Middle-aged flash packers

Today was temple, palace and pagoda day.

Steve and I walked along the side of the palace moat, watching large catfish and carp swimming about in the muddy waters. Some young lads caught a really large fish with a hand line. They were a bit shifty as there were signs up saying no fishing.

The walkway alongside the moat is new and well tended. Lonely planet are quite dismissive of Mandalay but I like it. It’s authentic with people going about their daily business and it’s more attractive than I expected.

We met Nik and Jan at the Royal Palace and we meandered around the grounds which are quite extensive.

Steve and Nik had to wear badges with “foreigner “ written on them. It makes me giggle just to think about the uproar there would be about “foreigners” in the UK bring made to wear such a thing. There were areas we weren’t allowed to go in as we were “foreigners” which of course immediately made me want to go there.

We did get to see the “ruined tourist train” which was indeed the worse for wear. I suppose I should have felt quite unwelcome with destroyed tourist trains and foreigner badges, but the locals are so friendly, it’s impossible not to feel at home.

A quick burger stop then it was off to Shwenandaw monastery. It is an old, wooden monastery and quite small. Add a bus load of Chinese tourists and you struggle to find a space where someone isn’t taking a selfie or pushing you out of the way to get their perfect shot.

It’s quite sad how universally disliked tour groups of Chinese people are. I don’t think I’ve heard one person say a good word about them. I think their cultural differences combined with a group mentality makes for a toxic mix of selfishness and arrogance. We have met Chinese people as individuals and found them charming but as a group – avoid at all costs.

As a final push for our sight seeing day, we headed for the Kuthodaw Pagoda. Steve was at the end of his capacity for temple viewing but as it wasn’t too far, we pushed on. It was good we did. The best one yet, with hundreds of shrines containing inscribed slabs – the world’s biggest book apparently.

We left J and N having a shop and got back to our hotel with enough time to spare for a quick swim and a complimentary cocktail.

Next on the agenda was a cultural show.

We nipped next door to have a quick bite at BBQ House before hand. (A decision we were later to regret) You select meat and veg ( we went solely for veg) which they stir fry and add to a delicious broth for you. Yum.

Our tuktuk fixer to the show was called Starskey. His nephew was driving and I got the impression that Starskey was definitely the brains behind the business. He tried to worm out of us what we were doing the next day so he could take us and also suggested they come and pick us up after the show. We said no – another decision we were to regret.

It definitely wasn’t a sellout job for the show, the audience consisting of 1.5 rows of foreigners and a smattering of locals with nothing better to do.

I enjoyed it though. The youngsters performing were from a local performing arts school under the guidance of their headmaster. At the end of the show, he sang for us and it did sound like a cat being strangled. I would never want to cause offence so I valiantly bit my giggles back.

For me, the real star of the show was the tiny little toddler behind us who copied all the dance moves. He/she was incredible. 10 out of 10 on the cuteness scale.

After the show we went to a bar/restaurant. How London does that sound? It Certainly was not sophisticated but we had a warm welcome once the tick ridden dog was removed from underneath our chairs.

And so back to our hotels. The young waiter saw us wandering along the road and called two tuk tuks for us. I don’t know where he got them from but they were dead ringers for Dumb and Dumber. Jan and Nik got the best one. Ours had the crazed look of someone either very drunk or very high. Or both. It was very difficult to make him understand so Steve navigated by google for him. I think our hotel was a lot further than he thought as he kept pulling over and asking the equivalent of “are we there yet?” He reassured us that he wasn’t going to jump any lights and he didn’t appear to be a big fan of the police. Other than that, he did get us home, albeit slowly.

I was actually quite worried as to how he was going to get home but Steve wasn’t so we left him outside the hotel.

Hope he was ok.