Infrastructure in Myanmar needs a serious upgrade. For decades the government had not really bothered investing in much, neither education, health care nor maintained basic road infrastructure very well. There are some ferries on the Irrawaddy, but they are slow and the only viable route is Mandalay-Bagan or vice versa. As trains are actually from... Continue Reading →

Myanmar remains one of the poorest countries in Asia – approximately 26% of the country’s 51 million people live in poverty. The isolationist policies and economic mismanagement of previous governments have left the country with countless problems including poor infrastructure, corruption, underdeveloped human resources, and inadequate access to capital, just to name a few. About... Continue Reading →

After enjoying interesting but long bus rides in Myanmar I decided to push luck even further: hop on the train from Kalaw to Shwenyuang, the closest station to Inle Lake. Unfortunately I was alone today. Because of a small foot injury I could not join Tanja on a two-day trek through the hills. I am... Continue Reading →

You are in Mandalay, the second biggest city of Myanmar and you hear automated voices in Japanese shouting "this vehicle is moving backwards". You jump into a taxi and another Japanese voice greets you: "please enter the correct memory card for the GPS navigation". Whilst this might amuse curious tourists, these Japanese voices are symptoms... Continue Reading →

As part of a pre-arranged tour from Mandalay we visited the Maha Ganayon Kyaung Monastery, which is one Myanmar's most important monastic education centers. It was advertised to us that we were able to watch the monks have lunch at around 10.15. Watching monks each lunch?!? If this sounds a bit weird - let us... Continue Reading →

In Myanmar you pay with "kyat". One kyat is not worth a lot though, currently one Euro gets you about 1600 of them... 😄 Since just a few kyat don't get you anywhere, there are also only notes and no coins. The smallest ist 50 kyat (about 3 €-cent) and the biggest 10.000 (bit more... Continue Reading →

We hopped on a flight from Kunming in Southwest China to Mandalay, Myanmar's 2nd largest city. A one hour flight and you are in a completely new world! You thought China is chaotic? Well, check out Mandalay! 😄 Crazy traffic on the street, a lot of garbage everywhere, people who live in shacks next to... Continue Reading →