Yangon

I arrived on Friday in Myanmar, formerly Burma, where I am in Yangon, formerly Rangoon.  Yangon is also formerly the capital of Burma but Naypyidaw is now the capital.  I couldn't figure out why the flight here from Bangkok is less than an hour but it is two hours going back.  Ya gotta think outside the box.  The answer is ... Myanmar is in a different time zone - one that is a half hour behind Thailand - and off by half an hour from the rest of the time zones in the world.

There are some other odd things in Myanmar.  For example, they drive on the right side of the road, but most of the cars, trucks, and buses have their steering wheels on the right side.  Apparently they used to drive on the left but the generals changed that around twenty years ago, which leads to two interesting thoughts.  First, in twenty years couldn't they have found some left side drive cars and buses?  Second, I wonder how the change went on implementation day?  Because it is hard to drive on the right from the right side, our tour bus has an assistant who sits in the front left and helps the driver.

When I was walking around yesterday, I saw a bicycle with a sidecar.  The bike was the kind I had as a kid - thin tires and three gears.  We called it an English racer.  The sidecar looked homemade, with two wheels in back.  A man was pedaling and a woman was sitting in the sidecar with a sun umbrella.  That's love, I thought.  Then I saw a few more of these bikes.  Finally today when I was walking around, I realized that they are Burmese taxis.  Instead of a rickshaw with the driver in front or back, one person can sit next to the driver.

While walking around I stopped in a park for a little while to rest.  I saw a woman in a yellow wedding dress and thought it was a bride and groom taking photos as I had seen in Vietnam.  But everyone in the park got up to watch and were taking pictures as well.  I think it was a commercial photo shoot.  Check out her shoes. One other thing that has surprised me is how many Moslems I have seen in Yangon.

Burma is known as the country of pagodas, but unlike most of the ones I have seen in other countries, the pagodas here are both richly made and historically significant.  Last night on my own and tonight with my tour group I went to the incredible Shwedegon Pagoda, the highlight of Yangon.  The main tower, which is over 300 feet tall, is gold plated and adorned with diamonds and jewels.  There are dozens of smaller temples and stupas around the main tower; apparently you can never have too many Buddhas.  Ornate does not begin to describe Shwedegon.  The most impressive thing is ... this temple is over 2600 years old.  Deep inside the main tower are eight hairs of Gautama (Siddhartha) Buddha.  That beats the pieces of the true cross in St. Peters by about 900 years.



This morning I went for a walk through the markets to the Musmeah Yeshua synagogue.  I arrived at 9:20 to find that it was not yet open!  First time I ever made it to Shabbat services early.  Then I saw a sign on the door:  open 9:30 to 5:00 every day except Sunday.  Huh?  I waited and finally around 9:45, Moses Samuels, the caretaker, appeared.  The Sephardic synagogue was founded by Iraqi Jews and once had a thriving congregation when the British were here.  When the British left, so did most of the Jews.  There are only six families left, and Moses is not a young man.  I went upstairs to the women's balcony where I spent my entire childhood.  The streets around the synagogue are full of shops and most of those on the same street are paint and hardware stores.  There is a mosque on the same block.

Notice the paint cans in front of the store to the right

The view from the balcony

My days of going at my own easy pace are over, at least for this week.  I met up with my tour group this afternoon and we visited a few sights in Yangon.  Tomorrow we leave the hotel at 4:30 AM to catch a 5:45 flight to Bagan.  I sure hope there is a lot of bus time to catch up on my sleep.