Myanmar - Part VI
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Wow. It's hard to find a good intro to Bagan. Basically, it's the ruins and remains of an ancient culture that flourished from c 900-1300 CE, or roughly 700 to 1000 years ago. The ruins are spread out over a huge area, perhaps nearing 100 square kilometers, located on a large bend of the Irrawaddy River. Many of the buildings and structures have been stabilized or re-constructed, and the immensity of the site rivals others in SE Asia, creating a fantastic tourist complex known the world over. We were lucky enough to spend 4 days here, giving us ample time to see the area and the amazing things contained within.
The story of Bagan starts back in the 10th century A.D., with the establishment of a kingdom centered around the Irrawaddy River in central Myanmar. Over the course of the next 500 years, power grew and waned, alliances were formed and wars were fought, and the fortunes of glory, power, and prestige filtered amongst the sparse forests and brick temples. Different temples were built at different times, and while the kingdom had numerous rulers throughout it's history, the three biggest icons in the long and fabled history of Bagan are the father-son sequence of Kings Anarawtha and Kyanzittha, (and briefly another son named Sawlu), and then the grandson of the Kyanzittha, Alaungsithu. While other kings ruled the area at various times before and after, it was during the reign of these four that Bagan saw most of it's glory. Due to the traders from India, and more importantly Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), Theravada Buddhism was the dominant religious sytem here, and the strong Hindu influence as a result is clearly evident, both in the architecture and the local cultural history.
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The kingdom saw it's fortunes fall for good in the later part of the 13th century, and by the beginning of the 14th century, the Mongols had finished off the remains of the kingdom, although it had been rotting and falling away in relevance for some time before that anyway. Later, Bagan would become a ghost town, and during a later episode of political upheaval in the capital city of Ava, near present-day Mandalay, the loyalist forces were instructed by the fleeing king to "meet in the ruins of Bagan". During the times of British Colonialism, there was a big (and totally colonial British) push to rebuild and restore a bunch of the temples. Many of them survived World War II largely undamaged, and It was in the later part of the twentieth century that it became known as a stop worthy of foreign tourists, and as far as I am concerned it is on par with Angkor Wat in Cambodia.
One thing that impressed me right off to the power of those 12th century kingdoms was the fact that they had conquered various parts of the Shan Plateau hill tribes. It took us roughly 8 hours of consistent driving in a bus at an average of 50 km/h to get between the two areas, and it was a huge chunk of terrain, to say the least. Lots and lots of kilometers across a huge swath of land, most of it through either arid scrub or wild jungle mountains. To think that the 12th century warriors and their war elephants crossed that varied terrain, and went up into the jungle-filled mountains, and conquered the remote hills of the Shan people is pretty crazy to say the least, and shows how badass they were.
We rolled in about 3 pm and after the "fun times" getting into Bagan, we were eager to get to our hotel room and relax for a little while. When we got to the hotel, they had us put up in a room with two beds, but after we spoke up, we waited 10 quick minutes and got into a nice, beautiful room with one big bed. The room was quite nice, so we hung out for a little while, and relaxed in the air con. After a while we wandered outside and headed a couple of blocks over and started looking at some small sites. That's the beauty of Bagan; there are literally shrines and temples everywhere. Right off the bat, less than 100 yards from the hotel, and we were checking out some restored structures.
After strolling around and seeing a half dozen good sites within a two square mile radius, we headed down to the river's edge to see an older stupa and try and catch a sunset over the river.
A quick note on the river here. The Irrawaddy River isn't just some river in Myanmar. It is THE river in Myanmar. The river's intricate and complex drainage basin covers a massive part of the country's area, and the river has been culturally center to the people of Myanmar for thousands of years. It is one of the great rivers of Southeast Asia, in the likes of Mekong, the Salween, the Chao Phraya, and the Red. The river provides life, fortune, and despair to millions of people along it's course, and Myanmar's key export, rice, is hugely dependent on the Irrawaddy River (especially it's massive delta) for cultivation area and yearly floods. It's been the lifeblood of the country for as long as humans have been around. So, part of seeing Bagan is not just seeing the temples, but also getting to see the Irrawaddy River up close and personal. As a geography nerd I have a kinship with major geophysical features (such as rivers, mountains, and the like) so it was really neat for me to get to see this fantastic river. |
The river is immense in scale. The biggest river I have ever seen in Colorado is the Colorado River in Grand Junction in a 20 year flood. No slouch of a river, probably in the neighborhood of 30,000 cubic feet per second. But, the Irrawaddy, even in bare bones low flow, flows with no less than 500,000 cfs. It can exceed 2 million in a flood. We were splashing in a channel that was easily a mile or more wide, and it was the smaller or two primary channels in the river. About a week later, after a week of solid rain over the headwaters of most of the Irrawaddy's tributaries, the river near Mandalay had been increased dramatically, and the river there was a few miles across. Truly an immense body of water.
