One of the things that fascinated my most in Myanmar is the daily ritual of seeking alms by monks and nuns. No matter where you are in the morning hours, there is every chance that you will come across monks or nuns walking in a long line with a bowl, seeking alms. They do this with great discipline, rarely talking to each other and never breaking a line. Nuns especially, with their bright rose-coloured attire stand out distinctly on the streets.
I have been seeing the sights of Yangon, Myanmar, and am enjoying my first look at the country. One of the first things that I did after arriving was to take a local train that took me through the rural outskirts of Yangon City. The trains here are much older and much slower than what we see in India. While a local commuter would long for something newer and faster, for a visitor, they are like a living history.
The air in the coach is very casual and easygoing. Many traders use the train to ferry their goods into and out of market. Stuff that I saw entering into the train that day included this large load of Bananas, plenty of vegetables, bedding materials and a huge white sack of which I do not know the content. Conversations with strangers was easy to initiate and was much enjoyed despite constraints of language.
Food vendors also keep moving in and out too. On sale were beetle-nut to chew, groundnuts, quail eggs, grapes and fried snacks.
Every year, some time during Dec-Jan months, the famous Pangong Lake in Ladakh freezes over and turns into a large field of ice. The azure waters of the lake are now trapped under a white skin. The mountains, barren and brown in the summer months, now have a sprinkling of snow that decorates their slopes. I made a visit to Pangong and the highlands around it, photographing the expanse of snow and the life that thrives even in these harsh conditions.
While it is a delight to watch the frozen lake, it takes some effort to get this far. The roads to Ladakh are closed in the winter months, with all the high passes buried under deep snow. The temperatures in the region dips to unbelievable lows, like -25C or lesser. Yet, the venerable BRO works all through the winter to keep the road from Leh to Pangong open, without whose efforts a visit would have been impossible.