Arriving in Yangon

In the morning, we took full advantage of the noon check out. I even got to Skype with my mom before we packed up really quick. We went out for a street breakfast: rice cakes, eggs and a banana cake.

The walk to the BTS was quite hot. On the second train a woman gave her seat to Ryan, seeing our giant bags. From the BTS, we got right on a bus to the airport for only 30 baht. Quite the unexpected deal after taxi fares around the city yesterday.

The lines to check in were pretty good and fast so we could ditch our now 16 (Ryan's) and 18 (mine) kilogram bags. The clay pot was really weighing me down, but it did fit in the bag. We checked out the food options and settled on a place with a menu page for vegetarians. Ryan enjoyed a crispy fried pork dish before mine was even out of the kitchen. Later, I had fried vermicelli noodles and veggies. On the other side of security, there turned out the be plenty of other options. Go figure. We gave into Dairy Queen and got brownie and Oreo blizzards. Not enough dairy in them to make me sick thankfully.

Our plane boarded half an hour late but the flight was pretty smooth. Myanmar had far less urban development from above than Thailand and China. Our e-visas got through without issue and the stamp even took up less room than it had two years ago. Ryan grabbed our bags and we found the guy with the Motherland 2 sign. He had a few more pick-ups to wait for before our van would be leaving.

I went to the ATMs and each one would go through the prompts with me but then tell me transaction failed. All three machines did this. I was beginning to get worried. At least, I found a city map during the attempts. Ryan went to try his card while I chatted with a couple from Spain and France who'd also been travelling since November. They'd seen India and Nepal. They'd loved Nepal which made me even more excited to go there in a few months. Ryan managed to withdraw from his account just fine, meaning it was my card and not the machines or TD Bank that had issues. At least we'd have some cash now and would figure out the rest later.

After a drive through the congested city on the unchanged bumpy roads, we arrived at Motherland 2, a guesthouse a bit removed from city centre. Yangon was a dusty city with a mix of new and old architecture. It was slowly under repair. Traffic ranged from bicycle rickshaws to trolleys, buses and cars.

At the guesthouse, we received free lime juice with sugar before handing over large amounts of kyat to pay for our room. Their bills came in pretty small denominations and they typically accepted US cash, though we weren't parting with ours yet. I fought with the wifi all night to try and look into my bank issues. No answers, but a lead to use skype to place collect calls. The internet cafe was closed till morning. I ate my vegetable sandwich and sulked while Ryan enjoyed his sweet and sour pork. I did get to do laundry through.