Smiling people

November 17, I head into Myanmar. The Chinese side gives me a hard time, because of my visa extension in Shanghai, which seems to be extended 10 days late. After half an hour they finally let me go to the Myanmar side. Here I call the number I received and after a while Mr. Tonka shows up to get me into the country. Once in a while I am asked to sign something and after more than an hour I am in. My bike already was on the roof of the taxi. I only have to pay the absurd amount of 150 euro to the travel agent of which the largest part will go to the regime I am sure. Then a taxi takes me and mr Tonka, who is a small fragile guy, instead of the big bulky association I have with this name. If I want to stop somewhere I have to ask Mr. Tonka and he will decide if we can. At the end of the afternoon I am released from my babysitter when I am dropped off at 1 of the 2 hotels I am allowed to stay in Lashio.

I have not noticed much of the regime, we had 2 checkpoints, but it seemed they could have been avoided if I had wanted to if I had been cycling on my own. I saw a university in the middle of nowhere, Mr. Tonka told me the regime deliberately is placing them there to move students out of the city, as they are the main source of its critics. The next day I am so happy, I sing, hum, whistle and greet people non-stop. The people seem to be happy to see me, before I see them they greet me with “hello”, “good-bye” or “ok” and all are giving me a big smile. Even the group of people working on the side of the road, with 2 guards with semi-automatic watching them, give me a warm welcome. Not far before Hsipaw I cross a bridge with next to it another bridge on the bottom of the river, the truck that probably caused the break still on it. When I try to make a picture I am told to keep on cycling. The guide had told me a nice place to stop was Hsipaw, he pronounced it as “chebor” so when I went trough Hsipaw I did not recognize it. When I ask for directions to Hsipaw 10 miles later the guy thinks I am nuts, I decide cycle 20 miles more for the next town. There I am invited by a kid to sleep at his house. He and his friends take me out with their scooters, to a place where a band plays (very badly) and after that to hot springs.

The next day I pay a visit to Mr. Thapa, the boys’ English teacher when I head in the direction of Mandalay. He is glad to see me again and offers me an instant coffee. Nearly everything is instant in Myanmar. After 15 mile I have to go steep down to the river, I can already see the road up after the river. When going down I can not avoid cycling over a snake that also was going down. It was making big s’s and made a launch for my rear tire but it was to slow, probably injured as well. This reminds me to be careful when I go off the road.

A couple of miles before Pyin Oo Lwin I see a beautifull Paya on the top of a hill. I decide to put in the extra effort and have a closer look. After only 10 meters my rear wheel hits the frame. Initially I think one of the bolts was not tightened enough, but this does not seem the problem. The ax is broken. On foot I cover the last 4 miles, to the city, I decide to skip the visit of the paya. It already is dark when I arrive at the bicycle repairman. A 12 year old kid puts in a new ax. I think he does a lousy job, the owner tells me to return the next morning when it is light and he will do it properly. The first four hotels I visit I am not allowed to stay, because they do not have a permit to accommodate foreigners. The fifth does allow me. In the evening I am invited by a bunch of girls to join their dinner. I get these honours because they think I am handsome and want to be my girlfriend. It is good for the ego, but after a while I get enough of it and leave. When leaving the restaurant I nearly break my knee as I drop one and half meters down in the sewer right outside. Fortunatly only my shoes are covered in shit. One of the cool things of Myanmar is that transportation relies still very much on animals. In the western world you would see this kind of transportation only used by tourists, here it is widely used by the locals.
In Mandalay I manage to play a game of football again with some local kids. We play barefooted on a sandy field covered with rocks. Winner remains on the pitch. After an hour, still undefeated I leave with hurting feet. I book the slow boat to Bagan which leaves the next morning at 5:30AM. In and around Bagan I make a little trip by bike with fellow travelers through to look at some of the thousands of paya’s. At first Hilton, an Aussie, takes us on a route to where we see no paya’s at all. If it had not been for Helen, from Norway we would have cycled a couple of hours without seeing one. Now we turn and go down the hill to places where there are paya’s in spades. Here we are reunited with the English couple we had lost earlier, they knew where they were going. At the end of the afternoon we are racing to get to a paya we can climb to see the sunset from. Now we loose Hilton, but we all meet again in town. Helen is leaving at 4:30AM next morning and decides not to go to sleep before that. Hilton and I decide to keep her company aslong as a couple of beers join the company as well. Before we know it is time to say goodbye. The harder part of travelling. I go to sleep for a couple of hours, before I leave also. Before I can leave I have to try to solve the problem with the middle sprocket. It's tooth seem to worn to grip the chain. Ofcourse I cannot do anything about it and leave anyway. After a few km the largest sprocket goes too, which leaves me only the smallest. In combination with the use of only the 3 lightest ones at the back, makes cycling a maddening experience, especially downhill. At the end of the afternoon I finally find a man who has something lying from an old bike. He puts it on and tests it for me. Considering the options he does a good job, but I am only able to use only the 2 smallest sprockets and the crank is bend, which makes pedalling a bit incoonvenient. Still it beats cycling in the lightest gear all the time. It is already dark when I am invited to stay at someones house. Half the village comes by to have a look at the white guy. Unfortunately also a government oficial comes by and I can see he makes my host uneasy. I decide to leave. It is pitch dark and I do not see anything. I cycle in some potholes before I finally find a sandy spot to put up my musquito net. I am afraid to stop in a grass because of the snakes. The next morning I check my front fork and what I expected is true, broken again. I can still cycle with it, but obviously have to be careful with higher speeds and bumps. I decide not to brake with the front brake. Without much problems I manage to reach Magway.