It was Friday night and you know what that means . . . 19th street here we come!!!!! We grabbed a group of our friends and headed downtown to enjoy an evening of festivities which started with 80 cent mojitos and ended with Kim making a slew of new local friends. Another epic night on 19th street.

As is usual with our nightly wanderings, we had some unusual finds one of which was another Myanmar delicacy. My students called these tree warms. The are available fresh and deep fried. We were going to try some but they were surprisingly expensive - I think they gave us the foreigner price increase. 

On Saturday we went on a much-awaited adventure of going across the river to the neighboring town of Dala. We took the ferry over after managing to find the dock and got some traditional Myanmar lunch on the other side (yes, Kim ate on the street). The we each got a trishaw to take us around town to the different sites. This defiantly needed it’s own post so:

Look how crazy adorable this little guy was!!!!!

Back on our side of the bay we lead our couchsurfers through a little tour of downtown in search of Dim Sum. We had heard that Chinatown has the BEST Dim Sum in Yangon (makes sense). But unfortunately we didn't actually know where Chinatown was to be found. It did show the area on the map but it was stretched over about 6 blocks. At least the walk was interesting. 

Although we didn't find any Dim Sum we did find some tasty doughnuts off the street. Kim really enjoyed them. 

Sunday we continued our usual tradition of grocery shopping but instead of taking our usual route we decided to take the long way around and explore our neighborhood a little more. One thing I love about walking around is admiring all of the colors that were once brilliant and vibrant used on the houses, now crumbling, peeling, and fading away. After walking down a random road for a good 15-20 minutes we turned out to a road that we knew but the surprises didn’t end there, we found a genuine ramen noodle house down a random side ally. Although we had already had a meal we know we will be back to try it soon. 

The week held a run of work, me at school and Kim building her menu for the restaurant. We hosted a new couchsurfing couple from Spain in the middle of the week and had a blast with them sharing our love of homemade sangria and delicious food.

I'm not sure what to say after that so I will just leave it there. See you all next week!

Saturday. Our adventure day. Kim was pretty set on not going to see more Buddha statues, “I’ve seen one so I’ve seen them all” which made for quite the challenge of finding an adventure for us to go on that didn’t involve Pagodas, there are quite a lot of them here. After searching a few websites, I came across a giant man built cave that sounded very promising so off we went.  

It didn’t look too far on our little map, and it was right on our road, so we took off on foot. Kim has spent a good amount of time walking around the neighborhood making it a fun time of her pointing out things that she has noticed and places she has visited. Eventually we walked out of the range of her journeys and continued on down the busy road that we were following. We walked for a while along Inya lake which was a nice break from the buildings and cars. 

In the park we found what looked to be a playground but upon closer investigation it was actually a "workout station" including directions on how to use each piece of "equipment" to get fit. 

After we left the pagoda we were getting hungry but Kim was determined to (still) not eat on the street. Being a chef she was very concerned about the sanitary of the food environments of the street stalls – I really can’t blame her. So we found a small indoor restaurant to grab a bite at. I ordered a strawberry milkshake which was quite tasty. They told us that they had “one chicken” left so we went for it and ordered that. It came as a heaping dish of fried rice with a large chicken leg on top. As is the norm here, we also received a slew of unknown side dishes. I believe these are used to mix with your main dish to make it taste more individualized – either more spice or more sour, etc. You also almost always receive a bowl of clear-broth soup with green vegetables. 

Refueled, we decided it was time to figure out the local transportation system. Although I certainly do not understand the buses here (there are no bus maps or bus schedules), we were informed that there was one main bus line that ran down our road all the way to downtown. Since we were actually still on our main road we thought we would give it a try. Looking up and down the street we found a group of people standing together and assumed that they were waiting for the bus. After only a minute or two, sure enough, a bus came rolling through. Lots of people got on and off but we decided to pass this one up because it was PACKED. This is the norm here because so many people ride the local “Ferry” as it is called.  We waited for the next one to come along only a few minutes later and flagged it down. I’m pretty sure the bus did not actually come to a full stop, instead it slowed down and the man that was hanging out of the makeshift door reached out and pulled us each up and in. As soon as my second foot left the pavement, we were zooming down the road. The man pushed us up in the bus and I stumbled as the locals scooted over to give us room to sit. I practically fell on a man sitting on the bench I was going for but managed to get situated. 

