Memories of Myanmar

Myanmar is the largest nation in mainland Southeast Asia, home to around 51 million people. The country is surrounded on three sides by densely forested mountains and plateaus, and around one third of Myanmar's total perimeter forms an uninterrupted coastline of over a thousand miles along the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea.

I visited Myanmar in October last year and was immediately enchanted. Since returning home from my trip many people have asked about my favourite country. It's a question that is not easy to answer, as I loved each place I visited for completely different reasons, but Myanmar stands out in my memory as a country I will hold dear to my heart forever.

Mountains surrounding Hsipaw

There are many reasons for this. The landscape is beautiful and the people incredibly friendly. But it is perhaps a single evening that retains a hold over my many recollections from that month spent in Myanmar, taking place in a little village high in the mountains surrounding Hsipaw, a town in the Shan state in Eastern Myanmar. Many visit Hsipaw to undertake one of the many scenic, hillside treks, and we were no exception. We were around an hour into the walk, passing through some rice paddies on the outskirts of town when our friendly guide told us that there was going to be an annual festival in the village that night.

It was already a special day, as our trek that day coincided with my travel companion's one year travel anniversary. At sunset, we made our way up to the village temple. Already, a crowd of people from the surrounding villages had arrived ready for the festival. Monks prayed inside as people made offerings. Shortly afterwards, a drum beat began and the young people in the village began dancing in concentric circles, alternating between boys and girls. Some of the girls were in beautiful traditional clothes and danced with soft hand movements that mimicked the picking of tea, while the boys dancing was more vigorous, rhythmically kicking up their feet, their arms draped around one another.

Riding in the back of a pick up truck

Our guide encouraged us to join the women. We did our best to copy their grace and ease of movement. At intervals, the drumming ceased, the circles broke apart, and the boys rushed to stand in small groups in front of a girl they liked. The boys began singing traditional songs of love and romance, as the girls replied. No sooner had it stopped than the drumming began again, the circles reformed and the dancing resumed.

Our guide told us this was an annual matchmaking festival, a once a year chance for young people in the villages to meet and, just maybe, find the person they would marry. To be part of something like this, even for just an instant, is the reason we travel. It felt like a true honour to be there in that moment, to be present, alive and on the road.

That feeling was something of a theme during my time in Myanmar. Getting lost in the countryside and endless temples around Bagan, weaving our way through herds of cows and goats, climbing Mount Zwegabin in the searing afternoon heat to sleep overnight in a monastery, ascending higher and higher into the hills in the back of a small pick up truck, these are some of my favourite and most treasured memories of a trip that changed my life forever.

Waterfall, Hsipaw

A postcard from Hanoi

The midday sun beats down over Hanoi, a rare full appearance from its customary hiding place behind a thick pillow of urban smog. Sitting at its highest point, it bathes the lake below in a light that crowns the muddy water with a gentle shimmer.

Lying down in central Hanoi's Thống Nhất Park beneath an eclectic group of trees, leaves that hang languorously like snakes and coconut trees that reach towards a sky that has today honoured us with a shade of azure blue. Fishermen cast hopefully into the shallows of the lake, young lovers kiss tentatively beneath the shade. Pedalos drift across the water, undisturbed by the stillness of this warm March day.

This isn't the quintessential Hanoi scene, but the distant sound of traffic is an aural reminder of your place here in Vietnam's quirky, wonderful capital. A city of 7 million people, a thousand years of history, a university dating back to 1010, and the fastest growing GDP of any metropolis in the world. Known as 'a city of lakes', Hanoi's sometimes chaotic layout is juxtaposed by the presence of numerous parks, open spaces and swathes of verdant, ancient trees.

It's a city that oozes nonchalance, from its wide boulevards to its labyrinthine streets and claustrophobic alleyways. A feast for the senses, a place where a beer can cost less than 50 cents, but the cars parked outside can cost a lifetime more. Beautiful in its contradictions, sometimes reluctant to relinquish its secrets, but so rewarding when it does.

Sitting on the side of a busy street, motorbikes whizzing past, is a chance to escape the chaos, if only for a moment. The constant flow of glasses and plates of food, set to the soundtrack of friends catching up, backpackers trading travel stories and the cracking of sunflower seeds.

Hanoi is not just a city. It is truly a sensory experience. Stop by, pull up a stool. Enjoy.

Traditional tattoo methods in Southeast Asia

There was something about the rhythmic prod of the bamboo stick and the heat dissipating as the sun went down, that was peaceful, almost therapeutic. My first Thai bamboo tattoo was almost over. Thanks to the incredible craftsmanship and talent of the tattoo artist Kig, I was left with something I will treasure and travel with forever.

Getting a tattoo while on the backpacker circuit of Southeast Asia is something undertaken by many who pass through the region. I got my first ever tattoo in Cambodia and instantly fell in love with the experience. But while tattooing is understood to be a relatively new phenomenon in the west, it is an art form that has been practiced in Southeast Asia for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.

In the Philippines, tattooing has been an integral cultural practice for many centuries. Similar to the Thai bamboo tattoo proccess used today, the traditional Filipino method uses a sharp object such as a thorn or a piece of bone, metal or wood, attached to one end of a stick and dipped in wet charcoal. Traditionally a slow and painful method, sittings are usually short and a large tattoo can take months to complete. The tattoos are said to possess spiritual powers and magical qualities which give strength and protection, and to enhance women's beauty and fertility.

When the Spanish first arrived in the Visayan islands in 1521, they described the Filipino people they met as "painted people". With them, and the expansion of Christianity in the archipelago, traditional methods of tattooing began to die out. Nearly 500 years on, the practice is slowly being revived not just in the Philippines, but also by Filipino communities all around the world, such as the "Mark of the Four Waves Tribe" in Los Angeles, who have grown into a global network looking to revive Filipino heritage and traditional tattooing methods.

Traditional tattoo method in the Philippines

In Thailand, and to a lesser extent Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, Yantra tattooing is still widely practiced. Consisting of sacred geometrical, animal and deity designs, the tattoos are often accompanied by Pali phrases (the language of earlier Buddhist literature). These offer power, protection, fortune and charisma, among other qualities. In Thailand, these sak yan tattoos are usually given by spiritual or religious leaders, traditionally Buddhist monks, using a khem sak, a metal rod sharpened to point. The process of getting one is intensely spiritual, accompanied by chanting and prayers, while the placement on the body is said to have great significance, the closer to the head (the centre of the soul), the greater the power.

In Borneo, among the Kayan people, tattooists are usually women, a hereditary honour passed down from mother to daughter, whereas it is more commonly a patriarchal role in other groups such as the Dayak and the Iban. As a young male member of the Iban tribe, you would traditionally first receive the Bungai Terung, an eggplant flower, to mark the Bejalai tradition (a journey of knowledge and wisdom), where an individual would leave their longhouse to experience the world. While nature is overall the main focus of Bornean tattoo designs, tattoos among the Iban people act almost like a diary on the body, a record of journeys and life events recorded on the skin.

Across Southeast Asia, and particularly in Thailand, the traditional "stick and poke" techniques used in all three countries remains popular, not just in the spiritual contexts outlined above, but also in more mainstream tattoo culture. It is believed that the this method is less traumatic to the skin and heals faster than the modern, mechanised tattoo gun. However, the skill involved in both methods is one of the intrinsically enjoyable aspects of getting a tattoo. As someone who is not blessed at creating art, for me, watching a tattoo artist create something of indelible beauty on your skin is almost as satisfying as walking away with the design itself.