Bagan

Tuesday 22 February
In the morning we were up quite early again to see the scenery, especially the entry into Bagan, with the temples starting to appear one by one. Harry had now come down with my cold.

When we got to Bagan, lots of people - adults and children were waiting at the jetty to try to sell us things, but our new guide, U Zor Minh was there, along with the regional vice president of Goodnews Travels, again with flowers for us. He manoeuvred us through the vendors, and took us to our hotel to leave our bags.

http://www.hotelbaganthande.com/index.htm

The hotel consists of a main building, built in 1922 to welcome the then Prince of Wales, and a number of bungalows leading down to the river, all with a veranda – and a very uncomfortable bench to sit while enjoying the view.

We got settled, and then went off with Zor to start our touring. We started with the pentagonal Dommayazika Pagoda, built in 1196, with lovely views. We had a tour around the pagoda, and a lesson on the differences between temples and pagodas (the shape).

Here Zor explained to us that he been an engineer, and had had come to Bagan in 1975. He worked with UNESCO when they were still in Bagan, although they left because haphazard renovation work being done in Old Bagan did not meet their criteria, and the junta approved projects like a golf course and a huge watchtower on the site. He really was an excellent guide, and extremely knowledgeable – and even better, he provided us with a list each day of what we had seen – the only chance we had at all of knowing which of the several thousand temples we had visited. He even used stickers of pagodas and temples to mark the difference.

He mentioned that most tourists like to see some of the life in Myanmar, as well as monuments, and so our next stop was the market in New Bagan, with lots of vendors and huge piles of fruit and vegetables. Zor pointed out that most of the vendors were squatting – for hours – rather than sitting on the ground, something they were used to but I could never do. Harry, having admired the guide’s jacket took the opportunity to ask for some sartorial advice, and so the men went off to get him a white shirt and a jacket to wear with his longyi. Much hilarity as he took off his shirt to be fitted!