traveling companions in the far east

Groups.  It’s not a natural fit for me.

And to be fair, groups don’t want me either.

Inappropriate comments, unnecessary questions, bad jokes, low rumblings of alternative thought, marmalade and cheese…you know how it goes.

So here I am, with a group traveling around Burma.

I had made a decision that to try and attempt to land at Yangon airport with just a guide book and a load of Khat, would leave me soggy of spirit, resolve and face.

Yangon in the last shout the monsoon

Recommended by a friend who had gone to India with a group, I bought a 14 day trip called Classic Myanmar from a company called “ Intrepid.”

I met my little group on the first evening at The Summit Parkview Hotel by the People’s Park in Yangon.

I had already ascertained that I had been booked into a hotel that had conventions. And that I didn’t like the carpet. Or the view from my window. And that the girl behind the reception counter was a bit of a cow. And that even though the guide books told me to bring US dollars

( fresh, flat and unused; and not printed after 2006)

Nobody took US dollars outside of the Convention Hotels and maybe an up market restaurant or two. So that when I went downtown to the Colonial District on my first afternoon, I couldn’t buy anything with my crisp greenbacks, not a samosa, not a taxi, not an umbrella.

I returned to the Summit Parkview, drenched to the skin and had to ask a taxi driver to wait whilst the cow behind the reception desk told me where to find a cubicle that I could change my brand new dollars into Kyat so I could pay him the three dollars it cost to get from the old customs House by the docks back to bad carpet land.

kyat.

To be clear here:

50 kyats = 5 cents

200 kyats = 20 cents

2000 kyats = 2 dollars

Our meeting was listed on the convention board as happening in the fine dining area.

I asked the woman at the reception where that was, she said it was in the café. I just followed the corridor of bad carpet to a room painted tan and maroon where a smiling face with a badge hanging round her neck and a yellow and lime green traditional outfit said “ Intrepid?” I almost said “ No, not all. Playing it safe for now…” but I sat down with my group and behaved for five minutes.

They were two young Australians. Three people who originally came from England but were now Australians. One man from Canada and a lady from Surrey. We all said hallo. I was the only one who was wet.

She gave us a list of common phrases in Myanmar, formally known as Burma. ( from now on calling it MFKAB)

Hallo ( or Auspicious to you all ) :- Mingalar ba

Yes: - hou’ke shin

Sorry:- sel’ mashi ba ne

Thank you :- kyei:zu: tin ta be

And of course.

Where is the loo:- ein tha be ma shi.tha le:

On the subject of loo’s;  outside of the convention hotel and a few restaurants where people from convention hotels go to eat the loo is the squat variety with a bucket of water .

young wet nuns

ladies in longyis

schoolchildren in their green and white

woman and her son and what is left of a bike that has no wheels

And on the subject of traditional dress; I have to say that skirts and trousers look very much the outsiders in Burma. Men wear the pasos that are a big pillowcases open at either end that they wrap round them selves left first then right and then knot in the middle. Normally made out of a green or purple checked cotton. The women wear a cotton top with buttons and long sleeves and a matching skirt, a longyi,  that is a 2 metre long piece of fabric that wraps and wraps and tucks. Shorts, I have seen just a couple of times on foreigners. Strappy tops I have seen a couple of times, again on foreigners.

woman with brooms. taxi drivers. Business men. Street vendors. Boat men. Families.

colonial windows

the old British bank. downtown Yangon

My tour guide has a mother who lives three hours north of Yangon. Her mother makes the outfits for her. 

Nobody shows their knees or their shoulders. Just the way it is here in MFKAB.

Oh, and me and the tour group…..I’m getting better.

I have discovered I like being led by someone who knows where they are going .

And groups are full of people with stories to tell of how and why they got here.

So , it’s all right :- ya ba de.  And good bye:- thaw:bi.

