Myanmar has been our last stop on our tour of Southeast Asia and it has almost come to an end! We spent a few days in Mandalay, trying to avoid being scorched in the 42•C heat and cycling around the city. We have found the locals in Myanmar to be the friendliest weve come across yet. They are so excited to have foreigners in their country and constantly stop us in the street to talk to us about anything and everything. Our second stop (after another bus journey of potential death for 8hours) was the beautiful and charming Inle Lake. We arrived at 4am and asked a local tuk tuk driver to take us to one hotel we had in mind. After ten minutes, he took us to a different hotel he had chosen. Standard. So after him smiling guiltily at us for a few moments, we insisted he took us to the hotel we actually requested, which he did. The hotel was full. So we tried another, and another, and another. All full. So we asked him to take us back to the hotel he first took us to! I think Im gonna miss our regular tuk tuk adventures... We hired some bicycles the following day and went to a local familys house for a massage. We pulled up at the end of the path and the ladies literally SPRINTED to us full of excitement that we had arrived! She immediately boiled us some tea and fried us plate after plate of different rice snacks. I thought I may actually explode when she massaged over my stomach. As soon as the massage (1hr/£2) was over, she boiled more and more tea and brought over at least 5 more plates of snacks. So so friendly! We were trying to be polite and keep drinking/eating but there was no end to the supplies, so eventually we politely admitted defeat. After all the tea, I then had to use their toilet. Not a toilet. Obviously. A hole in the floor, reached by first squelching through a ditch (probably the previous peoples toilet leftovers). My freshly massaged feet were no more haha. When I arrived at the toilet shack, it was basically four small planks of wood in the shape of a rectangle to stand on and four 50cm high wooden walls floating in the bog Id just waded through. I tried to balance, shield myself from the watching children, not touch anything and keep my trousers off of the floor. I peed all over my feet trying to achieve this, but was past caring and thought that hopefully, my pee actually washed off the other peoples wee Id just walked through. Rather mine than someone elses I suppose... We cant wait to have clean feet and not treat in potential poo puddles constantly. Yesterday Sean was so elated when he got in the shower at the end of the day to finally wash his big toe, which had been covered in suspicious sloppy brown stuff since morning. Bog aside, Inle was charming! We took a boat ride around the lake one day, visiting local markets, seeing silk scarves and other items being made, seeing floating vegetable patches the locals use and seeing the famous long-necked women. We also watched local fisherman paddle their boats with their feet, which is really very clever! A beautiful place and a nice way to wind down from our travels. Our next, and final, stop was Yangon. We have found positives and negatives to coming to Myanmar so soon after they decided to allow tourists in. On the positive side, we have seen the country exactly as it is. Nothing is geared up for tourists and in fact, there arent many tourists at all. Which is good! On the other hand, there isnt much for us tourists to do except the obligatory visit to Shwedagon Pagoda. We have spent most of our time in Yangon eating. Nothing to complain about :-) We ate some local curries, which were nice, but I can definitely say that I am all riced and noodled out after these three months. We sat and wrote a food wish list for meals when we are home. Its long and very British! Roast dinner, jacket potatoes, pie and mash....the list is endless! Even though we get home at midnight Monday, our lovely Mamma Valoo is preparing some jackets with strong cheddar cheese and Heinz baked beans especially for our arrival. We are VERY excited! To round off our trip, we are heading to the Shangri-la hotel for a huge buffet dinner and cocktails this evening. We have had such an amazing 3 months and feel very lucky to have had all the adventures weve had. It seems like a lifetime since we came away and have packed so much in! We will have stories to last us forever xxx
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 13:03:32 +0000
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