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我把那些不愿放大也不愿删除的记忆写在了这里。。。 - anonymous

2013年8月11日日曜日

Yangon, Myanmar

My friends and colleagues have seen me getting all excited about my first backpacking experience trip in Yangon and have been worried for me, travelling to this protected country with minimal mode of contact. I think it's a challenge especially for me this clean freak.

Waiting for my room to get ready at Mother Land Inn 2, Lower Pazudung Road


 The first thing I did when I touched down at the Yangon International Airport was to change some of the US dollar notes that I've got into their currency, Kyatt (pronounced as chyatt). Like what the forums said, they are very strict with the condition of the notes. Wrinkled, old and torn notes are definitely not acceptable. I had a hard time screening through the crisp notes that I have on hand with the locals. After going through the screenings, we proceed to Mother Land Inn 2, a guesthouse that we researched before hand, hoping that there will be room available for us.

God bless us, we managed to get a room and chatted with the friendly service staff and some other Caucasian backpackers. It's really interesting to hear their backpacking journey and to be frank, their stories are really encouraging.

Explored around the inn and located a super store down the corner of the road. A convenient spot indeed despite of the messy and bumpy road. There are no street lights in most streets in Yangon, so it's best to return to the guesthouse before it gets dark.

The backyard of the Houses. Rubbish every where, Stray Dogs every where...


I have always been dependent on my friends or local tour guides whenever I travel free and easy, but this is the very first time I did my homework, studies the map and sort of guided the journey! Feel so proud of myself. So our first destination in Yangon is the Bogyoke Market, a place similar to our Chinatown. If you are looking for cheap Longyis, woodcrafts or jades, this is a place for your.

Bogyoke Market


We went on to the Kan Daw Gyi Lake, a quiet and beautiful place perfect for dating. There's this fine dining restaurant beside the lake and to our surprised, we see dim sums! Though the food doesn't taste authentic, it is not so bad for a not well-developed country. After the tasty lunch, we wanted to be daring and walk down to Bogyoke Aung San Museum. We knew we've failed our challenge when we realized we've been walking round the lake instead of out the lake! With road signs that we totally can't understand, taxi is really the safer option travelling in Yangon. You can try taking the bus if you don't mind the squeezing crowd and locals with bunch of vegetables and cages of chickens in the vehicle, and not to forget, the likelihood that you might get stuck in the middle of your journey for hours with the passengers.

Seaweed Fish Roll, Signature Fine Dining at Kan Daw Gyi Lake

Friendly, pleasant kids at the shops along Shwe Dagon Pagoda


Shwe Dagon Pagoda is really an ancient, with over 2000 years of history. The Pagoda is made of real gold plates and gold offerings from the locals and tourists and kept in the Pagoda. Only the scheduled monks can enter the Pagoda and fix the pagoda when some of the gold plates fell off from the Pagoda. There are 6 gems on the pagoda too, shining so brightly that we can even see it from afar.

Late Evening view of the Shwe Dagon Pagoda


To have a better view of how the locals live in Yangon, we took the Circular Train for a long 3 hours. That was when I felt disturbed at the scenes. The standard of living is really low there, with the villagers living just beside the field and rubbish flying everywhere. Their home are made of straws and you can see some showering in the public, beside the street market with the stray animals. The locals spit anywhere and the sight of them walking bare-footed on the dirty road is really disturbing.


On board the Circular Train for USD1. Foreigners are given tickets for the ride in the Upper Class Cabin. A much more spacious seats for a better view. Standing on the train is prohibited in the Upper Class Cabin. 

This Daddy travelled from station to station and picked his girl up through the window. The girl kept waving at us with this blur look of hers when she board the train. Her eyes were shining so brightly that it's a waste not to take a picture of her.

The market along the railway tracks


The experience there is really great, made me appreciate the beautiful country that I am living in, the people there are simple too, a good reflection in my life. But....Another time to Myanmar? I doubt so in the short run....

Mother Land Inn 2 baked me this lovely Birthday Cake, a great surprised in the morning. All the service crew sang the Birthday song and kept wishing me Happy Birthday when they see me in the house. Real heart warming.

2013年8月4日日曜日

What I've been up to?

The other day I was walking along some random street, and this stranger came up to me and asked if I have a blog. And I was like "WHAT?" and he say cos I look familiar like he have seen me on blog, etc. Ok well~ It sounds like a scam to me so I smiled and walked away. I went home thinking that "hmm... someone out there could be reading my blog!" 😁



So here is a little update for the month after leaving it untouched for the whole July!

Life's pretty much the same for me, working... exercising....walking around..... travelling..... loots and more loots! Speaking of travelling, I am SO SO SO excited about the coming 2 or (maybe 3) trips this month! I'll be in Yangon (for those that do not know, it's the capital of Myanmar) in 3 more days and Hong Kong in 10 more days! The Department's retreat is set tentatively on 23rd August; we're going to the neighbouring country this year and that means 3 weeks of continuous travelling! Yay!

I've been really active recently too, with Zumba, Basketball (or Badminton), Kick-Boxing and Zumba again! But like what BIL always say, it doesn't make any difference with the diet that I am adopting now. *oops* Nevertheless, I'm happy enough when my colleagues say I looked different in a good way (even though I still appear to be the "you'll see Denise around when there's food" me) *grins* and when this ultimate PTI aka health freak TKH texted me with this sentence "U should be healthier than most people...." when he asked for a game after his training for IPPT with the interns. THANK YOU guys!

Did I mentioned about the "loots and more loots" in my previous para? I'm actually grinning now cos I really like the stuff that I bought over the months! So here it goes...

I bought this Door Hanger at Japan Home while on the way to Zumba and it was selling at only $1! Have always thought of getting one to hang my bags so that (as a neat freak) I don't need to climb up and down just to keep my bags.
 
This lovely sweetie (I name it Maddy) is hand-made by my dear Baby and she was selling it at the Purrrrrzar yesterday (FYI, the Purrrrrzar will be on 3 consecutive Saturdays starting from 3rd August) for $6. I love this at first sight cos it was so small, so sweet looking and the pastel rainbow colours (yes! I have a rainbow shorts that that it can match with) add on the thumbs-up it already deserve.

Ok, the focus is on the flowery cushion I got it at Daiso the other time while doing volunteering work with the God Bro. Though I don't really fancy flowers, I realize I do have a soft spot for flowery prints, lace and blah every thing under the category you think it fits.


Now this. 2 nendoroid figurines that cost a total of $85 at the Sundays-Only China Square Central  Flea Market. The nendoroids serves really good as an icon in pictures. The boy look like the Soulmate with the cheeky smirking face (okayyyy I'm in friendship LOVE with my Soulmate) and the girl is simply adorable with her pet that looks like a turtle! <3>

The latest on-line buy is this 2-in-1 "Sweet Glam" lip balm + colour. I don't really like gloss as it made my lips look oily and my hair tends to stick on the gloss on my lips leaving a trace of sticky and oily mark on face when I wipe the hair away. So lip balm is the alternative for a mositurised lips and the plus point of this balm is that it gives my lips a healthier colour. *thumbs up!* (P.S. a little OOTD that caused much "discomfort" to my Sis and Baby~ *bleahs* in the collage)
 
So of course the above are not the ONLY buys over the months. I've gotten myself jumpers from Bali that cost about SGD21, flora prints quarts and polo-T from UNIQLO at their special 4 days only promotion price at $19.90 each, flora prints (again~) flats from PAYLESS in JCube at (again~) the promotion price at $26.90 and the recent piece of VERY VERY comfy "Grandma" pants from Cottonon at $29.90.
 
Till the next post...... Bye!