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Part 3: Every village had its pagoda, the way English villages
sprout church steeples.
By Roy Attaway — Spring 2004
In the evenings aboard Robyn and I dined sumptuously
and watched entertainment provided by acrobats, musicians, and a classic
Burmese puppet show (they can last for days, going all night, in their
most expansive incarnation). For those guests not interested, there was
always the piano bar—or sitting topside in the star-filled night.
Food aboard was eclectic, the chef offering tempting
menus from all over the world. Lunch was a lavish buffet; dinner, a sit-down
affair. At one of these I had a chance to talk with Capt. Ba Nyan, 48,
a graduate of the Myanmar Merchant Marine. He was born in Mandalay, our
ultimate destination, and made master of this boat in 1990. He commands
a crew of 19—all spit and polish. They were attentive without being
subservient and invariably friendly and polite—a Burmese trait.
For two days the boat pushed against the thick current,
barely making 5 knots (aided by this same flow, she more than doubles
that on the downstream leg). By the second day it was surprisingly cool;
we were heading into the teeth of a chilly breath from the mountains.
The canvas around the lounge deck snapped like castanets.
The happenstance villages of the sandbars had now given
way to more permanent structures on high bluffs. Every village had its
pagoda, the way English villages sprout church steeples. Beyond Mandalay,
as the landscape rises toward China, the river comes from steep canyons,
a venue I would love to see.
We reached Mandalay, or rather its suburb of Amarpura,
early in the afternoon. Across the river was the ancient Shan capital
of Sagaing, where gilded pagodas arose like tops in a toy store. When
we disembarked for a day ashore, we discovered Mandalay is surprisingly
modern and clean. But then we went through the tangled streets of a residential
neighborhood, where teak houses contained, I was sure, the “dark
and sluttish rooms” of which George Orwell wrote in Burmese Days.
At the Mandalay Jetty we were plummeted back in time as we watched men
in loincloths whip oxen through the deep mud bank, dragging logs of teak.
In the late afternoon we went to Taungthaman Lake and
hired a canoe to view yet another sunset, this one casting U Bein’s
Bridge, reputedly the longest teak bridge in the world, into stark silhouette.
At gloaming on our last day, we found ourselves at the
Soon U Ponya Shin Paya looking out across the Irrawaddy plain, now swaddled
in soft, gauzy light. The Road to Mandalay gleamed on the far bank, her
promise fulfilled. We lingered long after the light was subsumed by darkness.
It was so still we could hear dogs barking in the distance and the crystalline
tintinnabulation of a bell.
The Road to Mandalay is
operated by Orient-Express and offers three-, four-, seven-, nine-, and
11-night cruises on the Irrawaddy River. Prices range from $2,260 (per
person, shared Superior Compartment) for a three-night cruise to $3,850
for 11 nights. State Compartments are $3,170, per person, shared, for
three nights, $4,610 for 11 nights. www.orient-express.com.
Roy Attaway is a freelance writer and photographer
who has contributed to a number of magazines worldwide.
>> Previous page >> Part 2: The light, in fact, throughout the river valley
was the most beautiful I’ve ever seen, a simmering golden hue. Page
1,
2, 3
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