Last night I woke every couple of hours and piled in more of the rehydration from the hospital yesterday.
A gentle caring phonecall from Brian at 7am advised me we leave at 8am. I was just planning a slow lie-in to see if I was actually alive.
At breakfast we checked the various membership statuses of the Falling like Flies club, ejected Brian and decided to decline any further membership applications. There are only 3 outsiders out of 13.
Down the hill.
We stopped at about 11.00am near to Mandalay to see an amazing sight of 1200 Monks lining up for lunch.
I saw western people! So the daily line up is something of a tourist attraction. They poured out of all these buildings round the Monastery, lined up in two lines, and on and on they filed past us. A moving experience, one could say. Yup 1200 men, all in saffron except for the very small boys in white robes, to collect their rice (only) to eat before 12 noon and no more food until sunrise tomorrow, except for the small boys.
Very nearby is a lake with 'the longest wooden bridge in the word' it's apparetnly 1.2km, replete with beggars and insistent hawkers flogging jewellery and nick nacks. I went out about 200m and enjoyed the warm breeze in a shade stucture on the bridge, and watched the other walkers pass. Most of us went all the way. We gave jippo to 4 of our group who came back in a boat! Cheats! They paid an old man $1.50 each to row them back across the lake.
Then to a weaving factory where all the looms are wooden, the real old original stuff - I tell you Myanmar is a time warp country - and young girls sitting together with the spindles and bobbins - then to the obligatory show room across the road.
Lunch was declined by some club members.
We went to the upstairs room of a typical place, a variety of dishes. I passed on the fried sparrow and goat brain and such. My fried rice was the biggest meal I've eaten in about 3 days. Would have liked to try the array of small dishes of cold food, but taking it carefully. My lime juice was delicious.
So to the hotel here in Mandaley and I've stayed here this afternoon to get this monologue up to date (you still reading??) and to take it easy. I'm not the only one staying in.
Just went to change money - the hotel offered K700 per US dollar which I naturally declined, so she sent me next door where I got 820. Would have preferred 870 but not going to argue, it was only K1000 less for a USD 50 note than last time. That's NZ $1.50-ish. I then went round the block. Myanmar is alien on one's own. Can't tell what the shops are. I'm safe, I'm not jostled or hustled, but I'm an alien. Malaysia is way easier to get around. The shops are more open and I can tell what they are about, and can ask - here language is often a total mismatch despite the good intentions.
Don't know when I will write again.
Tomorrow we have breakfast with an Auntie from the wedding, and then fly back to Yangon, same hotel as before.
Then it is a 7am flight to Bangkok and the long journey home. the two nine hour. layovers could be a misery. Then again they could be just what I need.
Hopefully I will write again and Missy please comment if you've read this. Please tell Frank I am going to send him here to be a small monk in white robes. Just kidding, those boys are half his age.
love, M