The buses themselves are ancient creatures that are certainly from a by-gone era. Almost all of the cars/trucks in the city are on the newer side. I was told that this is because the government wanted to clean up the city so they told everyone that if they had a vehicle over 20 years old they would have to turn it in, but in return they would receive a voucher for so many dollars off a new vehicle. This happened just a year or two ago when they changed the import regulations. So if you have read any stories of visitors riding in cabs with wooden floorboards, holes in the ceiling, non-working windows or doors, etc. I will gladly tell you that this is no longer the case (at least not in Yangon). The busses however are a different story. These are very old and designed for different environments. The doors on most of these are on the left side of the bus, meaning that one would have to exit in the middle of traffic (since we drive on the right here). Luckily most have chosen to create their own right-sided doors – solving at least that situation. 

Each bus has at least three people working on it at any given time: the driver, the doorman, and the money collector.  After we got settled we noticed a guy who was holding a stack of money and others who just got on also, were handing him a payment for the ride. As he came over to our area I asked how much and he said 100. I dug a 200 note out to pay for me and Kim. That means that the entire ride was a whole $0.10 a person. Yes TEN CENCE. We will defiantly be riding the bus more often. 

The ride was speedy and got us downtown in only about 20 minutes. Although their method of getting on and off was a bit hectic, it provided for a much quicker ride. Happily they actually came to a complete stop to let practically the entire bus off at a main bus stop just short of Sule Pagoda, the center point of down town. Since we had only gotten a bit to eat at the last restaurant, we were still hungry so we thought we would try out one of the places in the Lonely Planet (aka the bible for anyone traveling through Myanmar). 

Just a street or two over from the bus stop we tracked down 999, a tiny shan noodle house that would have been easy to pass by if we weren’t looking for it. Shan Noodles are a Myanmar dish developed in the north of the country in Shan state. Similar to true ramen noodles it is carefully made in a flavorful broth that holds a handful of long, thin noodles. These are topped with some red, paste stuff and include some green vegetables that Kim says is napa cabbage. We were both served quickly and enjoyed our warm bowls of soup. While eating we saw many other foreigners come in. It was probably the most foreigners I have seen in one place (besides people that I work with) since we have been here. All in all, 999 is a tasty place but I defiantly prefer the other shan noodles that we got when we were on the walking tour of downtown. 

Leaving 999 we decided to go in search of cheese. On the walking tour of downtown we found this ah-maZe-inggg frying cheese that was sold to us from one of the street stalls that we passed along the way. However, in our 5 hours of walking we must of passed hundreds of street stalls. Luckily I have a fantastic spacial memory and had an idea of the area of town that we found it in. Map in hand we began to meander along the crazy streets of downtown. Retracing our footsteps from our walking tour was similar to a scavenger hunt of sorts where we were on constant look out for things we might have previously seen to tell us we were on the right track. 

Eventually we found a corner that I knew we had turned down, shortly after we saw the JDoughnuts that I was certain we had passed, and finally we came to the street with THE CHEESE! Although the cheese lady that we had originally purchased from was not there that day, we did find a similar looking cheese in the same area – woohoo!!! Here is me, triumphant with our much-sought-after cheese. 

After a busy day we were happy to find our way back to the bus stop so we could get a lift home. We waited for the right bus a jumped on as it passed by. There was no sitting room as the entire bus was so full of people so we held onto the bars above our head tightly as we swerved through traffic. When the money collector guy made it to us I handed him a 200 note. He took this and asked for one from Kim. I told him no, that it was for the both of us. He said that 200 was for just one of us. I responded that we had just ridden the bus and it was 100 for one person. We continued to argue as he began telling us that it was a special price because it was a special bus. Well it didn’t look all that special to me. I know it was only $0.20 but it was more about the point that they were trying to scam us because we were foreigners – which does happen here fairly often. Eventually he stopped arguing with me and we gladly got off at the stop near our building. Later I did find out that the buses will charge different rates based on the bus, the time of day, and just about anything they feel like. Ooops. 

Sunday we did our usual routine of lazy morning followed by grocery shopping. For dinner we decided to go out and find some Dimsum (super tasty chinese dumplings). Kim had seen a Dimsum restaurant when she had visited a shopping mall earlier in the week with Sharon, so we went back to Dagon Center to try it out. Dagon Center was the first shopping mall I have been to here in Myanmar and it was truly a different world. You enter from the dirty streets that are bustling with street stalls and vendors of all sorts to a clean, white, florescent lit, sterile environment. There were 6 floors, plus the ground level, making 7 floors of shops at Dagon Center. Rather than the wide open expanse of shopping space that I am used to from the States, here they build up so the actual area of each level is fairly small but they still manage to cram a lot into the space. There were all sorts of shops including clothing, shoes, handbags, cell phones, stationary, gadgets, and restaurants. The very top level hosts a children’s play area similar to that of Chuckie Cheese as well as a movie theater (we will have to check this out sometime).

