Day 4, Myanmar, Mandalay

It is so much cooler today than it has been. I don't know if it will stay that way. A wee bit excited to see NZ butter at the breakfast table. Small things... small minds and all that! I was good though. Didn't have the eggs, toast, jam or cereal. Ate like the locals. That is my plan while I am here. Noodles, rice porridge and spicy veges. Yum!

The coolness didn't last long. 35 degrees at 12.50. Just got back from walking around the palace. Very pretty. Nice buildings but it is a replica as the original was bombed during the 2nd World War and destroyed. The new one was built in the 1990s so not as cool as I imagine the original was. They did a good job though.

The Mandalay Hill from the bridge outside the Palace gates (the tourist gates)

We wandered around the Cultural Museum inside. Pretty old stuff in there! Such a rich history. So much war and disharmony over the centuries.

So many people asked to take our photo. We saw lots of others just taking it. World famous in Mandalay. Wee bit weird. We just smile and say yes. The people are so friendly.

Inside we met a teacher who wanted to take our photo with her students.

We saw a squirrel on the walk out from the palace. We also saw a lizard on the way in. Quick little suckers. They make me jump a mile in the air when the scoot across. 

We stopped at a street stall for a coke and watched a guy crushing sugar cane. They make Happy Coffee with it. We would have got one but had already ordered our coke when we realised what was going.

The lad getting ice for the Happy Coffee. They left the freezer open the whole time. 

Crushing the sugar cane for the Happy Coffee. See the little bowl? That is where the juice is caught for the coffee.

Pouring the sugar cane juice in the cups with ice for drinking. 

A customer being served.

We walked back to the hotel where Mick ditched me to wander off and change some money.

The council cleaning up the rubbish (or moving it from one part of the waterway where it had blocked to another). We saw people swimming in this up further. Or maybe they were bathing. 

The good old council truck.

Local boys off for a spot of fishing. 

After a lie down and soak in the pool we headed back out on another adventure. We wandered some back streets with very poor people living in shacks next to obviously much richer people in flash houses. Quite sad to see. We found an a cool wee market and I brought a longyi which is the skirts that the ladies wear. They have asked me to wear one at each of the pagodas we have visited so it was time to get my own.

We found an awesome street food place which made indian food. OMG it was just awesome. it was naan bread made right in front of us with some chutney, a minty/chilli flavoured thing and a curried potato dish. It cost us 50nz cents each.

We wandered on and bumped into a guy we met earlier who had tried to sell us one of his tours. We hadn't wanted it then because we wanted to see the sunset from Mandalay Hill so we turned him down. This time we took him up on his offer and we visited a couple of pagodas and a monastery. Man that was so beautiful. Then he drove us up the Mandalay Hill. I am going to add the unedited photos not the good ones because I want more time to look at them all :)

I felt like a lazy cow but there is no way that I could walk up there at the moment with this back thing going on. The ride on the back of his truck didn't really help with the injury at all but it was better than walking. Any of my readers who remember the old zig zag road over Arthurs Pass will have some clue of what the ride was like. Very cool and a bit scary with him driving with his foot flat to the floor.

Mick had to wear a paso this time. It is the first time they have asked him to before entering a pagoda. I've had at all the ones we have gone to. I have bought my own one now. 

The escalator went up three very steep flights. 

These people asked to take their photo with Mick. Im going for the photo for a photo trick now!

Check out the golf course. Very flash

This man wanted a photo of me with every member of his family (below) and the baby. The grandmother kept telling the baby to come and see me. 

This brother and sister asked for my photo with each of them. 

Mick rocking his paso.

At the top we went on a three story, steep as hell, elevator that took us up to the viewing platform. Wow. Very cool indeed. The sunset was a bit of a fizzer but the atmosphere was nice. Many people took our photos and asked to pose with us. It is so funny when that happens.

The trip down was just as exciting. The views were pretty good.

Back at the hotel there were three local guys swimming in the creek that runs buy our hotel. The same one the drains empty into and we suspect, by the smell, the toilets flush into. Sad really. We went and sat by the pool because we were just in time for happy hour. Happy hour here means free, yes FREE, not cheap, but free cocktails for one hour. Was worth sitting out getting eaten alive by mozzies. After a couple of those and a beer we wandered off for a look around.

We found a place called Little Panda. It is BBQ buffet. You choose as much meat, fish, chicken and veges as you like, you pick up two gas cookers, a pan of broth and go cook. We must have been cooking all wrong cos they sent a girl out to do it for us. So delicious.