Yangon Part Two - Tourist Or Walking Oddity?
Yangon, Myanmar
The next day Toe collected me at Motherland 20 minutes late (admirably punctual by Myanmar standards) and we headed out in search of cultural excitement. We started at a market/bazaar that was only a short walk from Motherland that Toe assured me tourists never visited and judging by the neck-breaking double-takes people were giving me the whole time, I believed him. I was particularly popular with the robust fish ladies who were skinning and shredding fish, while enjoying unladylike sized betel chews. Toe paused our tour and allowed me to work the room, flirt and take pictures. Again, my marital status was questioned and the answer was met with universal, undisguised horror. As we left, the women, suggested that when I was finished with my travels that I might like to return to Myanmar to find a wife. I told them with a wink that I was seriously considering it.
A man trying to attain reclining Buddha enlightenment (SHAMELESS TOE ADVERT: If you’re heading to Yangon and would like to contact Toe for guiding services, you can reach him at: batin at mptmail dot net dot mm or alternately, if you wander around Sule Paya and the Independence Monument long enough, looking like an aimless tourist, he will probably find you (and so will a thousand less qualified poseurs). He’s endlessly knowledgeable, infallibly kind and a priceless resource on everything Myanmar. Please bear in mind that the going rate to send or receive an email in Myanmar is US$1 a shot, which is a fortune for the locals. If you’re going to contact him, please be as complete as possible, including all details such as dates that you will require his services, your accommodations arrangements, so he can find you, and anything special that you’d like to see all in the one email to save on his email expenses.)
I stopped at Soe-Win-Naing’s tea stand on the way home as promised. He had been busy thinking of stuff to show me all day and even though it was after 9:00 p.m. and I was exhausted, I let him lead me around the neighborhood for a while, admiring the monastery where he lived (though he was never a monk apprentice, so I didn’t understand the living arrangements) and the stupa where he went to worship. The stupa had the now familiar contemporary Buddha enhancement, a halo of colored lights radiating out from his head. These jazzed up Buddhas were all over Shwedagon and Toe told me that people refer to this type of display as “Disco Buddha.” When I made this crack to Soe-Win-Naing, he was not pleased and earnestly explained that these lights served to represent how Buddha’s powers literally exuded from his head, kind of like how Christians exhibited images of Jesus. I wanted to tell him that though I was far from a regular church-goer, I had never seen a “Disco Jesus” anywhere and that furthermore, in my humble opinion, the unnatural lights only served to cheapen the image of Buddha, making his image unnecessarily showy and that if a devout Buddhist were ferried through time from 500, 100, or even 50 years ago, he’d probably go into horrified conniptions at the sight of Disco Buddha. I managed to restrain myself from this lecture and instead yawned dramatically and, begging forgiveness, took my leave and headed for bed.
