We arrived in Myanmar via Yangon airport, got to our hotel in the early evening and went for a quick walk to see what was around. We had two full days ahead so for the first day we thought we would see the main religious sites in the city.
First up as we strolled downtown was the cathedral. Myanmar is primarily Bhuddist but a hundred or so years of being a British colony meant Christianity was bound to leave its mark. Fortunately in this case the mark was a stunning cathedral – cavernous yet bright and colourful inside. The open windows meant there were birds fluttering around inside, just to add to the serenity.
Round the corner from the cathedral lay the Sule Paya (Paya = Pagoda). This was the centre of the colonial city built by the British in the 19th century. Yangon, then named Rangoon, was the capital and hub of old Burma and remains the commercial centre to this day. The Sule Paya sits in the centre of a busy roundabout although the interior manages to remain quite ignorant of the outside noise thankfully. Inside there are shrines large and small centered around a large gold stupa. Like most of the big temples there is a tourist entry fee ($2) and you have to leave your shoes outside ($1 to keep them safe).
On the eastern end of town, close to the river, we found the Botataung Paya. This large complex has another huge gold stupa at its core, however this one is hollow and you can walk around the gilded interior, the centre of which holds a hair of the Bhudda (which you can’t get near or see up close).
Fortunately that isn’t the only thing to see. The site also has a huge turtle pond, a huge super shiny Bhudda and lots of other little shrines and niches. One thing to be careful of though is walkimg around barefoot on tiles that are being scorched by the intense Burmese sun!
The sun gets really intense in Myanmar especially in the hot season (which was just starting as we arrived) so we made a quick escape to the refuge of our AC room.
Once the afternoon sun had lowered we got a taxi out to the largest religious complex in Myanmar. The Shwedagon Paya in Yangon is a huge complex at the top of a hill and also the first religious site we found with free wifi! There are entrances at each compass point. Shoes and socks are left at the bottom, the $8 entrance fee is collected near the top.
We arrived on the eve of a full moon festival and there were lots of people there. It seemed to be a kind of alms giving ceremony with all the monks lined up receiving food and money from local groups.
We walked around the complex and there was loads to see. Hundreds of shrines; ones for each persons weekday of birth, huge ceremonial bells, big flashing Bhuddas, small jade Bhuddas etc.
We stayed until sunset when they lit up the huge central stupa and started lighting candles all around the shrines.
Once it had gone dark we got a cab back downtown and were done – happy for the karma boost we had hopefully earned that day.
