The Golden Yangon

With the ambition of ticking the countries across South East Asia, Myanmar was our latest tick and adventure. We didn't manage to get a long trip and we only stayed for 2 nights (totally regretting this!). We spent our whole trip in Yangon, their largest city with the population of over 5 million.

For the first day, we spent the half day with pagoda and temple visit. We were blessed with nice weather and pictures turned out so beautiful. The first and the most iconic pagoda (the one that you must visit when you're in Yangon) was the Shwedagon Pagoda. We hired a tour guide that was available in the pagoda entrance (optional) for just about 10USD for the two of us. He was very informative and taught us so much about the history and culture of this sacred place. Another plus was he took nice picture for us too and here's the picture.

The Pagoda was under some renovation at the time, replacing the gold plates and ready for their new year celebration in April (same new year with Thailand). Keith bought a sarong to wear as he was wearing shorts that day. You are required to wear top with sleeves, long pants or skirt or sarong and no shoes when you're in the pagoda.

After this Schwedagon Pagoda visit, we went around in a taxi that cost us about 10USD (if I'm not wrong, I remember it being very cheap)and visited the other smaller pagoda or temples around Yangon city. Then, we went to the Kandawgyi Lake for a walk. Spot the Schwedagon Pagoda in the picture.

We hopped into one of their local restaurant, the one that looked busy and popular to the locals (that's what we normally do, follow the locals, they know where's good food!). We ordered their local dish which is very similar to Chinese/ Thai food as their cooking were influenced by the Chinese, Thai and Indian cooking. I ordered fried fish with Burmese curry rice and Keith ordered chillies minced chicken stir fried with egg rice. They were really flavourful, tasted so good that we just inhaled the whole dish in seconds and they only cost us about 4 USD each dish! Very affordable! We ordered dessert too, Burmese style! We ordered the drink named Falooda and we fell in love right away!

It's hard to choose when they have so much to offer when it comes to food, I like all of them but the one that really blew me away was Mohinga. It's their unofficial national dish apparently! I saw them selling this dish everywhere (in a portable kitchen stall by the side of the street) like these but we didn't get a chance to try them with certain reasons (language mainly).

However, just before we leave the country, I get to taste this unofficial national dish - Mohinga and this is a shot before it get in ma belly! Yum Yum Yum!

I love it here, in Myanmar/Burma in general, the people are so friendly and everyone seems to be very relax, happy and pure if that's the right word. I suppose that's the effect of being a Buddhist country. Also, there are some pretty/good looking faces here. Their skin are well taken care of, especially their face. Most girls will have this mask/plant root paste on their face for cooling, UV protection and smoothing purpose. I bought myself some and I put a little on and took a picture :)

We definitely would love to explore more in Myanmar in other region when we get a chance. I hope country development won't change the culture they have now and stay how they are!

What a trip!! 

Love,
Carol