Kamarsae Village and Bago

November 26, 2015 (written in Sagaing)

crossing bridge

at Ko Kyi Win's house

The last day in Yangon (Nov 26) four students and our driver and I went to Kamarsae Village where I'd been last year.  After we picked everyone up we stopped for a breakfast: fortunately I wasn't hungry and had only a couple spoonfuls of someone's mohinga, because once arrived at the village, first we stopped at the house of Ko Kyi Win (Nyunt Than's brother; his son is Mg Htet Aung, the one who'd showed me around last year and is one of my students now), where they served us tea and Burmese traditional treats.
 

 

Mohinga at an auntie's house

Then we went to one of the girls' auntie's house, who served us a lavish mohinga spread, of which I had a couple servings. Then we stopped at another auntie's house, who also had prepared   The cook recognized me and greeted me warmly and enthusiastically, saying she had missed me ever since I left.  Daw Khin Win, Nyunt Than's cousin, gifted me with her notes, half Burmese, half English, from a meditation retreat she'd done, and I gave her my earrings, all I had with me to give.

other auntie's house

refreshments for us. And then over rickety bridges (the riverbed was dry when I was here last year, but now the bridges are up and boats carrying passengers down the river dividing the town) to the house I stayed at the year before—and another round of refreshments!!!

Ko Kyi Win and Daw Khin Win

Next we all went for a walk down the river to the pagoda that had been being renovated when I was here last, and the two girls showed me the corner stupas that their fathers had donated the money

Pagoda in village

for. One of the girls kept stopping and posing and taking photos of the two of them and of herself, looking like a model or movie star. Then the girls visited an auntie while the boys and I retraced the walk through the back lanes of the village that we had started last year, and on which my camera's battery had given out. Mg Htet Aung even remembered where it had given out, so I was able to get the pictures that I had planned on going back for the next day, only the police had called that night to say I'd had to leave.

on walk

Back at Ko Kyi Win's house, yet another multi-dish meal!!!!!!!!!   And then it was time to leave.

meal at Ko Kyi Win's house

We stopped in Bago on the way back and visited the great golden pagoda, and three reclining Buddha pagodas! At the last one, the girls and I had coconut milk directly from the coconuts which were  opened with a machete, while the boys had palm juice. Back in Yangon, we stopped at a fancy seafood restaurant, and then dropped everyone off. Mg Htet Aung took off before there was a chance to say goodbye, and I was feeling the lack of having been able to do so—then a few minutes later, still in the van, I got a good-bye call from him. 

 Reclining Buddha, Bago

Next morning early U Kyaw Lin Naing Oo, who's been such a gracious host to me and so helpful in getting me a SIM card, new charger for my kindle, my dinners, and my plane ticket, picked me up and brought me to the airport for my 6 a.m. Mandalay flight.









[Note:  to see more photos you can go to: https://www.flickr.com/photos/129187095@N02/sets/.  The first album "Top 400" is a selection of the best photos, so that would be the one to look at unless you want to look at even more in any particular phase of the trip.]