Myanmar 4 Days 4 Nights Trip

This Myanmar 4 days 4 nights trip was really an impulsive plan. I know AirAsia got promotion happening at that time but I didn’t actually want to book a ticket. I was just looking and clicking random routes! But you know how a(n) AirAsia promo is, when you want it the least, you actually get it. So there we go, a 1.2mio rupiah (around $100) return Kuala Lumpur – Yangon – Kuala Lumpur tickets for me and mom! Aha! *fanfare*

I read some blogs to figure out a great itinerary for our Myanmar 4 days 4 nights trip. My initial plan was to go around Yangon and take plane to Bagan and turn back to Yangon by bus. I even already booked the plane ticket. But as much as I want to push myself to maximize the time and take a trip outside Yangon, I finally cancelled the trip to Bagan.

From what I read, Yangon is like Jakarta in the 70s. Full of old vintage car and people going out in sarong. Part of it is true. People do wear some kind of sarong that they call Longyi (pronounced long-jyi) in a daily basis.

But vintage car? NONE!

When I first went out of the airport and got to the busy street of Pyay Road, I was wow-ed. All nice cars that you can see in Jakarta are there! From Mazda Premacy to Toyota Alphard; we even spotted one or two sports car on the road! Yangon has changed, it is totally not Jakarta in the 70s. It’s like Jakarta NOW (well except for the longyi part of course)!

Night 1:

We landed in Yangon at night, made our way to the hostel directly. After refreshing, we walked out a bit and saw Shwedagon Pagoda from afar. And then we walked back and had delicious Seafood Tom Yum at a less famous resto next to our hostel. A tip for you, try Myanmar style tom yum!! It tastes heavenly! I gotta say I even like Myanmar style tom yum better than the Thai style. 😀

Day 1 Night 2:

Cus we couldn’t make it to Bagan, Hmark Gyi, our personal fave driver – offered us to go to Bago instead. I didn’t know what’s in Bago but why not? Let’s go there! En-route, he asked what kind of place we like to visit? I said we like garden, and guess where he took us first?

Garden!

Well close..

A cemetery. 😛 Htaukkyan Second World War Allied War Cemetery, or Htaukkyan Cemetery for short.

After Htaukkyan Cemetery, off we went to Bago. Bago is a region around 68km from Yangon. It took us around 1.5hours to reach Bago. First, we visited Four Faces Buddha or Kyaik Pun Buddha Images. The image was huge yet the place was rather small, making it hard to take a good composed picture of the Buddha image. At around lunch time, we went to a nearest monastery. We were lucky, we arrived just in time for the food offering. More than 300 monks got in line and walked slowly. When we want to offer the food, they will open the container that they bring and let us put the food there. After that, all the monks will eat together at their humble dining room.

After dealing with our heart upon how humble the monks’ life and how exaggerate our life is, shame on us, we continued our journey to Shwe Maw Daw Pagoda, one of the most honored pagodas in Myanmar. We circumnavigated the Shwe Maw Daw Pagoda once and then off we went again to another place. This time to the Royal Palace where I just realized I got my own throne hall (eventhough it’s being renovated as per my visit). 😛

Then we went off to one of our favorite hidden-gem Hmark Gyi had taken us to: Longyi shopping!

We didn’t go to the big market to buy Longyi. Hmark Gyi was kind enough to go the extra miles to take us to one of the small home enterprise aside the city where they make all of the Longyi with their own hand, we even could see how it’s being produced. I opt for a yellow (of course) Longyi while mom went off the board buying more and more Longyi that you could ever think of. Hihi.

After Longyi shopping, we went again to our last spot for the day: the Shwe Tha Lyaung a.k.a the Golden Reclining Buddha image.

Day 2 Night 3:

We went around Yangon this time. First stop: Mahapasana Cave, where me and mom giggling looking at the jade and agate wall forming the aisle to get into the cave. If those Indonesia Agate Fans are here, they will surely faint and fly to stone heaven. Hihi. Me and mom are not a stone-fan and it always amuses us how people can be so cray over a stone. 😀

I cray over Ryan Gossling: something stone-cray people might not understand, so I guess that makes us even. 😀

After Mahapasana Cave, we went to the close-by Kaba Aye Pagoda. There are three layers of spaces in this pagoda; first is the exterior – an open-air area outside the main building, and then the first interior (if there’s such thing, I don’t know how to explain it well) but it’s the indoor circular aisle where people pray and circumnavigate, and then there is the hollow inside part where people pray in a more devoted ambiance.  I superlove the inside hollow of this pagoda. It reminds me of the chapel I often went to once. It is quiet, cold (thanks to the air conditioning), and just the right place to go to when you need to look within and brood over.

Finished our time at Kaba Aye Pagoda, we continued to Buddha Tooth Relic Temple where I circumnavigated the temple alone while mom waited at the side of the balcony part.

And then we continued to one of the two major lakes in Yangon: Kandawgyi Lake. As we arrived and took a stroll, we were amused by MANY (if not all) couples doing their ‘thing’ inside the car. If they don’t bring the car, then it’s the umbrella to shade! Hihi. Creative.

One of the highlight of our Myanmar trip is eating at Feel Myanmar Restaurant! Hmark Gyi took us there and we fell in love with this place so much that we went again on the next day. Hehe. I strongly suggest you to come to this Feel Myanmar Restaurant and eat there if you’re in Yangon!

Next stop: National Museum. I love this place cus it’s air conditioned (hihi) and their collection is actually good!

Last stop in Yangon for the day: Bogyoke Market, of course. We had a blast trying out clothes and buying souvenirs at this market.

We moved hostel today, I tried to get different ambiance so we moved to a different area. Our first hostel is close to Shwedagon Pagoda and our second one is close to Sule Pagoda. We walked to Sule Pagoda at night and enjoyed our dinner outside. TOM YUM FOR ME, OF COURSE! 😀

Bulan – The Tom Yum Warrior Princess! 😛

Day 3 Night 4:

Our free day! We woke up late and enjoyed our breakfast at our swag hostel’s restaurant. Then we hailed a cab and went to Inya Lake, mom’s been wanting to go there since yesterday.

We walked (and saw more couples behind the umbrellas) and enjoyed the lake. But it was pretty hot so we moved to Shwedagon Pagoda. BAD TIMING! It was so packed and the day was so hot! And after all the hotness, it was raining all of a sudden. (0_0)

We spent couple of hours at the Shwedagon Pagoda waiting for the rain to stop and enjoying the free wifi connection and then move again to find …. yes … Feel Myanmar Restaurant. Hahaha. It was hard to get there cus the taxi driver doesn’t do well with our English but nevertheless, we went there safe and sound and hungry and happy! Hahaha. Sadly though, Feel Myanmar Restaurant serves different dessert every day so the dessert we had the day before (Tharku, oh it’s so good I ate three portion of it. LOL), was nowhere to be found. Huhuhu. 🙁

It was raining again as we left the restaurant and went back to our hostel to take some rest, chat, and prepare our bag for tomorrow’s trip back.

Day 4:

Woke up early to catch a super early flight back to Kuala Lumpurt.

I know we missed many places on the usual traveler check-list, but clearly, we were content with what we did during this trip. After all, the fun of traveling with (my) mom lies in us spending time together! Ehehehe. 😀

So that’s all our Myanmar 4 days 4 nights trip recap.

It was short, yet it was memorable. <3

Senyum dulu ah.. 🙂

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For personal driver in Yangon, call Hmark Gyi +959421126446, or email him mharkgyi007@gmail.com or add him on Facebook here. He speaks great English and he clearly knows places to go. 😉