myanmar

I am finding it difficult starting this blog entry because so many things have happened.
I had been telling everyone about my parents, Edward and Christian coming out to see me and was very excited. I really enjoyed seeing them all, spending time with them and I am so appreciative they came to see me but it wasn't as stress free and easy as I had hoped. There was a clash of interests and some illness due to exhaustion and bad food. It isn't necessary to go into detail so I'll stick with the good stuff, which there was also plenty of.
Edward and I started our adventure in Yangon. We arrived at our couchsurfers flat and were very warmly welcomed. Jonathan gave us some great tips about what to do in yangon. We had a lie in and met jonathan in the afternoon. He took us around town and showed us some good places to go with mum and dad.
Christian arrived that day and i went to collect him from the airport. Annoyingly the airline lost his bag so we had to get some new clothes from the market.
We went to meet mum and dad from the hotel and took them to china town for some food.
Sadly mum spent the next few days in bed because she was exhausted after the end of term and the flight so the boys and I checked out the market and a very big pagoda.
We all piled onto a night bus to bagan and arrived early on the 25th. We all wore Christmas hats at breakfast and impressed the Burmese staff. We hired ebikes for the days we were in bagan and enjoyed zooming around exploring the temples. Dad, ed and I went on a wonderful boat trip across the river and took a tuk tuk up a bumpy track to the top of a hill. The view was amazing.
Edward got struck with a stomach bug flu thing so spent a few days in bed. This meant christian went ahead to mandalay and Edward and I met him there once we had said bye to mum and dad and edward felt better.
For my birthday we had a small explore of the city and christian and I went out for a lovely western dinner and cocktails. Was such a good change from noodles!
The next day we visited mingun and amarapura, two small places outside of the city and we had a tuk tuk driver for the day called steel fighter. We were even invited to a monk's funeral and saw him in a huam size fridge. The locals were very keen to try and tell us about the ceremony. We also walked along the world's longest teak bridge and witnessed a burmese seven aside football competition.
New years eve was spent in a noodle restaurant with the owner and his colleagues drinking beer and whiskey and playing the guitar. He was very friendly and we had a good pre-party before we joined the massive street party that was going on. We had a lot of fun celebrating with the Burmese!
The next day Christian went off to the beach and edward and I are spending the last few days of our holiday exploring the beautiful surroundings of mandalay before edward heads back to Mogadishu and I am travelling further to chiang mai.
Travelling in Myanmar has been fantastic because it had been so different to vietnam, laos and cambodia. There is such a wonderful mix of cultures with chinese, indian and thai influences. The people are the friendliest I have ever met and I always felt welcome. I have definitely eaten the best burmese food in mandalay and have enjoyed learning about this amazing country.
Two interesting cultural things is that men were a sarong type skirt which edward is wearing in the first picture and the women paint sandle wood on their faces to use as sun protection.

Jonathon, ed and I in yangon

In dala across the river from yangon

Bagan and it, s stupa-filled landscape

Mandalay