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That night we had a great meal at the Green Elephant Restaurant. We got the full five course local meal, and we were both very satisfied with all of it. Soups, appetizers, and main courses were all tasty. That night we hit the bed early and slept late the next day. It was a pretty awesome hotel room and it was a pretty luxurious sleep. The next day we rented two electric bikes and set out to go explore some of the smaller temples scattered around the area. Part of what makes Bagan so special is the access you have to so many sites. The larger temples and buildings usually have tourists milling around, as well as lots of hawkers selling trinkets, paintings, and t-shirts, but there are hundreds of smaller shrines and temples around that are deserted, and with the sparse vegetation, there are lots of trails wandering around going to many of them. Since they don't let foreigners rent full size, gas-powered motos, our only option was the cute little electro-scooters.
Dhamma-ya-zika
Our first real stop of the day (other than the one above) was a large pagoda with a stupa called Dhamma-ya-zika that dated to 1196 CE. This was an interesting structure in it's construction and layout. Most Bagan temples are either square, or rectangular in nature, or with parallel, congruent walls. Dhamma-ya-zika is a large multi-tiered stupa surrounded by five smaller shrines in a star shape around the stupa. It was neat to stroll all the way around it, except when were almost back to the entrance, I had the fortune of stepping on a tack that was lying face up on the stones. Not sure if it was left accidentally or on purpose, but as they don't allow shoes on the stupa grounds, I took it into the flesh of my heel. It hurt and I threw a little fit but it stopped bleeding soon enough and things were ok once again.
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Once we left, we turned onto a dirt road and rambled our way out a kilometer or so to a small temple not too far distant that had roof access, named Ku-tha. We scooted up a tiny, narrow staircase and found ourselves on the roof. Just getting that far up above the scraggly vegetation was enough to produce some amazing panoramic views of the sprawling site that is Bagan. I took entirely way too many photos here, but some of them came out halfway decent. I tried to take some more panoramic photos, to try and capture the immensity of the Bagan plain.
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Site 851
From the top, we looked across the road and spied a nice little complex in the trees about 50 meters off the road. It looked really interesting and I wanted to go see it. So, back down the tiny staircase we went, and across the road. We went bashing through the scrub and hiked across a field and found a nice, tidy little complex that had a series of small shrines and pagodas and was fairly well re-constructed. I really don't know what I really liked so much about this little group but it just seemed really neat. There wasn't anybody around so we spent some time enjoying the scenery and quiet.
Dahmma-yan-Gyi
Next up was the most massive of any of the Bagan temples. This hulking pyramid, bearing a shape very reminiscent of Egyptian or Mayan structures, is an oddball of the primary large Bagan temples. It's been called "brooding" before, by Arthur Cotterell in his book, History of Southeast Asia, and after seeing it from afar and up close I must say it does live up to it's reputation. It was erected in 1170 CE by King Narathu, who was told by a nat, or local spirit, that in order to make amends for accidentally murdering his father (the previously mentioned Alaungsithu) he should continuously build temples, shrines, monasteries, and other similar structures to provide good karma. So, the temple has always had an association with death, and a dark, almost negative energy surrounding it.
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These days, there are hundreds of pigeons and doves that have set up inside, and the inner hallways reek of bird droppings, further adding to the dark feeling of this temple.
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After Dahmma-yan-Gyi, we hit up a quick succession of large temples, not going inside many but instead just taking quick outside glances. Many of the structures in Bagan are very similar architecturally, and with almost all of the artifacts that used to fill these temples now on display [and protected] in the Bagan Archaeological Museum, they all tend to be rather sparse inside, and usually have one or two buddhas inside and not much else. So, they do tend to all blur together after awhile.
That Byin Nyu
Maha Bodhi
This interesting temple, built in 1215 CE, is different from the other area temples because it bears some striking Hindu influence. The many-tiered tower, with it's hundreds of small figures, represents Mount Meru, the center of the universe and home of the gods, and is very commonly seen in shrines and temples across India, Sri Lanka, and other countries with large Hindu populations. Here, it is a bit of an anomaly compared to the other temples around.
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Gawdaw Palin
Built in 1175 CE.
Paw Daw Mu
After lunch, and the museum, Kelsey was getting a bit tired, so we headed back to the room. I wasn't quite ready to pass out yet, so while Kelsey napped I went out and cruised up the road half a kilometer to a small site made up of a handful of shrines, some barrel-shaped stupas, and a couple of temples. It's amazing how interesting even these little complexes are.
That night we ended up at a restaurant called "The Food Corner" that ended up being pretty tasty. I got a beef curry that may have been my favorite dish of our time in Bagan. We played the game of "where are they from" with the other customers in the room. Always a good hoot for us. We went to bed early and enjoyed another long, nice sleep in our fancy hotel.
