MYANMAR (4/10/2007 - 26/10/2007)

Finally we landed in this country and in the afternoon we reached
Mandalay.
There were a few tourists walking in the streets, all the
internet cafe' were shut down during the protest by the crazy government.
We couldn't get money from the ATMs so we
changed our dollars in the shops.
All people were so friendly with us despite inside their eyes we
saw sadness.

Inside the country there are only a few roads where foreigners are allowed.
Along the way we met lots of nice friendly people. Unfortunately in many hotels we couldn't sleep, the owners weren't allowed to accept tourists.
Sometimes we rode more than 170 kms in order to find a place where to sleep.
We had our tent but in Myanmar it's much
better to find an "allowed" place where to sleep.
We stopped some days in Bagan in order to visit the thousands of Buddhist temples in that small area. The lake Inle surrounded by mountains and Bago. At the end we reached Yangon.

During the day Yangon was chaotic and noisy but after 10 PM
there was curfew and all people closed their shops and
went back home.

Before leaving Myanmar we could use internet because the
protest was finished.

Many people have been killed, many
monks have been arrested and the government is still working
in the same way as before. Nothing happened!
Incredibly the West doesn't care about that.
There's no petrol, no jewels, only rice and few people...
No business for the West!

26/10/2007: We flew into Kolkata (India).


Claudio and Patrizia