Thursday 7 April 2016
Still At Sea

A very busy day at sea--so much going on.  Besdies breakfast and lunch in the Terrace Cafe, I manage to have a Canyon Ranch Spa haircut this morning,  The staff are all quite surprised when I tell them that I live in Tucson but have never been to Canyon Ranch itself. Then it's time to attend another lecture on the triumph of Hinduism and the rise of the Janites in India.  (No, in spite of what you may think, these are not avid fans of Jane Austen, but adherents to the pure religion of Janism, which believes that all living things, from human to the smallest insects and plants, have souls that must be cared for.)  After the lecture, Professor Ruiz invites me to join his small group for dinner on the last night of the cruise before I leave the ship in Mumbai.

I broke off the previous blog entry to attend a cocktail party for returning passengers, some of whom have sailed over 275 days with Oceania (by the way, the "i" is not pronounced), and a fine dinner of lobster bisque and rack of lamb in the Polo Grill, excellenty served by a young woman, Victoria, from Belorussia. Tonight I plan to attend the show because of the scheduled appearance of a real live Broadway star:  Christine Andreas.  A dark-haired soprano with a big voice, Ms Andreas has been nominated for two Tony Awards and I have been fortunate enough to have seen her perform in New York, in the original cast of The Scarlet Pimpernel.  Even the cruise director is impressed by the presence of a real star; they don't get many on cruise ships any more!  I will give a full report tomorrow.

But while I wait until showtime in another hour, I shall take you back to Bagan.

Monday 4 April 2016
Bagan, Myanmar

After a long and busy morning of touring it is time for lunch at a small boutique hotel.  This is not where we will be staying the night; the one thing there seems to be more of than temples in this city is fine hotels.  Lunch is again served family style, and again presents a variety of local dishes.  The food in Myanmar is good, but it is becoming a little repetitious.  I guess the tourist industry has decided that foreigners want to eat only a limited number of dishes.

After lunch we drive to our hotel, The Bagan Lodge, where we will have dinner and spend the night.  Our guide gives us the most welcome gift of a 90-minute siesta before we head out for more sightseeing and more temples.  The hotel is thoroughly delightful and like the one I stayed at in Siem Reap, Cambodia, last year, built to resemble traditional native architecture.  The open-air lobby, restaurant, and bar are embellished with local art, primarily teak sculpture and lacquerware (the primary product of Bagan).  The grounds spread out around two large swimming pools with delightful gardens.  There are 50 bungalows, each holding two very large well-outfitted rooms.  As we are shown to our quarters, garden employees are busy sweeping the dust from the paths and porches (Bagan is a very windy and dusty town, by the way.)

 

 

I lay down on the king-sized bed and am sound asleep in less than 10 seconds.  Fortunately, the guide has set a wake-up call for all the rooms and at 4pm we head out again on our bus to visit a family-owned lacquer workshop.  The locals produce and sell exquisite work that is very expensive.  However, we learn that it takes about one year to produce even a small piece of authentic lacquerware (with a teak or bamboo base), so the prices are not really exaggerated.  Most of the pieces tourists buy at stands and souvenir shops are made of plastic and do not have the intricacy or longevity of the real stuff. 

Our Local Guide, Aung, Describes the Process of Making Lacquerware

Lacquerware Showroom

On the way out of the lacquer shop we are accosted by hordes of local children hawking their own wares as souvenirs. It is dangerous to buy anything from one child, however, because the other children will descend upon you and follow you around all day.  A simple "no" to the first one is the best rule for a tourist.

We are now ready to transfer from the comfort of our bus to the bumpy ride in two-person horse carts. Each cart has a local driver who speaks enough English to point out the best photo shots and is willing to stop and go whenever we ask.  One passenger (me) sits next to the driver facing forward; the other passenger sits in the back facing backward.  The ride is very bumpy and the air is very dusty, but we do get to see a large number of abandoned temples and parts of the old city walls.  Even with all the bumps I do manage to get a few good pictures as well as some videos.  

 

The 40-minute ride ends at the North Gu Ni Temple, one of the few that is still considered safe to climb.  Our guide indicates that this is the best place to watch the sun set over the temples of Old Bagan, and indeed it is an awesome sight.  We climb only to the middle level of the temple (although other and younger tourists climb all the way to the top), in bare feet over rough brick and loose stones.  The climb down in the dark is probably scarier than the way up, but the guides have brought flashlights for the part of the stairways that are inside the temple and very dark.

Entering the North Gu Ni Temple

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Views from the North Gu Ni Temple

Sunset from North Gu Ni Temple

Climbing the Interior Stairs

In the last lingering light of day we head back to the Bagan Lodge for a poolside dinner (pretty much the same food we had at lunch), a can of beer and a good night's sleep.  Our guide has set a wake-up call for breakfast at 5:45am and our flight back to Yangon leaves at 7:00. Fortunately the airport here is only 20 minutes from the hotel.