Shwedagon Paya Pagoda, Yangon

lady , born on a tuesday making her prayers

monk, taking his quiet time in the early morning

Crazy Bangkok

Morning light. Bangkok

Crazy Bangkok.
Today Carl and I went into town in the car. We went down some driveway, past a temple that spanned either side of the road to the river at the end. Towering above us to the left was a tall tower block which is one of the most expensive places to live here in the city.
It's hard to describe the temple.
On the right was some sort of altar and in front of it ten rows of chairs with white cotton covers on them ready for an audience. On the left was a large gold leafed building. A popular one apparently.  for people who want to gain " merits". Thinking there might be a Buddhist Piggy Bank of some sort. No one there this morning.
But just beyond the temple was a farmyard. An army of beautiful cows and a thousand cockerels. Looked after by an elderly monk in a saffron robe.

And beyond that was the river.  High and running fast at the moment. Where there was this open air restaurant, making green papaya salad and this pungent soup and lots of fried noodles. The plastic tables ran along the river in and amongst these square boxes on stands that turned out to be internment boxes for the ashes of dead ones.

We dropped off the car for a service and took a taxi into town where we went to an exhibit of old photographs of Siam.

Everyone is wearing black in Bangkok in respect for the King who died a week ago. All the billboards have photos of him. All the Thai TV stations are running footage of newsreels of his life.
Carl told me it would be harder to spot the Toms and Pretties. because in a world out of mourning the Toms are clearer because they wear black. But we still saw many Toms and Pretties, walking round hand in hand. The lady boys or Kathoeys are good in black or in color. And then there were the schoolboys graduating in their school uniforms with these strange overcoats of white organza with gold trim. The couple we saw were wearing heavy make-up. Lipstick, the lot.
As we tried to cross over a street from one mall to another we were held back by policeman. Carl said it would be a "royal on the road" moment. It would probably be the princess and since it was a mark of disrespect to have feet above her head, all the trains and walkways were shut down until her cavalcade passed by.

noodles, noodles

fruits, I think

pickles. with the King on the TV

That night we came back out to wander the night markets and the bars of the Patpong. We sat and had a drink whilst about twenty girls in tiny shorts and platform shoes and little t-shirts danced on these high counters.
Carl explained that these were girls who lived in the country and would do these shifts to make money to send home to their families. Almost a part of growing up, like a national service.

grasshoppers and crickets

Then we went to the gay bar where we had another drink and watched the shows. we only saw three numbers because everything was closing early because of the King. One with acrobatic boys and some fabric hanging down in orange loops. One with painted boys moving slowly so the flowers on their bodies came alive. One with eygptian overtones and a few rather oversized Pharaohs.
Because of the King the boys were all wearing black undies. I think I can say that I was a little relieved.
We got a motorbike taxi home because the taxis were all taken.
There was the driver then me then Carl. All on one motorbike. Carl turned down couple of drivers because he thought the size of their girth might make him fall off the back.
I was in-between terrified and terrified.

We were coming down this main road and Carl said loudly from behind me, " Just to let you know, he is going to cross four lanes of traffic now. then he's going to do a u-turn, then he's going to cross another four lanes."
It was like being on a rollercoaster with fumes.













Lots of stray dogs. Noise. Humidity. Bowing. Thick black hair. Kindness.

nighttime drink on the rooftop terrace.

memorials

On the River Kwai

 Standing in one of the war graves cemetery in Kanchanaburi on a hot and humid Thai day. The water sprinkler was spraying. There was no one there. We had come by the Kwai river with the Bridge behind us.

Friend Carl.

With just the sound of the woosht, woosht of the sprinkler I wandered the rows and rows of the small metal plaques. The Suffolk and Cambridge regiments. The Royal engineers. The Highland regiment. A Dutch regiment.  Most of them 22 or 23. A few as old as 35. Some with just their names. Some with a bible passage or a line of poetry from Wilfred Owen. Some just what you would put on a postcard home.


" Best son ever." " Couldn't be more proud." " Thinking of you every day."

just one of thousands.

" love Mum  and Dad."














Such a weight on one's chest.

All those young men. And all their mums and dads and brothers and sisters.


