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Leaning over to check how fast we're going - 150 km/h - I notice for the first time that the taxi driver has fallen asleep at the wheel. Behind us, the road stretches out straight and long, and I wander how long it's been since he nodded off. We nudge him gently, with a cautious hand hovering over the steering wheel in case he wakes with a start. Instead, he wakes slowly, almost lazily, and then grins sheepishly as he winds the windows down and turns the radio up. This proves insufficient stimulation, so he speeds up even more - 175 km/h. "To keep awake", he replies to our raised eyebrows, as if it's perfectly reasonable and should have been obvious. A surprisingly-cold wind shrieks through the cab in close-fought competition with the latest Thai pop sensation, as we hurtle through Bangkok's pre-dawn darkness toward the airport. Assuming I survive the taxi ride, I will soon be in the air, heading toward a South-East Asian country I have always been fascinated by - Burma/Myanmar...

Burma One: On the road to Mandalay...

Michael Meadows
2007-01-23 12:03:47

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The oldest of the brothers has spent 7 years in prison for telling a joke about the regime, and they are now prohibited from performing in public. Instead, they hold nightly shows, (some stand-up comedy, some music & dancing), in their own home and have become a firm fixture on Mandalay's tourism itinerary.

Riding back to our hostel on the morning of our last day in Mandalay, totally lost in my thoughts as the tri-shaw bumped along the pot-holed road, I suddenly came back to myself, realising afresh just where I was and what I'd been doing... I love experiencing those moments in travel! Blinking, as one awakening from a trivial dream, you're suddenly able to take a step back from those mundane, day-to-day considerations that occupy so much time on the road, (where to stay, where to travel to next, how you'll get there, how much money you have'puppet-master' mimick the movements of the other pair.

left, and so on and on...) and appreciate anew just how far out of your normal environment & routine you are! We'd just visited a Buddhist monastical school, at the invitation of two novice monks we'd met the day before on Mandalay Hill. They showed us around and then introduced us to the abbot, (a kindly old man with more than a passing resemblance to the Dalai Lama), who invited us into his office to share his small breakfast. As we returned home, in companionable silence, the sun was just rising, illuminating the mist that still shrouded the quiet streets & temples. At this early hour, no cars yet rattled along the roads, and the mist obscured all but the outlines of the buildings that surrounded us. Somehow, it even seemed to have swept the rubbish temporarily out of sight. It could have been a hundred years in the past. Gradually, as if sinking into a dream of shifting wraiths moving through shadowed smoke, we began to make out the vague shapes of monks in the mist, (solemnly treading the streets to collect food in their shiny black alms bowls). As our tri-shaws trundled on, the sun rose further, pulling the curtain of mist gently away with it, warming the streets and edging the red robes of the monks in gold. It was a scene of surpassing beauty & serenity; an otherworldly image I can't fully describe but will never forget.

Whenever I think of Burma now, I see in my mind's eye a long line of young monks, their red robes set alight by the first touch of dawn, moving serenely along a mist-cloaked dirt road. The elegant trees of Mandalay line their way, swaying sympathetically in the breeze, and even seeming to bow a little lower as the monks pass slowly by.

Immortal wisdom from the SPDC's "Book of Quotable Quotes"

Interesting: "Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff it is made of."

Just a little strange: "Love is a grave mental disease."

Bizarre: "You may be poor, but don't get your fangs broken."