Browsing articles from "April, 2013"

Video: Learning in Hsipaw, Myanmar

Apr 8, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma, Videos  //  Comments Off on Video: Learning in Hsipaw, Myanmar

 

More, inside the school

 

Video Myanmar Monks say Grace

Apr 8, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma, Videos  //  1 Comment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imIE6oRBC7k

 

Wat Phra Kaew, Bangkok

Apr 8, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, February, Thailand  //  Comments Off on Wat Phra Kaew, Bangkok

If you’ve been to Bangkok, you’ve see Wat Phra Kaew. What follows are a few unusual sites:

The monk on the right asks to be photographed with us. Sure we say. His escort then pulls out an i-pad for the photo.It’s not that an apple is a new requirement for frugal living. Many monks are supported by patrons and family.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The man on the stairs is repairing intricate mosaics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Luang Prabang, Laos

Apr 8, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, Laos  //  Comments Off on Luang Prabang, Laos

 

more photos below

Please scroll down

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Laos style mascara

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LP International Airport. Fourteen flights total today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A side building of the old palace

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Colonial Architecture of Luang Prabang. This is the three Nagas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Soup again. I like this system.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Avia going through a movement routine we developed

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Luang Prabang International Airport. I love these small airports. The baggage handlers literally walk the bags alongside you to the terminal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yangon

Apr 8, 2013   //   by Eva   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma  //  Comments Off on Yangon

Yangon is a city of contrasts on the move. It has in one vision modern concrete and glass buildings and at street level typewriters ready to produce documents for the illiterate. Notaries sit roadside among fortunetellers and bird sellers. A mix of ethnicities is everywhere. Old buses, their instruments out of order drive alongside modern air-conditioned tourist buses. Negotiation is a way of life. Honesty and Buddhist symbols are prevalent. The Shwedagon Pagoda, a place of pilgrimage, towers over the city. We visited it twice. Amazingly, no soldiers or policemen are evident. We saw no guns. People tell us that the secret police are all around. We couldn’t tell. (In Russia of old it was much more obvious. A shaven haired stern looking man in an overcoat would stare at you.) Perhaps in Yangon we were watched. We think not. This is a place on the move.

Click on any photo to enlarge it.

To prevent people from touching her, Avia visits the market in disguise. At this market, stalls were the street but the fish was so fresh it was moving.

Contemporary fashion. $2 per shirt. Get shopping!

In the bus. No chickens but no space either. The floor is wooden.

In the bus. Check out those instruments.

Shwedagon’s Stupa is typical. Buddhist symbols are used. Begging bowl at the bottom, bell, rings, lotus flower, teardrop (pineapple or banana bud), umbrella, jewel

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Avia with a friend who was visiting from Thailand.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you were born on Tuesday then on Tuesdays you get the honor of cleaning the floor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More birthday cleaners

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Worshipers believe that the spirit of Buddha actually lives in the statue. This is the idol worship we learnt of in our youth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Little pagodas surround the main stupa.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At night the Pagoda takes on a new persona.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monastery

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A stroll around the Monastery. He’s practicing his English. We’re learning about life in a monastery.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nuns wear pink robes and shave their heads. Novice nuns and monks enter the Monastery between the ages of 7 and 18 to learn Buddhism. It’s part of everybody’s life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s a 65 meter reclining Buddha. On his feet are carved symbols of his life and the story of his birth. Theravada’s Buddha is thin and sometimes feminine. The fat Buddha is in fact not a representation of Siddhartha Buddha but of a Chinese monk who claimed upon death to be a Buddha.

Reclining Buddha’s face

 

The legend says that when Siddharta was born, he was born with many signs on his feet ( in the photo). His father called all the fortune tellers of the Kingdom to ask them for the meaning. All the fortune tellers said it means that he would one day become the Emperor of the universe or the Buddha. The youngest fortune teller said that one of the signs on his feet was the sign of the Emperor and therefore he must become the Buddha.

 

 

 

Pages:«12