Day Trip Detour to Kekku

Monks lining up for rice in Taunggyi

I don't like to plan in advance when I travel. If you have everything all planned out beforehand, there's no room left for the cool place you hear about from a fellow traveler en route. Or how do you know in advance whether or not you will want to spend four days in a certain place? Even in high season here, as long as I'm one day ahead of myself in terms of buses or hotels, it's been fine. Well, okay, there was that one night I had to sleep in the lobby of the Royal Bagan Hotel, but that was a miscalculation of how long the bus was going to take. And I was actually really comfortable!

I was somewhat undecided about what to do with the couple of days before I had to be in Yangon for my flight home. It was going to be a very rushed trip to go trekking in Loikaw, but I really wanted to, so I thought I would try anyway. It's not very touristy, and as of the last Lonely Planet, had been opened to foreign independent travelers only recently.

I was in a travel agency asking the guy about buses to Loikaw when a woman came in and asked about taxis to Kekku.

He was on the phone with the bus company getting information about ticket availability, when I started talking to the woman..

"What's in Kekku?" I asked.

"Oh!" she said. "I met a Spanish woman who said you have to go. There are all of these pagodas, and then when the wind starts, all the bells chime."

She showed me a photo. It looked pretty stunning. She was looking for other people to share the cost of the transport.

"I might be interested in going." I told her.

By the time the travel agent got off the phone, I said to him, "I may go to Kekku with her." At lunchtime, I texted her to tell her that I wanted to join in the day trip.

I joined Rose (Guatemalan Canadian), Naomi (Japan), and Karin (Germany) on the day trip. Naomi had seen a travel promotion video that included Kekku, and Kekku was one of the reasons why she had come to Myanmar! Every traveler has that one thing-- the thing they came to do that for some reason captured their imagination and got stuck in their head. Sometimes you just see one photo and think, I *have* to see that. This was that thing for Rose and Naomi.

We set off early because Rose was determined to spend as many hours as possible at Kekku and stay for sunset. But I thought that some of the most interesting parts of the day were on the way to Kekku. We stopped at the market in Taunggyi, a market in a village between Taunggyi and Kekku, a village cattle market, then a celebration at a school. 

Flower seller at market in Taunggyi

Cattle market in village

Pa-O Women Greeting each other at Market in village

The celebration was a combination of an awards ceremony for the highest performing students and a student performance show. The whole village had turned out, and as soon as they saw us, we were guided to the seats of honor at the front. Our plan to stop by for a quick second was foiled... This is an adorable video of pre-schoolers vogue-ing!!

Students performing

The whole community came out to watch the awards and performances

Lunch as guests of honor with the teachers

Then the headmistress invited us to have lunch with her and the teachers. Watching the performances with the villagers and then lunching with them was a highlight of the day. 

After all of the detours, we finally reached Kekku. I knew we had arrived because there was a collective gasp from my fellow travelers. Kekku was calm and beautiful. There are 2,638 pagodas in Kekku, all built just within a few feet of each other. I don't know why, but there were only a handful of tourists.

Every place I visit in Myanmar that is still un-touristed, I think will be overrun in a couple of years. it was easy to get lost wandering in the field of pagodas, listening to the tinkling bells on the umbrellas. It was so quiet you could hear the brushing sound of the brooms of workers sweeping the ground... Peaceful.

Our guide explained to us that Pa-O people are descended from a dragon mother and a alchemist father. Their headdress is an homage to the head of a dragon and the five layers of their formal black or dark blue clothing are like a dragon's scales. 

Our Pa-O tour guide explaining the origin of the head wrap

There is something so poetic about that. 

You have to love a people who have magic in their blood.