Bawditataung Pagoda Festival

Today is Full-Moon Day of Tapotwe (February) and everyone from villages and towns around Monywa have come to make donations at the 1,050 foot high Buddha image. Inside the image the monks chant, waiting for the procession to begin.

First came the dignitaries of the town wearing their special hats, carrying a portrait of the founder of the monastery: Nar Ya Day Ba Dan Ta. 

Over 400 monks and maybe more than 800 laymen walked one behind the other and the people put in whatever the monks needed e.g. instant noodles or, as I was entrusted, detergent. 

Everything had to be given to the laymen as monks are not allowed, among another 220 rules, to touch money. Invitations had been sent out to monks in various parts of the country: Yangon, the Shan States and Kayin State and Mawlamyaing which is the fourth biggest city after Napidaw, Yangon and Mandalay.

My caring carers wanted to get me out of the sun. We didn’t find a shady place, but a much better place in which we could listen to and watch an orchestra from Hsipaw in Northern Shan State beating on drums and gongs and making interesting gestures with their hands and feet. There were several boy monks in the procession. All Myanmar males must go through Shin Phu in a monastery to learn the Buddha’s teachings. These young monks would stay in the monastery for just about a month then go home having learned many of the rules.

Bawditataung Pagoda Festival, Monya

Bawditataung Pagoda Festival is celebrated over two days in Monya alongside the Chindwin River in Sagaing Division. Bawditataung means 1,000 Bodhi trees (different spelling). Sure enough, near the festival there were 1000 of the trees and beneath each was a stone statue of the Buddha seated beneath a stone umbrella.

Having climbed 1000 steps (or was it 5000?) we emerged from the pagoda into a panoramic view of a standing Buddha, a reclining Buddha and a Buddha protected from the elements by a Naga (or dragon) that reared over his head. The standing Buddha is 1050 feet high. His cloak had regular oblong marks all over it. These turned out to be windows climbing 33 floors. Some brave souls would climb them (inside the image) but I resisted the temptation. This whole area of monastery, pagoda and images was organised by a sayadaw (abbot) in 1995. The project was finished in 2007, sadly just one year after its benefactor died.

Round about Mandalay

Win Kyaing is no better and is back in his village. Khaing Gyi and I spent the day photographing for the Mandalay file.
Below is a monk paying respects to the Buddha at Kuthodaw Paya. It is not necessary to go to the pagoda to get married, but most make attractive settings for wedding photographs. The Kuthodaw is the most unusual library. Dozens of stupas house each page. A typical Myanmar meal. The palace wall, a guard house above the moat

Paukwe

It is butterbean time in Paukwe half an hour by motorbike from Mandalay. The harvest is in and lies in heaps on the ground outside most of the houses. The women (mainly, though there were two men) sat on the ground in the shade of trees husking (if that is the right term) the slim, green, partially curved beans which closely resemble snow peas. The women were only too pleased to stop work when we told them why we were here.

It is a couple of years since a taxi-driver friend of mine in Mandalay, Win San, told me his uncle’s life had improved greatly when he received a pair of my no-longer-used glasses. He told me there would be hundreds of elderly people in Myanmar whose lives could also improve if they could see to read – or just see around them. So this morning we set out to see if there were elderly people in Paukwe who needed glasses. Yes, there were and yes they did, but the butter bean huskers were not elderly: Daw Khin Tauk is 72, Daw San Ye is 77 and Daw Khin Htay is just a girl of 68.    

As is most of Myanmar, this is farmland. It contrasts with Mandalay the very-close big city with paved roads and shiny cars. Here there are dilapidated trucks wheezing (as opposed to whizzing) along and bullock carts. Villagers grow and sell maize, peanuts, sesame and several types of beans including soybeans and butterbeans. The women cut up a juicy watermelon for their visitors and we were delighted to quench our thirst after the clouds of dust the motorbike had thrown up.  

In the past when the villagers could not fit into their budget, they allowed the Chinese (of whom there are many in Mandalay) to rent some of their land. Sometimes the Chinese would sow, harvest and sell their produce, at other times they would pay the villagers to do this for them.

It is not always possible to get there by motorbike. The village is inundated each year, flooded by a tributary of the Ayeyarwaddy River. So from July to September many of the villagers will move their cows to higher ground and move themselves, by places where they can find employment. Some may go as far away as the Shan States and pick tealeaves. The village carpenters, who build canoes in the village, will leave to build new houses for people in Mandalay.

One by one the women tried on the glasses. Someone was sent off to find reading material and great were the smiles when one after another they found the glasses helpful. So a big thank you to all who gave the glasses to me: they now have new homes.

It was great to visit this village for another reason: Pu Pu, who was in our sewing project, lives here. She now designs wedding dresses by order and employs two other seamstresses. Our sewing project gave her a start in life and she has risen past all expectations.

Hopefully the glasses will give the recipients a second start in life so, if you are going to Myanmar or indeed any developing country, please take all your unwanted glasses with you to give away.

Mandalay and Hsipaw

We are in damage control. Win Kyaing is taking his damaged back back to his village at his father’s request. I volunteered other medical suggestions, but it seems rest is the most important thing.

We are now working on Plan B. Luckily my phone is on roaming so we can keep in touch.

Saya Tay and I called on Pyone Pyone to give Tet Tet, the new baby her first dress. The photos will show that mother and big sister Kyaw Tazin like it too. 

Kyaw Tazin at kindergarten. Below as a model! 

Hsipaw in Northern Shan State, where one of the festivals will be held, has a romantic story attached to it – albeit with a sad ending. Cont. myandering.blogspot.com. Two young people studying in America in the 1950s fell in love and got married. The bridegroom was Shan and he took his bride, Inge Sargent, an Austrian-American, back to his home in Myanmar. Their ship docked in Yangon and surveying the cheering crowds on the quay, Inge remarked to her husband that there must be some very important people on board because there were hundreds of people waiting to greet them.  He then revealed that he was a sao pha: a Shan prince!   He took his bride to live in his haw sao pha or palace in Hsipaw.

The couple had two daughters and did much to improve the lot of their people. The prince was philanthropic and progressive and gave land away to the people who worked it. Then, in 1962, the sao pha failed to return from a meeting in Yangon and has not been heard from since. His disappearance coincided with the March 1962 military coup by General Ne Win. The prince, like many others, was arrested and perhaps died or was killed in prison. Inge remained in Myanmar for a long time trying every avenue to find her husband or even hear news of him. Eventually, intimidated, Inge returned home.