Pagodas embody the Buddhist soul of Myanmar. Repositories of physical relics from Buddha himself, they are also places for individual worship and communal socializing. During the 9th to 13th centuries there were over ten thousand of them. Today some two thousand remain --time, war, nature and neglect having taken their toll. They are ideal places to see Burmese art, architecture, sculpture, history, legend, religion, and social life all in one place. We visited three.
Sule Pagoda, built during Buddhs's lifetime, is smack dead center in downtown Yangon. It was the central point from which the British laid out the street plan of Rangoon, the former name for Yangon. It houses a single strand of Buddha's hair.
A large industrial looking metal-roofed shed, Chauktatgyi Pagoda was built in 1899 and moved to its present site in 1966. Its Reclining Buddha is 66 meters long and 16 meters high. That's 22 stories long and 5 stories high guys and gals. And that length is two-thirds the height of the Shwedagon Pagoda that so awed Kipling as he approached Rangoon by boat.
Shwedagon Pagoda has to be experienced to be believed. It's construction, a reliquary for five of Buddha's hairs, dates to 588 B.C.E, though historians believe it was built by the Mon people sometime between the 6th and 10th centuries. It is one of the more revered sites within Myanmar. It's internal design reflects Myanmar astrological beliefs and rituals as well as Buddhist. The atmosphere inside is one of constrained pandemonium --citizens on cell phones, monkeys climbing the spires, young people getting to know each other in its more secluded public spaces.
There is another spiritual aspect of Burmese life interwoven with Buddhism: nats, forest and mountain spirits who can intervene in one's life fortunes and misfortunes. There are 37 principal nats --from which the URL of this blog was taken. But that is for a later post..
The slideshow below also shows some more secular aspects of Burmese life in Yangon. These are described in the captions to the photos.
Sule Pagoda, built during Buddhs's lifetime, is smack dead center in downtown Yangon. It was the central point from which the British laid out the street plan of Rangoon, the former name for Yangon. It houses a single strand of Buddha's hair.
A large industrial looking metal-roofed shed, Chauktatgyi Pagoda was built in 1899 and moved to its present site in 1966. Its Reclining Buddha is 66 meters long and 16 meters high. That's 22 stories long and 5 stories high guys and gals. And that length is two-thirds the height of the Shwedagon Pagoda that so awed Kipling as he approached Rangoon by boat.
Shwedagon Pagoda has to be experienced to be believed. It's construction, a reliquary for five of Buddha's hairs, dates to 588 B.C.E, though historians believe it was built by the Mon people sometime between the 6th and 10th centuries. It is one of the more revered sites within Myanmar. It's internal design reflects Myanmar astrological beliefs and rituals as well as Buddhist. The atmosphere inside is one of constrained pandemonium --citizens on cell phones, monkeys climbing the spires, young people getting to know each other in its more secluded public spaces.
There is another spiritual aspect of Burmese life interwoven with Buddhism: nats, forest and mountain spirits who can intervene in one's life fortunes and misfortunes. There are 37 principal nats --from which the URL of this blog was taken. But that is for a later post..
The slideshow below also shows some more secular aspects of Burmese life in Yangon. These are described in the captions to the photos.
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