Princess Panhwar Day 12 Trishaws in Danuphyu

Trishaws are actually known here as sidecars because the carriage is attached to the side of the bicycle. When we were being ushered to our individual rides I noticed that the seats were well padded with cushions and I thought how considerate this was. After I had been following in the trail of sidecars I realised this was a practical neccesity. The seats are designed for slim Burmese buttocks and ours would never fit in them so they pad the seat up so that we are just balancing on top. It was a fun ride after I stopped worrying about my slim but wirey peddler. Our group went to the market first following the usual practice of sending each group on a different order around the circuit. This is a more affluent town and the produce in the market was fresh and attractive in very colouful displays. From there we progressed to a cheroot workshop where we saw two versions being made. One was the cheaper option for the local farmers which was essentially a corn cob leaf rolled around the makings. We were told the risk of these was the potential to throw sparks which could burn holes in clothing. The others were more like the ones we see but still very cheap. A packet measured by what the packer could grasp in two hands cost $1 US.
The main focus of the trip this morning was a Monastery in the buildings which had been a University in colonial times. They were beautiful old buildings  which were now very underutilised. There are only 40 monks occupying a few of the buildings which were well maintained. There were quite a few others which are looking in need of maintenance. There was a significant difference between the building occupied by the Abbot which was beatifully painted and the one occupied by the novice monks which was minimally maintained. Ye Min our guide who has reached monk status but needs to earn a living explained that the Abbot is the highest status Monk in the area and known to be very strict. He said he thought the few novices who came here probably had a pretty miserable time with stict rules. He then told us about some of the hi jinks that the novices had managed at the monastery where he had trained. There were 700 monks and novices there so strict oversight was  not possible. Here there was a monument to General Maha Bandula who lead an army to the Burmese Indian border to prevent British invasion. Unfortunately the Brits out flanked him by approaching by sea and landing at what is now Yangong (Rangoon).
He was killed at this town when he hastily came south and the 1st Anglo Burmese War was lost.
There was a lecture in the afternoon about the country's natural resources and how the Chinese exploited the situation during the period when western countries including Australia imposed sanctions. The Chinese are still heavily involved to their continuing benefit.
Last night there was a concert performed by the crew for our entertainment. The performances were enthusiastic and ranged from comedy to group singing of popular western songs to traditional dance. We were all hauled up on the floor to participate  in the tradional New Year dance. Fortunately in the dim lighting and the crowd our fairly graceless efforts merged with the scene.