language barrier and b) him being as deaf as a post. I told him to pull over nearby and got out and walked with my near 30 kilos of stuff. Even though I knew there was little likelihood of the train leaving on time - and even if it did I could probably run and catch it up - I wasn’t missing it on account of this fool.
And so here I am in my sleeper carriage and honestly, it’s not bad. Four thin, fairly hard bunks that don’t look like the comfiest night’s sleep ever, but it’s clean and so’s the bog and there’s tons of space because I’ve got the whole berth to myself and as ever the people around me are all lovely. Frankly I’ve stayed in worse hotel rooms. If there was mains electricity I’d consider moving in.
Apart from the fact that once the train’s underway it’s like a mobile bouncy castle. It’s enough to make you seasick. I’m only glad I have the option of the lower bunk as if I was forced to sleep up top I’d fear leaving a Looney Tunes-style imprint in the ceiling.
I spend a bit of time in the restaurant car, which is a lot like a beer station on wheels, and about as welcoming for women. I chat to a man who later just gets off the train in the pitch dark while it’s still moving (yep, he enjoyed my company that much). But mostly I hang my head out the window and look up. We’re in the middle of nowhere, so there’s no light, there’s no cloud either, but best of all there’s no moon, and I’ve never seen so many stars.
Eventually I actually get the head down and manage a few hours of sleep in between being flung around like I’m on a bucking bronco. I’m not exaggerating - it is very unsettling to be woken from your sleep to find yourself in mid-air. Really brings a frisson of authenticity to those falling dreams.
To illustrate just how violent this was: before I went to bed I had put a drinks can in a cup holder (the fact that there’s a cup holder at all should tell you something about the smoothness of the ride compared to European trains). When I woke up, it was still in the cup holder. But upside down. It had been sent high enough in the air to turn a full 180 before coming back down again.
As it turned out the train was only two hours late. We arrived blinking in the morning light, sore and tired, and sailed into Nyaung U in the back of a little white pickup.
