On our first day in Mandalay, the Mahammumi Pagoda, a Buddhist temple, had a lively atmosphere with many families paraded in their best attire.

Colorful Parade

On our first day in Mandalay , the Mahammumi Pagoda is a Buddhist temple. The atmosphere was very lively, and many families dressed in their best clothes lined up in procession.

The most eye-catching sacred object is the golden Buddha wrapped in gold foil. In Myanmar , it is customary for devotees to place gold foil on Buddha statues or other sacred objects such as the famous gold stone during the program of our stay. The giant statue is covered with thousands of extremely fine gold foils, which are very delicate and covered with gold foil several centimeters thick. Men are the only ones authorized to cover sacred statues with precious metals.

Mandalay's Gold Leaf

The gold plates are made in a nearby area, where dozens of small factories turn small ingots into thousands of ultra-thin plates after hours of work, during which time The metal was hammered onto wooden supports. The aim is to flatten these sheets as much as possible so they will expand before being cut by delicate female hands. Different stages of this transformation are allowed to be punctuated by the knocks of workers, each with a specific role to play in the transformation process.

Royal Palace

At the beginning of the afternoon, we headed to the north of the city to reach the Royal Palace. Formerly a royal residence, the British Governor-General occupied the premises from 1885 during the British colonization of the country. It was destroyed in 1945 and rebuilt with forced labor in 1990.

Here the hustle and bustle of the city seems to calm down as we are just a stone's throw from the city centre. The years of the military dictatorship are still visible through the omnipresent presence of the military in the palace, which remains uninhabited. Some parts of the palace are even closed to the public.

Starting from the entrance, you have to travel a kilometer before you reach the various buildings that make up the entire palace. Several wooden buildings have withstood the ravages of time and faded, but the interior beauty is neat. The place is nothing special, but the green surroundings of the palace kept us away from the noise and dust of the city center.

Pagoda, Pagoda

The sun at 1 pm is too hot, but we still have to visit the pagoda. We each rode a motorbike which was a cheap way to get around the pagodas which form a major attraction in the country. Hoping not to get indigestion from these places of worship, we ended up going to the new pagodas: Paya Kyauktawgyi, Paya Sandamuni and Paya Kuthodaw.

On the heights of Mandalay Hill

Our day ends with a climb to Mandalay Hill, a pagoda with a height of 230 meters that attracts devotees and tourists who want to enjoy the panoramic views of the city and its surroundings. Towards sunset it was incomplete due to a thin layer of mist in the sky which we suspected was caused by pollution and dust.

After returning expressly to our hotel to confirm the program for the next day, we left to satisfy our stomachs at a restaurant frequented by locals not far away.