vaga #3/24 Shwedagon Paya Rangun

Part XXIV  

I am now finishing  "Vaga #3 Myanmar"   !! puff finally !! it took much longer than I imagined. I am finishing with this wonderful temple thus leaving a closure that represents me and sums up Myanmar. A country immersed in Buddhism. This pagoda was the last thing I visited, it is in Rangoon, Rangun or Yangon, everything is the same, it is the most symbolic one of the country. The photographic support is not the best, in any case  later I changed my cell phone for another with a better camera, but that will be reported later on in future stories. As always, I share my experiences, the ones that I have seen with my eyes and my sensations, whether they are marvelling, or not understanding the rites, or feeling overwhelmed by beauty, or fatigue, or the scorching heat, or the burned soles of my feet and what I hear at the same time as  see For a moment I wanted to do two chapters with this temple since I took 500 photos in 4 hours, and it was very difficult to select because it is a complex temple with many buildings and all so varied, with rich architectural details I stayed until dusk when the beauty was at its peak, and it was a comfortable time of the day. How to select from so many photos? I decided to go with what impressed me the most, be it some of its architectural beauty with its many great details, but above all the life inside it, how people relate to the temple, how active its faithful are, temples that are lived in. I transfer my story to things that are not found, nor are life related to them in Google. The touristy, impressive and perfect photos are found in Google, which I recommend. 

The very first thing was the tremendous beauty, what a way to see in this country so many wonderful pagodas or payas, they are majestic and very different from each other. You have to give the best to Buddha, with the majesty, gold and beauty. Where Catholicism has only the Vatican with its Sistine Chapel and great cathedrals of which I have visited many years ago, and I like them, but for me nothing is compared, not only to this temple but to so many others that I have explored, and they are only a part of those that are here. At the time of editing I have seen many Buddhist temples in other countries, but none come close to those in Myanmar. This temple in Rangoon is the most outstanding in its importance, one of being located in the largest city in the country and not least is its majestic appearance. It is on top of a low hill but stands out from the city, its gigantic gold dome can be seen from all sides, yes, entirely made out of gold sheets, the ones that are replaced every two years, it always has to shine. The cost of this is immeasurable and around there they told me the amount of gold that is required for its maintenance, which I do not remember and there are several more in the country with gold domes and I do not stop wondering, what is the third-poorest country of the world doing with all this gold. Under the dome there is a strand  of  Buddha’s hair under 7 locks, you never have access to it. The spire where the dome ends has diamonds, rubies and emeralds of impressive sizes because depending on the angle of the sun they produce sparkles and with the sunset they are more appreciated, And I had the chance to see the stones are red, green and white.

I arrived on that ruined tandem bicycle already mentioned in vaga#3/19 On wheels “c” as my extreme transport at 4 pm, a brutal hour and I suffered through it, but the tremendous burden was minimised by the heat and my burned feet, constantly looking for a little shade to recover. The beauty of so many temples and mini temples, all with different architectures, niches, altars, domes, some gold, others white, A huge space that runs in circles where there are temples on both sides, the main one is in the centre, the others surrounding it. There must be about 100 buildings, whether they are niches, small temples, icons where people pray, and obviously each one is more beautiful than the other. Each metre there is a surprising variety of new images. In the chapels or niches there were monks meditating alone. Mystical energy, energy of beauty, being above the mundane world, is how I felt. I went around it about 10 times, each lap was about 400 meters, in the first round I was speechless, the following taking photos and in each lap I discovered new things, after taking the photos, I walked just to feel, to be filled with magic, The light was changing, by 6 pm more of the faithful arrived with the lessening of the heat, and I was realising that the beauty of the sunset was incredible. Women, men, children, monks, youths, families, all integrated. I value my aloneness, there more than ever and to be able to live this spirituality at ease, on my time, with burned feet that become  second nature. I can imagine with a close companion the first reaction will be to complain about the heat, burning feet and would say that it has been seen, it is time to go after only one hour.

many people work, clean, sweep, and prepare the hundreds and hundreds of candles for the night, and it is done daily, all on their own initiative

the very fine, diverse, harmonious architecture, with hundreds of details, representing kings, princes, and others, for example are for fertility either for a man or woman. The details of small images on the side of each temple are many, they are characters, animals from fantasy stories or humorously for me, they are funny, it seems that they are by the sculptor's imagination, but surely there is a huge explanation behind. If you look at almost all the photos there are these details. They also use video screens where sentences are displayed.

