Getting off the bus in Mawlamyine at 7 am, I really had no idea what to do or where to go. So I took a seat at a crummy restaurant and ordered food and tea while I planned and woke up.
Several motorcycle taxi drivers offered me their services, and I started up a conversation with one of them, who I invited to join me for tea. Shortly after that, we were off on this tiny scooter/motorcycle on the bumpy roads on the outskirts of town, with me and my backpack hanging on for dear life on the back seat.
We first drove to a university campus outside of town and met this man’s brother there. He spoke English well and suggested I stay a while at a local monastery. They would let me stay for a few days for free if I wanted, he said, but I would have to meditate with them…that sounded like a great way for me to clear my head, so we put-put-putted our way the monastery compound. To get there, you had to drive on a dirt road lined with rubber tree plantations and rice fields. The monastery looked out from a hill covered in green vegetation….
After asking for directions from a few monks, we finally came to the main “administration” building where I would have the opportunity to pay my respects to the senior monk and ask him for permission to stay.
We took off our shoes and entered the main room. The head monk was sitting on the floor there with his legs crossed in front of him, looking calm and inviting. His “assistant”, who spoke English well, sat next to him with both legs on one side.
My driver immediately put his palms together in a respectful greeting, went down to his knees and bowed all the way to the floor. I tried to copy him, but it wasn’t as convincing.
The assistant invited us to sit, and that’s when I made my first big cultural faux pas in Myanmar: I crossed my legs in front of me and as soon as I had done that both the assistant and my driver opened up their eyes wide and reached out towards me like a parent in a Museum reaching out for their child as she pokes holes into a Monet with a pencil: “no, no, no…you cannot sit like that!” I quickly changed seating positions and sat on my legs. Oops….great first impression I made.
They invited me for lunch and I asked whether it would be possible to stay for a night or two. They said yes (not a very enthusiastic YES, and I don’t blame them after the sitting incident), but that I would have to stick to a meditation schedule that started at 5 am. And ended late into the evening. So I said, OK thanks, I think I’ll just stay for lunch….!
That afternoon I spent driving around the town, passing pagodas, decrepit mosques…I also roamed the local market, where they sold everything from shirts to mounds of dried fish. Children would occasionally shout “ey, ey!” when they saw me.
I stayed a night in a hostel looking out over the river and planned on catching a ferry to the small town of Hpa An the next morning.
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