I don't know why, but Mandalay conjured up a picture in my mind before coming here. It sounds like a town from a fantasy novel, but the reality is sadly devoid of magic and swords. It's still a nice enough town, just not an exciting one. It reminds me of Vientiane. I like the city, like the people, but there's just nothing to do here. I arrived at 930am, had breakfast, and then just chilled out until 1pm before even starting my day. Yet I still finished all the attractions before sunset.

I started by heading to Mahamuni Pagoda, a big market / temple, of course. They let everyone, even idiots like me, walk up and put gold leaf on their very ornate Buddha. Apparently its the 2nd holiest place for Buddhists, so I suppose it's kind of a big deal? They had a lot of cameras, and the TVs outside showing a live broadcast on the Buddha Network, or whatever channel that is. So look for me on Myanmar TV tonight. I'm the white guy being scolded for taking photos. After checking out the market, it was off to Mandalay Palace.

Mandalay Palace is a ripoff. It's 10000 kyat to get in, and that ticket is supposed to get you in every sight around the north part of the city. In reality, it's for Mandalay Palace only. It's a massive complex, and you are barred from seeing 90% of it since it's still an active military base. The place itself is a nice view from on top of the watch tower, but up close the buildings are unimpressive and empty. If anyone ever goes to Mandalay, only do the palace if you want to pay $10 for a photo similar to mine. So anyway, off to Kuthodaw Paya and Sandar Mu Ni Pagoda.

These 2 places contain "The World's Largest Book". Yessss! I love "World's Blankiest Blank!" It's not exactly what you think though, it's a large series of tablets in little shrines detailing Buddha's story, and Buddhist Canon. It is quite large, probably larger than a football field. So, world's largest book - check.

Afterwards I was feeling tired so I stopped at a roadside sugar cane juice place for a refresher, and an hour nap, apparently. Which, if I may say, I never liked sugar cane juice that much until Myanmar. It's soooo good here, and tastes like... well, sugarcane. And not sugary water. Feeling refreshed, the next stop was a hike up to Mandalay Hill for the sunset. On the way up a surprisingly tall hill, I met 2 monks. They come to the hill every day to practice English with foreigners. One had been studying for only 6 months, but spoke better than most of my Thai students. See kids - put in the effort. Anyway we walked to the top, and we had a nice chat about life as a monk. At the top we ran into his monk friends, including Hein, a super cool dude who loved to talk. Having just learned English himself he's going to start teaching it, which is just beyond awesome. I was really impressed by his attitude and humor, and he was even cool enough to bring me back to my hostel on his bike. A+ guy all around.

And back at the hostel, I sampled the other Myanmar beer brands. I was always unimpressed with Myanmar Beer, just tastes like a standard lager like Bud. Mandalay beer is a little more skunky, like Heineken. Last was Dagon Beer, and the best in my opinion. But really you are really not missing anything. I'll take every Thai beer sans Cheers over every Myanmar beer.

The next morning was off to Pyin U Lwin, a sleepy town up in the hills. Except nobody seemed how to get there, even my hostel and the internet. After walking to 3 different "bus stations" and seeing no means of transport, I hired a motorbike taxi to take me to one and tell them where I'm going. I got a songthael, which works for me, as it's only 60km away. It was an interesting drive, being crammed in with the locals and 5 barrels of milk. I guess if we got thirsty we'd be set. Or maybe I could convince them to make sour cream a thing in Asia.

Arriving at Pyin U Lwin, it was lunchtime so I stopped by a local spot for food. I ordered chicken curry. Apparently that means "all the food currently in Pyin U Lwin with a side of chicken curry". Like, the pic doesn't do it justice. After I finished the cauliflower, she replaced it with another bowl. Then she filled up my rice. I realized that this was a never ending battle I could not win, so I decided to give up about trying to insult her for leaving food on the table. After I went to Kandawgyi Garden, which sounds a lot like the word for KFC in Chinese. Anyway, KFC Garden is really the only attraction of note in town, but it was maybe the tidiest place in Myanmar. It's more like a National Park than a garden, it's a massive complex with miniature zoos, conservatories, museums, playgrounds, observation towers - you name it, they've got it. It also had some very noisy monkeys. Jeez monkeys. This is a quite place, stfu. Anyway I spent a few hours there, then went back into town.

