အီစတာ မွန်
A one-side story is never considered complete because there will be a few missing pages – Jonathan.
At the end of the day, as we fell into separate beds, exhausted, I came to the realisation that we agreed on nothing and made no compromises, if only for or if there were.
I returned to MRA. Not alone, but with Ester.
I am always a little scared when I finally visit a place I’ve always wanted to see. I can’t help but think the place will never be as good as my anticipation of it. But MRA is an exception; this town never disappoints me, regardless of the times I’ve visited.
It’s now early March, but we still feel the pleasantness in the morning air. When I came here three months ago, I woke up to muggy mornings, the light conquering the town, seemingly impenetrable layer of haze that bathes the streets in huge orange, gold and yellow. Now the setting has changed; the bare tree branches fill the atmosphere, giving us a sense of nostalgia that summer is coming.
My first mistake was thinking we could walk to all-must-go places. By the time we had left Koe Thaung temple, the sun was at its highest degree. The back of my shirt was damp with sweat, but I ignored the heat and had not slowed my pace to accommodate it. I was enjoying the walk. I did not quicken my steps, but Ester fell behind me.
At one point, I slowed down to let Ester catch up with me; her blank face, I saw, reminded me of a meme I came across on the web that said, “I do not need to say it bro but read the subtitle on my face.” I could not read her mind, but I could only take a wild guess and make assumptions here. She was, obviously, pissed off.
I love arts & photography, but I do hate to spare my precious time especially when we are visiting medieval towns like MRA which is famous for its magnificent religious structures. All I want is to stop, stare, and wonder in awe at them. At the same time, I like to let my imaginations run wild and travel back in time to visualise their original structures before they had been badly weathered, in the worst case, damaged by humankind's negligence.
I returned to MRA. Not alone, but with Ester.
I am always a little scared when I finally visit a place I’ve always wanted to see. I can’t help but think the place will never be as good as my anticipation of it. But MRA is an exception; this town never disappoints me, regardless of the times I’ve visited.
It’s now early March, but we still feel the pleasantness in the morning air. When I came here three months ago, I woke up to muggy mornings, the light conquering the town, seemingly impenetrable layer of haze that bathes the streets in huge orange, gold and yellow. Now the setting has changed; the bare tree branches fill the atmosphere, giving us a sense of nostalgia that summer is coming.
My first mistake was thinking we could walk to all-must-go places. By the time we had left Koe Thaung temple, the sun was at its highest degree. The back of my shirt was damp with sweat, but I ignored the heat and had not slowed my pace to accommodate it. I was enjoying the walk. I did not quicken my steps, but Ester fell behind me.
At one point, I slowed down to let Ester catch up with me; her blank face, I saw, reminded me of a meme I came across on the web that said, “I do not need to say it bro but read the subtitle on my face.” I could not read her mind, but I could only take a wild guess and make assumptions here. She was, obviously, pissed off.
I love arts & photography, but I do hate to spare my precious time especially when we are visiting medieval towns like MRA which is famous for its magnificent religious structures. All I want is to stop, stare, and wonder in awe at them. At the same time, I like to let my imaginations run wild and travel back in time to visualise their original structures before they had been badly weathered, in the worst case, damaged by humankind's negligence.
I like to believe
that the main sponsor of these religious structures, the king himself here, would have, no doubt, taken pride in them, perhaps longed for compliments from the people in the future, us, and to inspire with awe of his marvellous
achievements powered by thousands of slaves, and the legacy he left behind but what do we, us in the future now, do? We snap here and there and leave nothing but rubbishes & destructions. Let alone the admiration.
It got my nerve when she repeatedly asked me to snap the same shots at the Shite Thaung temple. I could no longer hide the frustrations that I said out loud; my patience was growing thin. I knew I fell from grace then and that I had to let the steam out, and when I was able to recollect myself, I picked up a small bright yellow bayan leaf I found on the temple platform and gave her as a token of peace.
The last day came, and I persuaded her to get out of the bed and take a walk around the neighborhood where we were staying. It was a lovely walk, at least for me, and a pleasant evening. We joked about the ad we saw that was about the T-tine rental service; it was the Burmese word T-tine that I did not understand what it meant nor heard of before.
It’s like a scaffold, she assured me. We have got a word for scaffold in Burmese so what is T-tine. The confusion remains unsolved in me.
It got my nerve when she repeatedly asked me to snap the same shots at the Shite Thaung temple. I could no longer hide the frustrations that I said out loud; my patience was growing thin. I knew I fell from grace then and that I had to let the steam out, and when I was able to recollect myself, I picked up a small bright yellow bayan leaf I found on the temple platform and gave her as a token of peace.
The last day came, and I persuaded her to get out of the bed and take a walk around the neighborhood where we were staying. It was a lovely walk, at least for me, and a pleasant evening. We joked about the ad we saw that was about the T-tine rental service; it was the Burmese word T-tine that I did not understand what it meant nor heard of before.
It’s like a scaffold, she assured me. We have got a word for scaffold in Burmese so what is T-tine. The confusion remains unsolved in me.
It was by mistake that day we stumbled ourselves in one of those five Man Aung stupas, wherein the small paintings are hung on both sides along the pavilion entrance to the sitting Buddha. The paintings are mainly depicting the various Buddhist hells in glorious detail, the cartoon-like images of people being tortured uniquely.
Among them, two paintings got my attention. A woman was fed hot something to her, which could have been lava, and a few women around her lay
helplessly surrounded by hellhounds. One could never guess the reason behind them. In another painting, a man is in an upside-down position; his feet are tied down. Two hellhounds in the form of human beings saw the guy’s private part,
to which Ester explained is for the attackers, who had committed sexual assaults/harassment in their previous life. A worthy point to note.
Our adventure stopped in Pa Ya Paw stupa, the story of which is another subject of confusion. Again, along the entrance to the sitting Buddha are the paintings depicting the story of how the Buddha statue was found in the river. I tried to read one or two of the descriptions I found beneath the paintings and could have mispronounced a few words and phrases. She made the brouhaha over my Myanmar Reading and I felt fucked-up. I put the blames on Pali.
Our adventure stopped in Pa Ya Paw stupa, the story of which is another subject of confusion. Again, along the entrance to the sitting Buddha are the paintings depicting the story of how the Buddha statue was found in the river. I tried to read one or two of the descriptions I found beneath the paintings and could have mispronounced a few words and phrases. She made the brouhaha over my Myanmar Reading and I felt fucked-up. I put the blames on Pali.
On the way back, I told her about my love for frangipani, their aromatic essence in which I could drown eternally.
Silence.
All I felt was the heat, and I was bloody thirty. The angry sun had no mercy on us.
Ester slipped her shoes back on at the bottom of the stairway that leads up to Htuk Kant Thein temple. I asked her why she did not wear the socks.
........
I saw a man selling ice-lolly sticks in nearby open rest-house. I asked her if she would fancy an ice-lolly.
I had that familiar conviction that the war was about to be over.
မြောက်ဦး နေသည် ပူ၏။
ကျနော် ရင်သည် ပူ၏။
မောင့်နှမ အီစတာ ရေခဲမုန့် သွားစား ရအောင်။