I was especially impressed by a meditating monk that I have  already mentioned in the previous chapter of "the monks who impressed me", he is here, there were several more in small chapels, others, not so focused on their meditation !!!!!! said the paparazzi !!!!

One of the most characteristic rites of this particular pagoda is the blessing of water, it has to do with your birthday and the day of the week you were born, being the crucial day of the week, so there are several small centres with a pool of water that represent your day, once you have placed it you worship it. As soon as I arrived, one of the faithful tried to explain that when entering the first thing that is to be done is to pour water on an image, I ignored it because I found it had nothing to do with me. Today I no longer have that attitude, I accept the invitations to blessings, and I receive them in a good way. Blessings do not hurt anyone and as I say they are never in excess.

the second anecdote of the day after arriving by bike as a passenger, I thought that I had already fulfilled the quota of the day in terms of anecdotes,   !!! nope !!!  Another one was waiting for me, it was 6:30 pm just before sunset, when the activity was felt, a character approached me, he was about 55 years old, grey hair, with a bun, skinny with tremendous blue eyes and wearing a sarong, totally atypical of the physical appearance of the Burmese He got me into a conversation, showed me a notebook full of opinions in all the languages ​​that he took out of his bag and knowing that I was from Chile, took his time and found a comment from a Chilean and asked me to translate it for him, which I did. His perfect English made sense when I learned that he studied in an English school, remember that Myanmar was an English colony and surely his father was responsible for those big blue eyes…. I was caught off guard with all that ecstatic experience, from being in the Pagoda. He caught me off guard, and he caught me unawares, and he got me. A great connoisseur  of the history of the Pagoda, and he was racing through the information. He told how I had to take the pictures, and forced me to take from certain angles  until he took the phone from my hand, and he took pictures.  Sorry, these are my pictures Nope it had to be those of the tourists, for example the crows on the domes caught my attention and the statues were a contrast that produced a certain grace. He challenged me, I don't know how many times, because I was stuck on something and when I didn't follow him, he cracked, he didn't stop talking, I took it lightly, because the truth is that he knew a lot but lacked manners, he was quite a character. He asked me about my birthday, the day of the week I was born and what time I was born!!!! WTF how could I possibly know the time of my birth  he did a mental calculation in less than a minute, he told me I was born on a Wednesday ... ... haha, haha.  ???? I've never checked it but maybe now I will. He forced me without giving me the right to say no to bless the statue that corresponded to me by year and day of the week to pour water over the pool indicated with an image of an elephant or a snake, I do not remember, because  I was paying attention to his instructions ... . hahaha ...   a blessing for you, he told me that I couldn’t deny myself. Since I am so old I had to make the blessings with two wells at the same time instead of one like my pairs on the side, 10 times, which is not a hundred years, how did he get to that number ?????? I did it, then the same in another statue in the same place and to finish off in front of the pool another blessing. now I had to pray, forget about skipping the ritual, there was no way out,   here we go submitting was the only thing to do. He would tell me what to say in English, then I would repeat the same thing without understanding the words at times, I would repeat them as well as possible, and he challenged me that it was not THE RIGHT PRONUNCIATION, Nope, and he admonished me again. I laughed, and you could tell that I was laughing, it was impossible to hide it, I was not laughing at the rite, but at the way he treated me.   LOL  

At sunset, he took me to see the sparkling of the precious stones, If I had been alone it would have been impossible to know where to find and less chance of seeing them, it was at a particular angle. With the character whose name I don’t remember, I learned a lot and I forgot a lot because he was talking so much that I also lost concentration. We said goodbye around eight o'clock, and I left feeling humoured and very exhausted.

I end with this photo, my arms open in an attitude of admiration for so much beauty, and I am  grateful to have been a witness to it all.