Yangon, Myanmar – December 1st – 4th, 2016

Yangon is considered the “last great Southeast Asian city”; to us it seemed a lot like any other a big city. Worse yet, we lost our celebrity status! There were other tourists everywhere and the locals pretty much ignored us, which was a bit of a shock (and more than a little hurtful) after being such a big deal for the past week and a half. Also, for the first time on our trip we stayed in a dormitory. It was a pretty nice place, but we soon learned that there really is something to be said for having walls between you and a snoring neighbor. Despite these less than ideal circumstances, we ended up having some great experiences in Yangon.

Top right and top middle photos were taken on the way to Yangon. The top right is a storage room for rubber collected and processed by hand at the surrounding rubber plantations. The top left photo is us in from of our dorm bunk beds. The bottom two photos are some of the views/traffic around Yangon.

Arriving and departing Yangon by bus is… overwhelming. The bus drops/picks you up at the biggest and busiest bus station known to man (not sure if this is true or not, but sure seems to be true). Being that is was dark both times we were at Aung Mingala bus station did not help the situation. Upon arrival, we had to find transportation to downtown Yangon, which is about an hour and a half away (in wall to wall traffic around the clock). First things first though, we had to find the bus station exit, which was an undertaking on its own. Although you can take an overpriced taxi, we attempted to take the bus in order to save money. That was, until we saw the bus. The public bus looked like an abandoned school bus crammed to the brim with Burmese travelers. After attempting, and failing, at negotiations, we settled on a shared van instead. The return trip to Aung Mingala was no better. At the downtown bus station, we ran into the same chaotic mess except this time the shared van filled in seconds, leaving us out to dry. We ended up sharing a taxi with two Malaysian travelers. The problem this time was finding our bus in the cesspool of bus companies and people. Most all signs are written in Burmese script and matching the symbols proved extremely unsuccessful. We asked about 15 locals for directions before finally finding our bus over an hour after the taxi had dropped us off. Good thing we left ourselves plenty of time.  

Myanmar is not exactly known for its cuisine, but we were able to find some pretty good food around Yangon. Between Indian food, vegetable and meat skewers, and Shan noodle soup, the soup was probably our favorite. We have also recently become obsessed with fresh fruit smoothies (that is when we can be sure the water is filtered)! The markets provide all of the fresh fruits, vegetables, and meats you can imagine. The fish and meat are sometimes so fresh that they are still struggling to move and breathe when you buy them. If they are completely dead, they have been thoroughly butchered leaving you the option to pick any part of the animal that you wish (literally any part of the animal). Flies are included for free. I realize that this is just the way that it is and at least they are using all of the animal, but actually seeing it is something else. Also, when you order meals with meat you will receive not only meat but cartilage, bones, etc. In other news, I have recently become a vegetarian.  

Markets around Yangon.

Around Yangon, we visited a huge handicraft market called Bogyoke Aung San Market. It was interesting to see all of the Myanmar art and handmade crafts. Their resourcefulness is incredible, since most, if not all, of the crafts are made from natural products grown, harvested, and processed in Myanmar. On our first night in Yangon, we walked to one of the jetties to watch the sun go down and took a bicycle taxi back. The poor guy had to work so hard to lug us back to our hostel, we both felt bad and contemplated swapping with him, but figured we wouldn't be strong enough to pedal for more than a couple of minutes. 

Streets of Yangon.

Jetti and nearby pagoda at sunset. Right middle photo shows us on the bike taxi. 

The next day, we hopped on the circle train which circumnavigates the city very VERY slowly (~3 hours for the loop). The locals use the train to get around so the people watching was excellent. There were vendors selling everything from live chickens to quail eggs, fresh fruit, newspapers, betel nut, and everything in between. Added bonus was that for a short time we were celebrities again! After eyeing us for about 30 minutes, two brave young girls sandwiched us to take photos and play phone games with us. It was nice to feel wanted again. Since my attention span remains very poor, we lasted about 45 minutes before becoming bored by the train and hoping off. We walked to a nice pagoda park and fed stale bread to some humongous fish before catching a taxi to a lakeside driving range and hitting a bucket of golf balls. For sunset, we took another taxi to Shwedagon pagoda, the most famous pagoda in Myanmar. The pagoda grounds were built to enshrine three Buddha hairs that were plucked and given to a couple of merchants for their donation to Buddha thousands of years ago. The pagoda was out of this world lavish, much like Versailles in France. The top of the massive pagoda included a 75 carat diamond and a three-foot replica pagoda on display was made entirely from solid gold. Don’t get me wrong, it was absolutely brilliant, especially at sunset, but we were a conflicted by the extravagance, especially in a place where so many of the Buddhist congregation are struggling for basic necessities, yet being asked to contribute daily to the church. 

Activities around Yangon. The bottom left photo is a picture of one of the girls on the circle train. 

Shwedagon Pagota at sunset. The bottom middle picture shows the lines of volunteer sweepers cleaning the marble floors. 

On the day before our first overnight bus, we wandered the streets and viewed some of the colonial architecture in Yangon. We were stopped for almost two hours by a random local that talked our ears off (in English we could only half understand) about American and Myanmar politics. Correction, I should really say he talked Andy’s ear off, because he’s a man and sexism is real. Although after two hours we were more than ready to shake him, we did learn some interesting things about Myanmar’s culture, struggles, and corruption in the government. For example, in Myanmar, a man is not allowed to enter the home of a woman without her husband being present. Also, the former government was extremely corrupt, but the new head of the government is making many positive changes for the Myanmar people. Lastly, the locals (and apparently many Myanmar people) believe that America is exactly as Hollywood portrays it – therefore, we all love our president and honor him (He, “knows because he’s seen it in the movies”). We promptly corrected this stereotype. After escaping the talkative grip of the very friendly local, we made our way for $3/hour Thai foot massages before departing for Inle Lake.