Travel Day Rangoon to Hsipaw (say “See-Paw”)

13th November

A frustrating day, taken up almost completely with travelling. Not without its moments of anxiety/concern over the workings of travel arrangements!

The journey to the airport was a lot better than when we arrived. The traffic was light (maybe because it was a Sunday) and we drove along some interesting roads, still observing the faded grandeur of sweeping boulevards and decaying colonial buildings. The general rule appears to be that if a building is in good repair it belongs to the army, though we were again assured that the new government is making changes, with free education and health provision being introduced, though of course necessarily at a somewhat slow pace.

We had time to stop for a quick photo at the gates of the house where Aung Sang Suu Kyi was held under house arrest. Naturally not much to see, being still hidden behind imposing steel gates, though in due course it will no doubt become something of a shrine. Interestingly, the house is only a few hundred yards from the US embassy.

The airport was a reminder of how third world airports used to be (and often still are). There were no mechanical aids for baggage handling, so almost the first thing that happened when we entered the departure area was that our bags were whisked away and weighed on a huge red Avery weighing machine and we were led to the check-in desk, leaving the luggage sitting in an undignified pile on the floor. Once checked in, baggage tags were magically attached to the correct bags and they vanished on the shoulders of the first of a succession of incredibly slight and fragile-looking porters with the build of children. My case, embarrassingly the heaviest of the lot, actually seemed larger and heavier than the man carrying it!

There were regular and strident announcements of impending departures – at least that was what we assumed them to be, though in common with travel announcements all over the world, these consisted of “Attention please, ladies and gentlemen” followed by completely unintelligible speech, rounded off with  “…immediately.” The system was assisted to an extent, however, by a succession of men carrying old-fashioned paging boards with “Flight… now boarding”, which ended up being the most reliable source of information, especially when a computer collapse, followed by an almost complete power blackout, rendered all other channels ineffective.

All the time the temperature and humidity both remained high, so we were in a seething mass of people being slowly rasted at 30˚C and 98% humidity. People, however, remained good-humoured and mutually supportive, and some rueful jokes and gestures were exchanged to keep the atmosphere relatively buoyant. I did, however, become a little weary of hearing repeated variations of the “Delay one hour” mantra.

The plane finally left several hours late, but at least we were on our way and in an air-conditioned environment. There was a moment’s concern as the (prop job) plane landed at the “wrong airport”, finding ourselves at Heho instead of Lashio, though for a short while we feared it was in fact Mandalay; but it transpired it was an interim stop which nobody had told us about and we stayed on the plane for the second leg.

On arrival at Lashio our bags were removed manually from the belly of the plane and left on the tarmac for a bit while the passengers all milled about taking selfies in front of the plane and wondering if we were meant to carry them ourselves. All was resolved when we were herded into the arrivals building and our passports were scrutinised and their details noted. There then followed a five-minute walk (without our bags) off the airport to a kind of concrete shelter where our bags were passed to us over a low wall and then taken to the car. Not quite sure of the thinking behind this ritual, but it seemed to appease some sort of concern amongst the Burmese travellers…

There followed a 2-hour journey in a minibus to our hotel in Lashio. Unfortunately, because of the flight delay, there was no time left “at leisure”, so we ate at the hotel (a bit of a mistake as it turned out) and went to bed, ready for the rigours of the next day.