The official boat departure time from Monywa in Burma’s Sagaing Region was 4am (yes, ayem), so we got there at 3. A and I had spent the previous night exploring Monywa’s nightlife scene. As there was none (that we could find), 3am didn’t seem like a push.
It was.
Hello Monywa. Photo: Mark Ord.
We were heading up the Chindwin River. How far we didn’t know, but as the boat started in Monywa (map link), it seemed as good a place as any to start.
The boat had two decks—we’d purchased our tickets the previous afternoon. I want to say our shared cabin had reclining seats pulled out of a dead bus, but maybe they were out of a Kombi. We made our way to our assigned seats (yes, assigned) hunched over. As I can sleep anywhere, I went straight back to sleep.
Pick your chariot. Photo: Mark Ord.
I don’t know how much later it was, but we were still moored. A woke me up.
“Hey mate, you have to see this,” they said.
There were perhaps three or four rows of transported bus chairs and we were in the second row. Immediately in front of us were a set of small TVs.
They were screening a video of foreigners eating live monkey brains.
No, it wasn’t Indiana Jones. It was some dated film of decadent foreigners eating monkey brains.
Like this, just even worse dressed.
I blinked. Wot?
Then, post blink, the broadcast switched to a Buddhist monk. He was giving a sermon in Burmese. I don’t speak Burmese so I don’t know what he was saying.
Then the video flicked back. The monk was gone replaced by what I guess was a '70s soft–core flick.
Then the monk was back.
Then the soft–core was back.
Then the monk.
Then the monkey brain stuff again.
Are we there yet? No, we actually haven’t left yet. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
The cabin was perhaps half full. A and I were mesmerised. It was one of the most bizarre public transport experiences I’ve had in Southeast Asia. If I had to guess, I’d venture the monk was railing against Western decadence. It could just as much have been ‘70s Western fashion. I don’t know. My mind whirls.
What I do know is the river travel in Burma is unforgettable.
After about two hours the video got flicked off and we started roaming the boat. We stood by the railing, watching Burma wake up and slide by. It was just fantastic.
Dawn on the Chindwin. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
There was no food or drink on the boat. Every now and then, we’d pull into a village and the locals would paddle out in sampans. They were selling cigarettes, noodles, snacks, and then, upon seeing foreigners, beer. Lots of beer. Warm, canned beer.
The first night was at Kalewa (map link). At the time, there was talk of this opening to an overland route to India. One of the last impediments to an overlander’s dream falling. The border wasn’t open, but roadworks were well underway in anticipation. It is, at least pre-covid-19, now open—some paperwork required.
Kalewa was a smudge on the riverbank. Half mud, a third wood and the rest rutted tarmac. A local rode us out to the main tourism mainstay, a suspension bridge. There was a huge tree where the boats would lean to, its roots holding onto the shifting bank for grim life.
Are we there yet? No. Does it matter? No. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
We checked in with immigration; they were more bemused than put out. Then we investigated Kalewa’s nightlife—lower key than Monywa seems a fair description. We slept in a small flophouse. The beds were hard. Hard.
Most of the next day we pushed upriver. A mishmash of mountains and forest slid past. Then a half–sunk barge loaded with earth–moving gear, scoops grasping at the fast-flowing water. Collapsed bridges, then sampans with cigarettes and beer. Kids everywhere.
We pulled into Mawleik (map link) towards the end of the day. It had a real guesthouse, and the ground floor was an internet cafe. Sitting, listening to dial–up, another Westerner rolled in. He was a tour guide for a high–end cruise parked out front. He couldn’t abide another moment with his pax so had sought refuge in the internet cafe.
Still chugging. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
Their boat was a faux paddle steamer. He was taking them down the river that night for a candlelit dinner on a sandbank.
“Wankers!” the guide spat out, “I’d rather eat with you guys.”
An hour later, A and I sat in a riverfront restaurant. Iced beers and a mix of Burmese curries laid out, the river slid by. The stilted restaurant sat on the bank, with the muddy water so close we could have leapt into it. We chatted, elbows on sill, watching the customers board for their romantic dinner.
Later a local fixer, also an English teacher in the parts, introduced himself. If you have ever been to Mawleik, you would have met him.
What IS it with golf?! Photo: Stuart McDonald.
Did we need a guide for the next day? He’d show us a colonial-period golf course—those Brits I tell ya. Oh and and the grounds of a hospital where every WW2 Japanese patient committed suicide.
And he did.
Our ride home arrives. This photo still makes me laugh. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
A day later, we took the boat back. It was just as good.
Couchfish Week 8: Of eating brains and a Burmese boat trip