The drive back was the exact reverse of the route south, we'd passed several rube plantations on the way. The Rubber Tree was "relocated" from South America by the British to be a cash crop in this area of the empire, the climates being very similar.
Each tree is tapped daily with a gentle score across the bark extending the angled gash made the previous day, the white sap rising quickly and dribbling into an awaiting ceramic pot. A 1000 trees producing trays that are left to dry out, we arrive an hour before that happens and the white rubber feels like refrigerated tacky blancmange, finger tips leaving an impression in it but not breaking the surface, each tub being worth around $1-2 once ready for sale.
It'll be pressed and left out to dry on the clothesline. The family tend to 4500 trees that will each live around 45 years before being turned into baskets.
It's a perfectly timed break in the drive as we'd foolishly accepted a local snack, a foil packet of "Pyin-Oo-Lwin tea"; finely green tea leaves laced with a fairly warm chilli sauce though I didn't know it was that until the first tentative taste. The green goo looks awful but was actually ok but a second, bolder mouthful was less good and ten minutes later I'm starting to get very hot, nauseous and rapidly reaching a point where the Toyota's brown velour is at risk, the plantation arrives at the car window and the upholstery is saved; rubber protection if you like: Packets of Pyin-Oo-Lwin tea should be avoided.
More miles pass and we hit Yangon traffic, terrible traffic, 5pm Monday is motoring hell the world over but it's amplified here because every road is being expanded, this Government is building ready for an economic boom, most the roads are filled with diggers and bulldozers performing the widened work.
Final stop is the War cemetery, thousands on named and unnamed graves, quite powerful:
4am start for the 6.30 flight to Mandalay, the airport is very manual, floor walkers with hand signs and chalk boards offer slightly more information than the electronic boards that never update, somehow fits with the terminal building which is all carved teak. Each passenger wears a goofy sticker showing where they are destined to fly. It seems to work and we land in Mandalay on time, we're not staying though and immediately we drive to... Pyin-Oo-Lwin, home of the tea and also coffee which is far superior to anything I've been offered so far (and probably also stolen from South America).
This a different planet to the country we've seen so far, much cooler. The waiter must be about 10 years old is dressed like an Everest Sherpa as he delivers traditional dishes with gloved hands and beanie. Its much greener and no traffic. It's where the Colonial government relocated to escape the hot summers, it was 43degrees in Mandalay last year and it's getting hotter every year, deforestation ensuring there is no shade or respite from the baking sun. But here high above Mandalay at 3500 ft the climate is familiar and the land greener, The New Forest with bigger hills and we're still in the Northern hemisphere, it's still winter which means it will be very cold when the sun drops.
George Orwell penned Burmese Days in this wooden hotel and which is being restored, many things in Myanmar are being restored, none of them very quickly so we're years from checking in.
We're only 400 miles from the border with China and the influence is clear, huge trucks deliver cheap electronics in exchange for Myanmar's natural resources, let's just say that Customs have a tough time restricting what is exported, pillaged from the country.
This is an area of diverse peoples, religions and languages, 31 in all originating from the regional states and tribes and further mixed by immigration from India, Bangladesh (Burma was treated as an extension of India by the British and workers moved between countries easily) and more recently from China. Each people have or had their own lands, own rites which results in feuding and conflict. Resolving this is the biggest expectation of the forthcoming government. The next being to give the land and Jade mines, improperly claimed by authorities and exploited by neighbouring countries back to the people, freeing them the trap of illegal trading in timber, minerals, wildlife and poppies so they have a chance to improve their situation. It feels possible, optimism is sweeping across the country and unfaltering support and belief in The Lady, Aung Sang Suu Kyi suggests this will happen. Her party takes power on 1st February after her landslide election win last November.
Our guide is Naing and the driver is Winn, so inevitably we find ourselves in a Naing - Winn situation: It's too early to check-in to the hotel but we're next to the Botanical gardens and use them to pass a few hours. Sword fights of the tallest bamboo canes fight in the breeze with metallic chinking, orchids spout from every nook and a pair of Hornbills inspect everything like Professor Yaffle before sweeping by so close we need to duck:
They share a berry
Walking up a deserted walkway, a monk having taken his photo with us earlier on the trail (we'll be in the next edition of Monking Monthly) I climbed up the last few steps to a wooded platform in the tree canopy starring back at me is a golden Hoolock Gibbon:
I freeze in a dilemma, enjoy the moment or reach for the camera that could frighten it away.
After the initial surprise she relaxes and walks upright along the railings queen of the swingers, jungle VIP.
Amazingly a black male arrives and they continue to play with each other on the walkway ahead of us before moving into the trees, tender moments exchanged between them, bit of tumbling, bit of grooming, the golden always following the gibbon with the quizzical eyebrows.
Once in the trees they all but vanish until their looping swing and the bending branches betray their location.
Aside from Tea and Coffee, the area is well known within Myanmar for its fruit wines, we opted for strawberry... When I was young I used to make model airplanes from balsa with my Dad, the wings were coated with a thin tissue paper that you lacquered to tighten and seal it. I wasn't old enough to buy the lacquer but it came in a jar and had a very strong solvent, glue smell. This fruit wine takes me right back to that memory: Use in a well ventilated area, away from naked flames. The bottle smells like port on opening, the initial sniff is jammy deserts but after that something is not right. The taste is industrial solvent, plane lacquer, I'm retching it's awful. I poured the rest of the glass over the wooden balcony to see if it will lift the gloss off the wood as the taste suggests. It's yuk.
The food itself though is excellent, the local Myanmar beer is excellent, outstanding in fact so there is no reason to explore any further with the fermented fruit!
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