I think Pyin U Lwin's romantic nature is a little oversold. There were horse drawn carriages here and there, but when a common form of transportation in Myanmar is ox cart, a horse doesn't really seem out of place. I think it's more of a honeymoon getaway, as it's quiet, has nice air, and a pleasant mid 20s temperature. Back to Mandalay, I shared the songthael with Linda, who recently finished a 2 day meditation at Pyin U Lwin. She was a talkative one, almost like she was making up for the 2 days of silence. Back in Mandalay, I had about 5000 kyat left. I had heard it's nearly impossible to exchange kyat back into a useful currency, so after dinner, it was off to the grocery store. With some clever math, I managed to pick up some snacks and alcohol to take back to Bangkok, leaving only 200 kyat left as a souvenir. Seeya, Myanmar! You're an odd place, and not what I expected. I don't know how you went from near North Korea levels of isolation to "whatever, let all the tourists come" in such a short amount of time. But unfortunately, I can already see your pristineness vanishing. I mean, you just got Coke last year. Sure Coke is great, but you held out this long - keep it going! Anyway, for anyone out there who's curious, you should visit Myanmar as soon as you can. Because the country that was Myanmar is disappearing, fast on its way to rejoin modern society and losing a bit of itself in the shuffle. It's all downhill from here.

Against all odds I arrived in Bagan, aka Indiana Jones Playground, to find myself in a desert. I didn't know SE Asia had a desert. Some people say the military salted the land so nothing could ever grow here, drive the people out, and destroy the monuments. Seems unlikely unless they were airdropping tons of salt daily, it's a massive place.

For the 5km into town the taxi drivers offered an astronomical 5000 kyat a head, and I found 2 others going to the same hostel. We called the hostel and they sent a cab for 8k total. While we were waiting, the guy said 4k a head, then started to get pissed and tell us our taxi will get lost, and continued to harass us even after it arrived. It's a shame, as so far it was the only ripoff experience I've had so far. Anyway, after a curry lunch and renting an E-bike it was off to see some of Bagan.

Bagan is weird. As you can see from the photo, it is impossible to see everything. It's like Ayutthaya or Sukhothai on steroids, with some 3000 temples, and hardly any tourists in sight. And with so many, 9/10 times I had the entire place to myself. Basically Bagan is like this - you wake up before dawn, rent an e-bike, drive out to one of the many temples, climb to the top, and catch the sunrise. Then it's a day of you driving around the desert, seeing something interesting, playing on it for a bit, and occasionally stopping by the side of the road to pick up water and snacks. There are 3 towns around Bagan in a triangle shape, with small villages of a couple dozen people dotted around as well. So, if you break down, you're never more than a short distance away from help. The first day I saw, climbed on, and explored more ruins than I ever have, including Angkor Wat. You can really go hours without seeing people if you want, so you straight up do feel like Indiana Jones. I was hoping I would find some golden idol I could replace with a bag of sand, but no such luck.

Looking for a change in pace, the next morning some of the hostel goers and I shared a taxi to Mt. Popa. A giant, vertical cliff that sticks out like a pillar from the landscape, someone decided to put a shrine on the top, because Asia. They said there were 777 steps to the top, but it actually didn't seem like that many. Along the way there were monkeys. Godamn monkeys. And cats, it's like a contest to cram the most asshole animals in one place. The top is just a standard shrine, not much else. It's about the journey, not the destination, right? Back to town, we ate at Weatherspoons, which per these Dutch guys in Yangon, was "the third best burger in Asia." I think it's because in Asia there's no burgers for comparison besides McDonald's, but yeah, still a pretty darn good burger. After hitting a few more temples on the way back, that was it for Bagan. I guess I didn't really have much to say about it, but it was still my favorite part of the trip. It's a physically exhausting place, the sun and heat really get to you after a while. I think I need a vacation from my vacation, because besides drinking enough water to fill a lake, and reducing the world's sunscreen supply by 10%, it's basically like Angkor Wat without the tourists. As Myanmar continues to open up, in 5 years this place will be full of tourists and unrecognizable. I was lucky to be able to see it when I did.