Have read " The Narrow Road to the Far North."
Saw many years ago " To End All Wars."
Watched the night before heading west to Kanchanaburi, " The Bridge Over the River Kwai."

The Bridge over the River Kwai

But it is this acre of grass. One of many.








With little squares of metal and the engraved notes from home. And the books where you can read what street in Inverness or Hertfordshire, Melbourne or Darwin, Christchurch or Dunedin;  these young men left from, in a khaki uniform. And who sent them off. Probably waving.

etched into stone.

Later that day at the Hellfire Pass Memorial Museum,  which was started by an Australian POW who came back in 1984  determined to find the Konyu Cutting which they had all called  'Hellfire Pass.'





Almost consumed by Jungle, he found it and convinced  the Australian government to dedicate it as an historic memorial to all those who died while constructing the Burma Thailand railway.

Of the 60,000 allied POW's that worked on the railway, 12, 900 died there. Around 90,000 civilian laborers also died. from inadequate food, inadequate medical facilities and the brutal treatment of the guards.














There are no words for the enormity of standing on a piece of railway high up in the jungle that cost so much. No words.

Hellfire Pass today. with a tree now grown, where the tracks would have been.

a bowl made by an Australian now a potter, once a POW here at Hellfire.

So I leave it to Dr Kevin Fagan  whose words are engraved on a piece of stone at a clearing the far end of Hellfire Pass. Beside a small stream which comes down from the mountains.  With tall trees and a canopy of leaves with an occasional monkey leaping from  a branch.
All quiet now.

Orange in India

It is the brightness of the saris that I will remember. Not the ones being sold in stalls in markets. Or even those worn in the city of Jaipur for the festival of Dussera.
It is those worn by women walking along the streets with an enormous bunch of bamboo shoots on their heads. The women holding onto a cow or a water buffalo on the side of the street. The women far away in a field pulling something from the ground. Sitting on the back of a motorbike behind their husband. The washing lines of the shacks which had one flicking around in the warm air.
These saris were not pastel, nor white, nor black, nor gentle. They were vivid. Orange mainly. Or deep pink. Sometimes yellow. Occasionally red.
The men in pale blue shirts and brown trousers. In white dhotis or cream turbans. Sometimes they sat around. Sometimes they followed a flock of goats. But they trailed behind these women who threw their color out as a challenge to the difficult lives they were living.

men playing cards

women weaving a rug

woman with her dyed wool

Maharajas kept sections of their palaces for the women of their choice. who would all live separately and wait to see if they would be the one visited that night by a secret stairway. It was probably a lucky life.

the women quarters

The maharajah's quarters

a steep well inside a palace

Breakfast was porridge and baked beans. Waffles and white toast. chocolate milkshakes and muffins.
papaya and kiwi fruit. sambal and parathas stuffed with cheese and chillies. masala dosa and mango lassi. you must know which serving spoon I picked up.

man lying on the platform at Delhi station

girls piled into the back of a taxi in jaipur

three friends going to the Albert museum in Jaipur

men and their sacks on their camel.

went by train from Delhi to Jaipur. Saw slums and buildings unfinished but occupied. Saw fields and trees and cows and goats. went by car from Jaipur to Samode. went by car again from Samode to Ranthambore. Saw people piled up onto motorbikes. one, two, three, four, five. Helmets over bright head scarves. turbans flying in the wind. shoes, no shoes. everyone balancing and everyone in a hurry but swerving for all this hundred of cows who just lay in the road because it obviously seemed like the best place to take a rest.







Rode on an elephant. Rode on a camel. Rode in a jeep and held my breath as a tiger walked past me close enough for me to see if she had eyelashes.

spotted deer

Arrowhead. a three year old tiger. strolling by.

Ranthambore Park.

two guards at the amber palace

the pickle man in the market

wiring in the city centre

the spice man

the man who makes the stamps for the block prints

the woman sifting her grain on her rooftop

Chaotic. Glorious. Crazy. Wonderful. Filthy. Brilliant. Sad. Exciting.

You say to people, when they ask you when you will be back, " Next year."

sunrise at Ranthambore

sunset in the park.