After a long, but delicious week in Bangkok, I finally acquired my Myanmar visa. Hey, here’s a tip: don’t be an idiot and apply on a Thursday or else you have to wait all weekend until the visa gets processed. Another tip: don’t wait until your 30 days in Thailand runs out either or risk paying extra for overstaying your visa. Whatever.
Ok, so I arrived in Yangon, Myanmar around 8:00 PM. From the airport, I paid 8000 kyat to my hostel on 20th Street in Chinatown, conveniently called 20th Street Hostel. The hostel itself was nice enough; air-conditioned with curtains and walls giving each bunk bed it’s own area. The beds were wonderfully comfortable, however the bunk bed frames loudly squeaked every time you moved. Free breakfast included coffee, tea, and little cakes/rice cakes… I guess that’s breakfast.
After spending my first day in bed being lazy and slightly ill, I met up with my German friends the next day (hey Vitali and Heidi!). We walked around to get a lay of the land, stopping to buy some necessities (sweat rags) and to try the betalnut. Betalnut is really good and everyone should try it. Not! Okay, so it’s quite disgusting and it’s confusing as to what you are supposed to do with it. I bought it from one of the many vendors on the streets, popped it in my mouth and started chewing.
My mouth immediately flooded with red saliva; do I swallow it? Do I spit it on the street? It was very confusing. I did both with excessive grace, as the spit drooled out of my mouth and the locals laughed at me. Well, at least they were entertained. Nevertheless, I would recommend trying it once, and only once, as it is part of the Burmese culture and is the cause of the red/brown stains on 70% of the men’s teeth.
I don’t know what we did the next two days as we spent about 4 days total in Yangon (ahem, Netflix), but on the last night we finally made our way to the Shwedagon Pagoda. This is a huge, golden pagoda and is the main/only attraction in the city. Pay the 8,000 kyat entrance fee and take the escalators up and up to the top. Try to go at sunset and wait until dark when the lights are turned on and the golden pagoda shines bright.
After returning from the pagoda, I met a girl at my hostel who turned out to be one of my sister’s good friend’s, best friends from back home. This is why you talk to everyone, people. We decided we needed to get drunk since it was American Thanksgiving and we made our way to 19th Street to find the party and $0.60 beers. See my post on The Green Gallery for details on my Thanksgiving in Myanmar.
The Wide Wanderer 