Bagan, Myanmar

Every stop just seemed to get better and more picturesque.  Way too many pictures to whittle down.  After landing in Bagan our first stop was the morning market where merchants bring fresh fruit, veggies, eggs, meat and fish daily.   Here's a seriously loaded down truck load coming to market.

There were also a lot of stands selling betel leaves and areca nuts. The people wrap the nut in the leaves and chew on them for, I guess, some type of buzz or energy.  It stains the teeth dark red and you can see red spit everywhere when walking around.  Here are a couple of pictures of the nut, followed by the leaves they wrap it in.  Nowadays they also add tobacco at times.

More examples of thanakha on the cheeks of babies and women:

The brown stuff in the closest bucket is fermented soybean paste.  It is served in the middle spot of the serving dish in next picture and is offered everywhere.  You use the spoon to scoop a little, add some fried soybeans, ginger, and dried shrimp and then pop it in your mouth.  It was surprisingly good and once our guides figured out we weren't squeamish about trying new food we had it everywhere including when we crashed a wedding.  Still can't believe none of us got sick between eating off a spoon an entire village used, to eating unfamiliar things our stomach surely weren't used to eating.  

An interesting tradition that has taken a sad turn...the long neck women, aka 'giraffe women' of Padaung.  The ancient custom of fitting the young girls with brass rings around their necks has unfortunately turned into a stunt used as a tourist attraction and exploitation.  Our guide said the rings were initially used to keep tigers from biting the neck and legs, but our guide book said it was to make the women less attractive to raiding neighboring tribes.  

Our boys were very interested in the boys who were novice monks and they were just as interested in our little men.

Our ride for visiting the local villages

 Drying plums which will then be exported to China

She used the little boy as a counterbalance for the wood she was carrying

Saying goodbye to Rosie

Went exploring one night and got locked inside a temple

 With a whole bunch of bats.  They were very, very cool to watch.  We found out later from another American that there are a lot of viper snakes in the area and they even had a picture of one they saw near their hotel room in Bagan.  Turns out Myanmar has one of the highest incidence of deadly snake bites in the world.  Glad I read that on the plane home.

My big man's officially ELEVEN!