I’m in love with a MANdalay!

What a day. I thought when I got back to my hotel that I was definately going to collapse. After eating street food all day, forgetting to drink water, and sitting on the back of a motorbike all day, my body had pretty much had it. I knew I was gonna get the runs eventually, and I guess today was my lucky day. But not until the end.

I digress.

Yesterday, the boat finally reached Mandalay. We pulled up on shore around 4 pm, and I walked up the river bank with a couple from Holland that I had met on the boat, the only other foreigners aboard. We had become good friends in the last couple hours of the trip, looking over my guidebook together and talking about places to go, things to see, etc etc. I don’t know their names, but they’re lovely. Well, they had called hostels before leaving Bagan, and every place was full. No rooms. Nowhere. So we decided to share a ride into town, and just walk around together trying to find lodging. Whatever, it’s not important.

Basically, we took a ridiculous half hour rigshaw ride through terrifically dangerous traffic, and ended up on the cornder of 86th and 25th street. That meant nothing to me, but I noticed the street signs were in English. Anyway, we walked into the first hotel we saw, the Royal Hotel (hah), and there were two rooms open. A single and a double. Awesome. I’ve been TOO lucky. Dude behind me in line, not so lucky.

Anyways, $12, and I have a room all to myself, my own bathroom, and air con! Woah man, moving up in the world!

So I was heading to an internet cafe last night, and a guy approached me. He didn’t have bananas.

“Hello!” Blah blah, we had the usual, Where are you from, are you married, conversation and I told him I had to hurry and get to an internet cafe. I knew it would be closing soon. I showed him in my book where I was headed, and he said, “Oh no. Foreigner price. I take you to local place. Free. Get on.”

I hopped on his motorbike and he dropped me off somewhere in the middle of the city.

“Meet me at 9 in the morning outside the hotel. We go on adventure.”

Thus began my fun with Angelay.

I am a bit too pooped (in more ways than one) to write details, but I will let the photos speak for themselves. We spent the whole day together today, driving around Mandalay and surrounding areas. It was incredible. He took me everywhere I would never have known to go. He decided I needed a makeover, so I got the traditional Burmese makeup applied by some shop owners in the middle of nowhere. We saw a bunch of monks lining up for meal-time (which was nice at first, but then I encountered the hoards of tourists literally snapping close up photos of the monks faces while they were trying to eat. We left shortly thereafter.)

We ate amazing food that I wouldn’t have known how to order. He let me crash his motorbike. My friends from Holland crashed a rigshaw into our motorbike. We crashed a wedding. Actually, two. I got lost. He was amazing. After my makeover, everyone I passed told him in Burmese how beautiful I am. He said not to talk about his sister that way. He bought me dinner. I bought him gas. We talked about our families. I choked on a chicken bone. It was all lovely. He told me he would never let his sister get her lip pierced, so I should take it out. We went to the river to watch the sunset. We will meet tomorrow at 6 pm for a night adventure, and then he will take me to the train at 4 am the next day.

I am delighted again to be in this country. After the tourist-crazed adventure in Bagan, this is quite the break I needed. Tomorrow, I plan on doing absolutely nothing. Well, except for sneaking into the pool at a five-star hotel down the street. I’m back to life.

And yes, the toilet here is clean.