“Hoteh o sightsee first?” asked the driver.
I thought about this. I really
wanted to go to the hotel. I wanted to put my stuff down and settle in but I
also knew it was hot, and going to get hotter. Plus, I thought it was kind of
silly to come to Bagan to see a hotel. But then I thought, “Yeah, but you
really do want to put your stuff down
and repack your bags for sightseeing” so I said, “Hotel.”
As I stepped in to the hotel lobby, I took out my travel
voucher and handed it to the woman who was walking toward me. She greeted me
warmly and directed me toward one of many wicker couches with plush cushions.
“Welcome, sit down,” she said as she took my voucher and
passport. “You wait,” and walked away, toward the counter across the room.
A man approached me as soon as I sat down and gave me a hot
towel. Then another person handed me a glass of fresh juice. The woman walked
back across the room toward me and handed me my travel voucher.
“This is for Inle Lake,” she said (the place I was going to
visit next, not the hotel I was
currently at) and turned around and walked away.
I started to search desperately for the voucher for the
hotel I was at. I searched through my
money belt. It wasn’t there. I searched through my backpack, it wasn’t there
either. I finally took out all of my
travel documents and methodically checked through each one, hoping it had just
gotten caught between two other ones. I found the receipt for the travel package
I had bought and thought, “I paid for
this, she must know that I paid for
it. Why do I have to give her that piece of paper?”
She came back and said, “Many travel documents,” and smiled.
“Maybe it is in the car?” I asked. “I go look?”
“I have,” she said.
“Oh,” I said in absolute relief. “I thought I lost it, I was looking for it.”
“Oh,” she said. “I give the Inle Lake back to you. I have
Bagan.”
“Sorry,” I said.
“That’s okay,” she said. As she filled out the documents for
me to sign, I looked around the lobby. Just to the left of the hotel counter
was a small marquis sign. It read:
Myanmar Treasure Hotel Welcomes: Shannon Blyant
“Oh my gosh,” I thought. “I think I’m the only one here. I
think I am their sole hotel guest.” And then I laughed because normally those
signs are for conventions and I thought, “Oooh look, it’s the Shannon Blyant
convention- and I’m the guest speaker and
the only attendant. I wonder what
they’re giving as door prizes.”
The woman finished filling out the form, explained it to me,
and asked me to sign. She asked me about my trip and shared a bit about
herself: how bored her kids are when school is out, that her daughter was 8
years old, how much she loved her country, and then she mentioned that they
practice Buddhism.
“I study Buddhism, a little bit,” I said, and I motioned
small, with my index finger and thumb.
“You meditate?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said smiling.
“In the morning and the night our minds are…” and she
motioned in the air, a whirlwind of activity.
“Yes, yes!” I said, and we both smiled.
“My name is Kim,” she said, and offered her hand.
“I am Shannon,” I said.
“Shaw Lin,” she said.
“Shan in.”
“Shah Lin,” she said. I didn’t know what to do. Shahlin was
fine but I had heard her say MyANmar and BagaAN so I knew she actually could say ShAN in. I didn’t want to
insult her by smiling when I knew she was saying my name wrong- it just seemed
demeaning to her intelligence.
I tried one more time: “MyANmar? ShyANin.”
“Sha Lin” she said.
I nodded and smiled and she gave me my room key and directed
me toward a man. He took my bags and walked me to my room. After he put my
things down I asked, “When I want to sightsee, I go there?” and pointed to the
parking lot.
“Yes,” he said and walked away.
I put my things down, put on sunscreen, walked to the
parking lot, and got in the van with the same man who had picked me up at the
irport. As we backed out of the parking lot he asked me, “You want Pagoda o Mal-kuh?”
I looked at him, a little bewildered. I had heard the word pagoda but I had no idea what the other
choice was.
“Ummmm, I don’t know,” I said.
“Pagoda? O mal kuh?” he said again, enunciating his words.
I decided to practice right speech and just tell the truth,
“I do not understand the second one. Pagoda yes. Other one?” and then I
shrugged my shoulders.
“Okay,” he said.
We turned out of the driveway on to the main street and I
saw lines of shops.
“Oh!” I turned to him. “Marrrket!” and smiled.
“Yes,” he said, and pointed to the shops. We veered to the
left and he pointed to a bunch of people gathered around someone speaking through
a megaphone.
“Democracy,” he pointed. “NLD,” he said and I saw the banner
for the National League Of Democracy flying above the speaker’s head.
“I love this,” I thought to myself. “I love that democracy is a sight to see in the tour of Myanmar, that it goes right along with shops
and pagodas.”
We continued to drive this way, him pointing out sights to
me and describing them. At first, when he would describe things, I couldn’t
tell if he was speaking to me in Burmese or English because I didn’t understand
any of it. But after a while, I
concluded that he must be speaking in
English. And so I started to listen
for English and when he described things that I could actually see or said familiar words, I listened
for patterns in his accent and what he was saying. “Oh,” I thought to myself.
“This is kind of like making harmony with others. I’m learning him in the same way that I learn others and myself, I’m
trying to find a way for us to do this together.”
After quite a bit of
driving, I noticed that we kept driving past
the pagodas, like, seemingly, all of
the pagodas. He seemed to be talking
about them but we weren’t stopping at any of them.
“Hmmmm,” I thought. “I wonder if this is a driving tour of the pagodas. I wonder if
we’re just going to drive past them
and only see them from the outside.” And then I pictured my friend, who had
said that I must go to Bagan to see
the pagodas asking, “You mean you went all the way to Bagan and drove past all
those pagodas and didn’t go in to any
of them?” And then I pictured Paul, leaning back, opening his arms wide and
shrugging his shoulders all the while saying, “That’s what it was…” with a broad smile.
And so I leaned back and decided to enjoy my driving tour of Bagan. I started looking
out the window at the things beside me, instead of wondering when we would get
to the pagodas and which ones we would go in to. I noticed people, and dogs. I
started to see shops, and landscape. I actually started to see the place I was in, instead of imagining the place I was going
to. It was cool, and I was glad to be having this tour of Bagan- to be seeing all of the people here and their
home. But then I began to wonder if this was going to be a really short tour,
and what I would do with the rest of my day.
Finally, we turned off the main road and down a driveway.
“Oh,” I thought. “I guess we are
going in one.” (stay tuned for part 3)
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