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Waking up super early the next morning, we headed back out to the Ku-tha complex to try and catch a sunrise over the temples. Watching the sun come up over the Bagan plain is supposed to be one of the highlights of visiting the area. Unfortunately, there was a fair amount of clouds hanging out, so the sunrise wasn't as incredible as it could have been. Still, it was really quiet and peaceful, and seeing the temples in the dark, all light up under the floodlights, was still worth hanging out. The sunrise was still beautiful, and the weather was plenty nice. We got to see some of the locals headed to work, taking their carts through the fields. Interestingly enough, the only major temple that wasn't lit up with floodlights was the "dark" temple of Dahmma-yan-gyi.
Ananda
After a nap at the hotel, we were back out and exploring some more. That day we cruised back to "Old Bagan" and saw some more temples. The first stop was Ananda, originally started in 1091 CE, and it has the biggest grounds of any temple in Bagan. Much of the original white plaster that used to cover all of Bagan's temples has remained, or has been restored, and the central tower has been restored to it's former glory. Ananda has also retained a good number of it's artifacts, and boasts 4 massive golden-plated Buddhas, one in each side of the central block. On the inside, in the hallway between the outer wall and the inner sanctuary, there are hundreds of Buddhas, large and small, located in niches way high up on the walls. It is remarkable architecture for an 11th century building, with some nice bas relief and figures etched into the exterior walls.
Shwezigon Pagoda
After a quick lunch in Nyaung-U at the "Food Library" restaurant, which was really good but hilariously small portions, we went to Shwezigon pagoda, which is probably the most famous of all the Bagan worship sites. Built right around 1100 CE, it's a massive pagoda and still a major site for pilgrims looking to worship. The grounds have a large covered walkway leading up to them, much like the Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon. It is a sight to behold, and impressive to say the least. The major difference between it and Shwedagon is the use of red mixed in with gold in a 2-tone pattern.
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Our last stop for the day was Bu Phaya, a small stupa originally built in the 11th century (and then rebuilt after an earthquake in 1975) that is located on the apex of the bend of the Irrawaddy around Bagan. It wasn't much, just a wee little guy. One neat thing about it was that it was one of the few sites that actually directly overlooks the river, much the Lokaw Nanda pagoda we had visited a couple days previous.
It was here that we saw a good example of a culturally inappropriate tourist. In the sites around Bagan, it's strongly recommended that women cover their shoulders and wear pants past their knees, and nobody should wear shoes on pagoda grounds. I know it is unfair when men can wear what they want, but it's just good practice as a visitor to another country to follow their customs. So we were a bit disappointed when we saw a girl strolling around with a "shirt" on that was really nothing more than a scrap of fabric on the front. She was basically in her bikini top, and extremely short shorts, not to mention full of tattoos, which by themselves are a source of intrigue. There was little regard for the local custom, and her accent sounded pretty American. Bums me out, making the rest of us look bad!
It was here that we saw a good example of a culturally inappropriate tourist. In the sites around Bagan, it's strongly recommended that women cover their shoulders and wear pants past their knees, and nobody should wear shoes on pagoda grounds. I know it is unfair when men can wear what they want, but it's just good practice as a visitor to another country to follow their customs. So we were a bit disappointed when we saw a girl strolling around with a "shirt" on that was really nothing more than a scrap of fabric on the front. She was basically in her bikini top, and extremely short shorts, not to mention full of tattoos, which by themselves are a source of intrigue. There was little regard for the local custom, and her accent sounded pretty American. Bums me out, making the rest of us look bad!
By that night I had run the camera battery dry so when we went out for the evening we unfortunately were without a way to take photos. It's a bummer, because that afternoon we watched the sun go down over the Irrawaddy, and the colors were amazing. I should actually say, we watched the sunset FROM the Irrawaddy, as we were standing up to our knees in the water. That night we had dinner at the Black Rose, and it was pretty good. Most of the food we had in and around Bagan was pretty tasty. This place had a really good soup that I enjoyed. Later on we went to a pagoda called Sitana Gyi Htapa, which was exciting for two reasons. The first was a row of elephant head sculptures along the base of the temple, which was different from anything else we saw. Second, this one hasn't been unexcavated all the way, so we were able to climb through a tiny hole in the side of the temple, and wriggle into the debris-filled tunnels of the interior. It smelled dank and musty and old, and it was real neat. Not a typical way to visit an ancient temple.
The next day we leisurely awoke, and eventually caught our bus, and headed off to Mandalay. All in all, we had a great time in Bagan, and it is one place I would not hesitate to visit again. I would also not hesitate to recommend it to anyone who is thinking of visiting. Don't miss out on this amazing treasure. It's well worth the trouble to get there.
On to Part VII - Mandalay...
All photos copyright Kit Davidson unless otherwise cited.