A STOP IN BURMA -- TRAVELS OF THE SAUSAGE

BURMA, A.K.A 

MYANMAR

Hello !!

I am finally reconnecting to my traveling blog, after a long while, and a very difficult winter. A little message for Armelle, if you read me, I will write an article about the Chalet Les Loups, a magnificent 5 star log cabin accommodation that I visited this winter in Châtel, France, however I think the release of my article will be more interesting in mid-autumn, when the reservations for Winter stays begin again, rather than publishing my snow pics now, in the heart of summer, when it's 40 degrees outside ! I needed some time to recover,  so please forgive the delay.

I am now taking you to a place where it's very, very hot, (at least in January), to Bagan, Myanmar. I had been wanting to write a blog post for a long time, also to show you the things I made, because I created a collection of semi-precious jewels in Jade, which is inspired by this country and whose jade was directly bought on the spot.

My travel to Burma dates back to January 2016, and I can't wait to start traveling again, and create new collections with faraway inspirations !

My trip happened within another trip, that I was making around Thailand, where I stayed for three months. I only stayed in Myanmar for 10 days, but they were enough to capture my imagination and dazzle me.

The first obstacle to overcome was probably the shock of the difference of development between Thailand and Burma, as if I had passed into India. Roads were inexistent, dusty, or broken, there were open shops everywhere, adding to the street mess, vendors of street food cooking on their little barbecues in the streets, colonizing the pavements, and I was greeted by a gigantic traffic jam that kept me three hours in the taxi, taking me on the 10 km ride from the airport to my hotel spot. Houses, buildings, large green parks, temples, but mostly the urban heat, the pollution, life at night in restaurants when the temperature had finally cooled down. And thousands of people.

Where do the people disappear once a country is developed ? I don't know. It feels like the pavements are emptier the richer a capital or big city is, while you can't walk on the pavements of developing countries (if they already are being built.)

Burmese people, are warm and welcoming. I was greeted with infinite care by the staff of the hotel I was staying at, a solo traveler well taken care of in all of the budget hostels I stayed at throughout Myanmar. I was helped numerous times in the streets, in the shops, in the temples, where I often got lost.

I met some awesome travelers. I went to an out of this world gigantic concert in a park for New Year's Eve, watching a Burmese Rap superstar band perform. They sang songs I couldn't understand a word of, but everyone was singing along with them. The atmosphere, at this park, at this concert, was incredible. The people were friendly, even brotherly, they huddled with us to take pictures with "the tourists", and we all had little neon lights that everybody was waving, and that looked like millions of stars in the dark.

You have to travel. To see that, at least once in your life. 

I spent the first days resting after New Year's Eve, and exploring Yangon. Its temples, of course, among them the Schwedagon Pagoda, an outrageously enormous site made of pure gold. But also, what caught my attention even more, was the local street market.

My goal, like before in Thailand, was to find materials and fabrics to sell into my craft shop, and to make a collection of jewels that would be inspired by this country.

When you set out for something like this, the first thing you have to do is watch. Listen. Note the details, the people's habits, see what's a characteristic of this country, that you haven't seen anywhere else, yet. The first thing that strikes you when you enter Burma, is to see the children's faces, the women's and most people's, made up with a sort of yellow paste, like dried up cookie dough (really !).

It's a local custom, to protect the children, or the people who are wearing it. It made me think of the ceremony of Durga Puja, in India, that I had witnessed in Darjeeling, and where people deposit some colored rice paste on their foreheads. But this, is yellow, sometimes with bits !! It's impossible not to notice it. It's called Thanaka. It's a cosmetic powder made from the root of a tree, and you can learn more here : THANAKA.

Nothing like a little visit to a maze-like local market, to help you discover a country's culture. Objects, fragrances, fabrics, food, fruit, and most of all A LOT of noises. Looking at the fabric stalls, I realized it was going to be a tough job to pick some. The materials were so fine, with sometimes silk, sometimes linen in it, embroidered in such a refined way...

Women and men don't get dressed in Asia. They "drape" themselves. You probably already know the sarong, you can find it in various South East Asian countries. Men, women, young people and old people, wear them. They have colors and patterns that are very different from one Asian country to the next. Try checking what they wear in Bali (Indonesia), Malaysia, Thailand, India, and Myanmar, for example, and you'll see what I mean. Some of them are gorgeous ! Sometimes sewn, most of the time just tied, they do not forbid in the least the widely spread use of motorbikes and bikes, even though they are a sort of skirt !

In Burma they wear the LONGYI, and you can learn more about it here.

I finally escaped the scorching heat and the noise of Yangon, to find myself in the northern part of the country, in a more spacious and less crowded and polluted city, but as interesting, although too big to cover completely : Mandalay.

Its name suddenly suggests to me colonial explorers of the 19th century, maybe because of the poem entitled "Mandalay", by Rudyard Kipling ? But it is mostly "the city of jewels", because of its historical specializing in the extraction of jade. It had about 2.5 million inhabitants in 2015, counting the suburbs.

I found myself with very nice traveler friends, in a lovely guest-house, spacious and well kept, that arranged my trip to Bagan afterwards.

For me Bagan was a revelation. A site that triggered as much enthusiasm in me as Angkor Wat in Cambodia, and Palenque in the Mexican jungle. You probably see the clichéd image that the tourism industry wants you to have of Bagan, hot air balloons soaring in the sky upon the temples at sunrise. Ok. It costs 200 euros, for two hours. You have to get up at five. I didn't do it. But I saw Bagan on a smaller scale, so to speak, and having much fun, on a little electric moped, (my first two wheeled engine, he he !), getting stuck on sand roads, and loving to put my shoes away and back on, to enter and exit the temples, feeling the red stone's heat under my feet, and the soft surface of the millennial paving slabs, in the interior courts, trodden upon by millions of feet other than mine, before me.

My visit ended with a return to Mandalay, where I saw the very beautiful Mandalay Hill temple. Perched on a hill, you can get there with a taxi, or moto-taxi if you are lazy like me, along a steep and sinuous road. The climb doesn't end there. The temple has lifts, and even escalators, (that you sometimes have to be barefoot on !) so that the faithful believers of all ages can make it to the top, most of the time at sunset, like I did. The temple offers a gorgeous and widespread view over the city, which is perfectly soothing and calming, whatever your religion, in particular if like me you are not a buddhist !

A return to Yangon, then a return to Thailand, a little stay, an express flight to Kuala Lumpur, back in Thailand again, visiting paradise islands, and back to France. My travel makes me want to go back, because at the time, I was roaming the country like in a daze, registering sounds and pictures and events without understanding them, taking it all in for later.

Only now am I ready to give my impressions (july 2018 !). You can see more pictures of Bagan on my instagram Streetsausage, and there will be a specific article about my jewels and the fabrics I brought back from Myanmar shortly. Some of the pieces are still available !!

See you soon, for other travels,

Saucisse -- The (street) Sausage from Myanmar