Browsing articles in "Myanmar-Burma"

Pyin Oo Lwin – in the market

Apr 8, 2013   //   by Eva   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma  //  Comments Off on Pyin Oo Lwin – in the market

                                                                                                          
                                                                                                             many kinds of rice

                                                                         fireman leaving on a mission (what a beautiful old fire truck)

so fresh



 Yannay needs Sandals-
unfortunatly these really cool     ones made  out of recycled tires are not comfortable for our city        feet.

 

 

 

 

I love to watch motorbikes in Asia as they are used to transport literally everything  – here with piles of shopping from the market

and here with piles of children (pick up from school – similar school uniform to ours) We have seen trees, huge piles of boxes, geese, pigs, covered with birds cages and bamboo house walls, being transported. ( They are just too fast to be photographed)

 

A few short side videos from Myanmar

Apr 8, 2013   //   by David   //   Myanmar-Burma, Videos  //  Comments Off on A few short side videos from Myanmar

Avia and the cow bell

Water powered merry-go-round

Team blacksmithing, Inle Lake

How to catch fish, one at a time. Traditional Inle Lake fishing.

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

 

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.

 

 

 

Road from Mandalay to Hsipaw, Myanmar

Mar 31, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma  //  2 Comments

Mandalay is a dusty town with impressive temples. Going east into Shan (Thai) country …

click on a picture to enlarge it

Side Street, Mandalay

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MANDALAY WORKSHOPS

Gold is pounded into thin leaf then sold to Buddhists to add to Buddah statues in local temples. It’s an act considered meritorious.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Workshops 1: Wood Carving

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Workshops 2: Saygin White Marble Sculpture

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not shown: puppet workshop, material mosaic workshop

TEMPLE LIFE, MANDALAY

Psychedelic Buddah

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Temple Golden Ceiling

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Initiation Ceremony. Boys aged 7 and up are initiated into Monastery life as Novice Monks. There they live like monks up at 4am, eating only until 12pm, learning to pray, meditate and repeat Buddhist mantra and suryas. The initiation ceremony is like a Bar Mitzvah. They dress up, visit the Temple, tell the head monk that they are ready and celebrate with family and friends.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Novice Monk Ceremony 2: note the Buddhist symbols like the umbrella.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ROAD FROM MANDALAY TO HSIPAW pronounced Ti-paw.

Road making by hand

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More road making by hand. Preparing the tar.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gardens at Pyin-OO-Lwin

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don’t think its called Veneration.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cheese sales on the road side

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Rice Pancake Factory

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HSIPAW an interesting outlying town on the way to China

Madahya Monastery at the entrance to Hsipaw

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More of the Madhaya Monestary

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hsipaw mandarin seller. Cart, straw, mat, mandarins

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hsipaw.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hsipaw. Still using the old wooden wheeled cart and bulls with the ring through their noses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hsipaw. Smart chess players even in the remotest place

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chess

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hsipaw’s local market

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hsipaw’s rice merchants. Each box a different rice type.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Inle Lake, Myanmar (one month ago)

Mar 31, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma  //  1 Comment

Photo essay.

 

Floating Island, Vegetable cultivation. Farmers use boats to tend to their crops which grow on floating islands made of Lake debris. Usually one wouldn’t stand on the island. It sinks.

Sinking onto the floating island

This home cost $100 to build

But the house needs wood for cooking fire bought from this market.
As in North America, people try not to burn their house down.

Making a Living 1: Rice Noodles drying

Making a Living 2: Rice Wine factory 40 and 80 proof. I think that these guys do well.

Making a Living 3: the silversmith. He’s copying the drawing onto the container.

Making a Living 4: Bringing the market to you.

Making a Living 5: Cloth made from Lotus stems. Sacred Cloth. Everyone should aspire to own one.

 

Avia apprentices in Lotus cloth making.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 6: Blacksmith “all together now” see video.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 7: Fashion photography

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 8: Hotel (Hospitality)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 9: Flower impregnated paper and parasols

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 10: Massage

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 11: Two robes, a towel and alms

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 12: Italian Restaurant

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 13: Tourism. Hat Model.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making a Living 13: Rice Paper Home Factory

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hospitality from Rice Paper Making Family. People are especially hospitable and friendly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There’s got to be a temple or a stupa somewhere

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Temple Mural.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

David sees Africa wherever we go

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back to the Airport. All our bags. And some of our journeyers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Myanmar’s Rosetta Stone

Mar 31, 2013   //   by David   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma  //  Comments Off on Myanmar’s Rosetta Stone

In Bagan, Myanmar there lives a stone. Captured in 1112 and now in jail for a thousand years, it tells of … it doesn’t matter… the point is that it has four sides each written in a different language: Mon, Pali, Old Burmese and Pyu. And as a result of this linguists were given insight into these ancient languages. This  Myazedi inscription can be seen near the Myazedi stupa, in it’s own cell.

People come from far and near to be photographed with foreigners next to the inscription.

Bagan, Myanmar – must see (one month ago)

Mar 30, 2013   //   by Eva   //   Blog, Myanmar-Burma  //  Comments Off on Bagan, Myanmar – must see (one month ago)

Bagan is one of the world’s gems.

Bagan is situated on a red earth, scrubby, plain. Over the course of 250 years (from 1044 to 1287), Bagan’s rulers and their wealthy residents showed it off by building over 10,000 religious monuments in an area of 104 square kilometres (40 sq mi).  (about 1000 stupas (towers containing Buddhist relics also called pagodas). Today, about 4,000 remain.

In twenty years Bagan will be a must visit place on any itinerary to Asia. Today it is a place of sand roads, run down hotels and home based restaurants.

It cost $3 to rent a bike for a day which coming after Vietnam’s $1 per day felt like a rip-off. Nevertheless, feeling strong-armed, we took the bikes out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Following are a few views from Shwe-san-daw Paya

Shwesandaw Paya

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Everyone wanted Daniela in their photo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Peaceful place

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

View from our hotel

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More views

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More views

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stopped by the cows

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On we went

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hti-lo-Min-lo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Heading for the village. Man against beast.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Villages have no running water and no sewage. This village has a well sponsored by the Japanese government which pumps water into a trough every day at 5pm. All the village children then carry water in very heavy buckets to their homes.