As a traveler, I usually embark on journeys to places I have never been to before. This rule, though, comes with a few exceptions. Among the places I returned to sooner than I had expected was Bagan in Myanmar. I always felt I had some unfinished business after I arrived home from my first trip there in March 2013. The itch to resolve that became the sole reason why exactly three years later, I penciled in a plan for yet another jaunt to this ancient city. This time, I arrived as a solo traveler and armed with a lengthier period of time to explore this olden city crawling with centuries-old temples and pagodas.
My Return Trip to the Heritage and History Bursting Plains of Bagan, Myanmar
Got My Electronic-Motor Running
Riding an e-bike under the scorching sun of the summer month of March, I explored far and wide, stopping only to take photographs of the scattered ruins of many kingdoms' pasts. Yelling a series of "Wow" to the wind as my spirit rejoiced, I marveled at the spectacular and timeless vibe that lingered in that place. Enveloped by small pockets of towns fused with scores of small hotels and guesthouses, Bagan was inhabited by some of the friendliest and nicest people I had met. My experience this time around easily encompassed another memorable collective incursion into the history-rich plains of Bagan.
Passing through off-the-beaten sandy trails, I was able to visit some of the most obscure temples and pagodas and accomplished covering more ground. As vast and tenacious as the landscape of Bagan was, there was so much to see and discover. For five successive days, I awoke early before sunrise with an eagerness to explore. The bursting heritage and antiquity of this place served as the only motivation I needed.
Kingdom of Pagan
Bagan was known as an ancient city situated in the Mandalay Region of Myanmar. The ruins that then lay scattered in its golden, powdery plains were from the kingdoms that flourished from the ninth century until the thirteenth century, when it served as the capital of the Kingdom of Pagan—the very first kingdom that consolidated all the regions under one rule and was also credited with introducing Theravada Buddhism and establishing the Burmese ethnicity and culture across the whole of Myanmar. During the peak of that kingdom, more than ten thousand Buddhist pagodas, monasteries, and temples were built right on the vast Bagan plains.
After incessant invasion attempts by the Mongols, the Kingdom of Pagan eventually fell and the once glorious territory was reduced to pockets of settlements, at no point in history ever regaining its former glory. Old Bagan, however, became a central pilgrimage destination for Buddhist pilgrims, and a few hundred more temples and pagodas were built sometime between the thirteenth and twentieth centuries. Battling the forces of nature, such as cyclones and earthquakes, many structures were damaged through the neglect of time.
Today, over two thousand two hundred pagodas and temples serve as beautiful ruins and stunning reminders of that wonderful, storied past. Slowly opening up to tourists, the country of Myanmar had managed to conserve those significant relics by establishing the Bagan Archaeological Zone, which covered the entire Old and New Bagan regions. This conservation effort also helped put Bagan on the map of travelers worldwide and was seen by many then as comparable to Cambodia’s Angkor Wat complex. As a self-described archaeology junkie, I believed this city could hold its own candle and dished out a unique appeal to travelers like me who desired historic ruins and magnificent scenery to photograph.
Traveler Meet-Up and the Bagan Sunset
Upon settling in at my cabin at Bagan Lodge and Resort, I met with a Lithuanian girl named Egle through a mobile app and decided to meet up in the afternoon. Egle, I later learned, worked at a nearby hostel called Ostello Bello. After downing one bottle of Myanmar beer, she told me about her "secret spot" to best watch the sunset. Renting an e-bike for each of us, we rode toward the less crowded temple she had been telling me about to watch the famed sunset of Bagan.
Not long after, I found myself sitting atop a temple with Egle alongside three other travelers. The seconds that passed by became a moment of quiet solitude. As I stared at the beautiful undertaking of nature when the golden, round shape of the sun slowly dived into the fiery horizon of the sky, marveling at the visual feast, I whispered a prayer of gratitude for being there at that exact moment. "I don't want to be anywhere else," I told myself. "This is what I want to do for the rest of my life."
The solemn sunset and the striking visuals it brought injected my insight into this place with an increased fascination. The next day, I would start and repeat the process for the next five days. I would rev my limited e-bike engine to fifty kilometers per hour and battle the unforgiving heat with the hissing wind kissing my face. Temple after temple, pagoda after pagoda; I hopped from one to another, taking self-portraits and meeting locals along the way.
The Timelessness of Bagan
Other than Egle, I was fortunate to cross paths with a number of locals; each one displaying a genuine smile and a probing curiosity about my origin. "Where you from?" many of them would ask me. "Ah, Philippians!" they would repeat back to me after I told them, "from the Philippines." A lot of them sold souvenir items, but everyone engaged me in a friendly demeanor because most of them, other than wanting to earn from tourism, just wanted to practice their English by conversing with travelers. One young girl named Zuzo even tried teaching me a few phrases in Japanese and Spanish. "I don’t go to school, but I learn Japanese and Spanish from tourists," she told me. "Come, sit here, teach me your words in your country, too." I told her to remember the words "Salamat" and "Magandang Araw" if ever she meets another traveler from the Philippines.
In the succeeding days, whenever I passed by the corner where she set her stall selling cold beverages under a decade-old tree, she would always recognize me and wave her hand. On my last day, I stopped by to say goodbye and communicated to her that I might return the following year. "Next year, my store bigger," she told me in a confident manner. "I’m sure it will be," I replied as I gave her a thumbs up while I drove away aboard my e-bike.
My remembrances of Bagan had definitely occupied a larger portion of my memory bank. The timeless atmosphere prevailing over those desert plains brought forth an abundance of heritage and history. As a traveler eager for new knowledge, exploring that part of the world was becoming addictive. Just like how young Zuzo’s small stall would expand someday, I felt like the lure of this ancient city was becoming stronger for me as well.
