After so many temples in so many Southeast Asian countries, it’s hard to get excited about seeing ANOTHER temple and yet we found ourselves on a slow boat from Mandalay down the Irawaddy to visit the temple-strewn plains of Bagan.

The temples started sprouting up here like weeds a thousand years ago. There are now around 2000 temples remaining – with a few brand new ones to offset the thousands that have been destroyed over the years. That sounds pretty incredible, and it sort of is. It is hard to find a spot where there is not a temple of some sort in site. Some of the temples can be climbed and offer unreal panoramas of a galaxy of stupas rising above the trees. The temples are fairly spread out over 16 or so square miles of farmland, so we rented bicycles for a few days to explore. That turned out to be a bit of work on some of the sandy paths, but at least there weren’t any real hills. I woke up at 5:30am one day to capture the temples rising through the misty jungle sunrise. Instead, I got a 5 mile bikeride in the darkness and rain and a few gloomy photos. Yay!Like the rest of Myanmar, Bagan was largely devoid of tourists. On our biking adventures, we came across hundreds of temples, but only a handful of foreigners. Only sunset at one of the big temples near a posh hotel drew them from their air conditioned lives. OK…we had A/C, too. But we managed to go outside and see stuff during the day.

We also found the moral equivalent of the Thai “No Whammies” Prayer Machine. Here, you throw money at target wishes a spinning wedding cake. I’m shooting for “May you win in lottery”.

Skirts for men – IN. Except they’re called longji. This traditional wear is worn prominently throughout Myanmar though pants are nowadays widely seen on the streets.

Rouge on cheeks – OUT. Women, children and pansy men wear sandalwood powder on their cheeks as make-up that doubles for sunscreen. Most people wear it smeared neatly in squares prominently on their faces. Other variations include messier shapeless blobs, rebellious mickey mouse outlines and the all over spread.

It’s no longer Rangoon, Burma but goes by Yangon, Myanmar now. There are limited entry points into Myanmar and you can only enter the military led country by flying into Yangon. Actually only certain parts of the country are open to tourists at all. This includes the official new capital located more centrally within the country where the government buildings are built like bunkers, locals were restricted access, and foreigners are absolute forbidden to go near. Years ago during their last election the military leadership lost but refused to give up the seat of power so their regime of oppression remains. Outside of Myanmar there is a debate over whether or not tourists should visit the country because a portion of their spending money goes directly to support the military via government taxes and visa fees. However when you ask the Burmese the same question they can only express how much taking tourist dollars away hurts them directly. And it’s not just the income they need from foreigners but they want visitors to take take their stories out of the borders to be shared with the world. Those that are against the regime risk harm for themselves and their family. We heard stories of people divorcing their wives, moving to far off regions, cutting off all communication to their family, and even remarrying just to keep their families safe. Some have even tried to fake their own deaths in fear of retaliation of their political beliefs. All these things are not on the surface or evident on the streets. In fact walking around the various towns it looks like people are just busy trying to eke out a living, which they are. Much of the oppression is hidden from the west. The internet is heavily monitored within the country. Email sites like Yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail are all blocked out as are blogs and many international websites. The violence that resulted from the monk protests six months ago in the Rangon made headlines in the international media and has kept many people away. That was evident in walking around bustling Rangon where we saw less than ten tourists in total over several days.
We talked to monks and local people that cautiously told us that they could not openly speak out against the government. A monk briefly recalled the demonstration months ago where monks were beaten and killed to stifle the anti-government protests. Most of the people in this largely Buddhist country are impoverished and the few that have money do their shopping overseas. The shelves in markets are lacking and hold the same basic provisions. People live in the streets and those that have nothing beg from the poor. So it’s probably not surprising that as much a tenth of the population submit to the temple and don the sacred robes where they are provided with a roof, education, and food. But like I mentioned this suffering is quiet, beneath the surface of a population that has found no safe outlet for their grief so they tiptoe within the boundaries, trying not to step on the wrong toes.