On the fourth floor we found the Dimsum restaurant. This seemed certainly like a chain place but ended up being quite tasty. I’m sure people who have had “real” chinese Dimsum might not agree but we found it delicious. We ordered 6 or 7 different dishes to share that included everything from red pork rice dumplings to ramen rapped dumplings. After we devowered those we asked for the menu again and ordered another 5 or so dishes and continued to munch. Each dumpling was fresh, hot, flavorful, and just yummy. We even tried some fried dumplings and some sweet cream filled ones. It was a delicious meal that we are certain to enjoy again! The best part being that we can since the check for the two of us only came to $11. Oh happy day!

Afterwards we popped over to the ice cream parlor next door called Swensen’s. We had seen this restaurant around town and wanted to try it out. We decided to share a sundae together and it was so rich with hot fudge, caramel, and dense ice cream that between the two of us we couldn’t finish it. It was unusual having such flavors after not tasting anything like it for so long. It was a great treat but at a high price of $5.60 for just the sundae. I hope we can return here again also maybe next time just a cone will do. I will say that the ice cream is pretty amazing, just like home – which is saying something because so far we have not had good ice cream experiences here. 

Monday quickly came and began my second week of school. I’m working on getting to know my kids names, the class schedule, planning for classes, and just getting into a basic routine. Developing material for a whole new curriculum is quite exhausting. I’m still in survival mode right now, just getting enough planned and prepped for the next class or day. I’m looking forward to when things begin settling in and I have some long-term plans set. Until then, wish me luck.

It was a very exciting day on Wednesday when we decided to finally go get some kitchen equipment. I have been amazed at what Kim can do with only a 2 burner hot pot and a rice cooker, but to make our lives a little easier and better we knew we would need a bit more. We set off in search of a toaster oven and blender. Heading to the “new Ocean,” since that was most recommended for household goods like these. This is another large department store similar to Walmart in the way that it has everything from fresh fish and food goods to clothing to electronics and everything else you could need. We had only one option for a toaster oven so that was an easy choice. For the blender we got one that doubles as a food processor as well as a juicer (supposedly). I know it doesn’t sound like much but we were ecstatic bringing home our new kitchen toys. 

A week of so ago Kim began looking for job opportunities. This proved quite difficult because a lot of job positions here are filled by word of mouth. Kim knew she didn’t want to work in one of the big hotel restaurants opening up but those are also the ones that would be able to pay her what her experience is worth. The positions available are slim to none but she did respond to one add in particular looking for a chef for a new western restaurant opening soon. We hadn’t thought about it much until she actually got a response asking for an interview this week. Yippie!! So Kim went off to a café to meet up with one of the investors of the restaurant. They instantly hit it off as Kim explained her cooking experience and philosophy (no microwaves and no oily food). Obviously Alex, the part owner of the restaurant absolutely loved her – who could blame him? But there was a problem, they were only prepared to pay a small salary to who they hire. Kim stood her ground, knowing that she was worth much more than that, and said that she needed to be compensated accurately. She left the meeting with good vibes but no position.

About an hour after the meeting Kim received an email from Alex saying that he couldn’t think of anyone better to fit the position and he wanted Kim no matter what. He offered her the salary that she had asked for along with some perks if she would take the job.

That is how Kim became the Head Chef and Kitchen Manager of Smoothie Foodie, a western smoothie parlor and café. She will be focusing on making good western food with – wait for it – no rice! And no noodles! And no oily foods! The restaurant is still under construction currently but they are hoping to open by the end of September or early October. Yay!

To celebrate we went to see the restaurant space on Friday night where we met the other owner Austin. Austin is a local Myanmar, but lived in Toronto for 7 years so he is fond of the western way of life and western food. He returned to Myanmar not too long ago and began importing vehicles for the high class along with making some very strategic (and very profitable) real estate choices. They all sat down and talked about menu options, general food questions, and what kind of equipment and supplies Kim wants. After listening to Kim talk about food for an hour we all got very hungry! Kim can do that to people.

Austin decided to take us to Sharkies – a very nice western restaurant that we had heard about from a bunch of different people. The specialize in making their own ingredients like cheese, pasta, and sauces. They serve amazing handmade pizza and pastas. It was a delicious evening.

As Austin was dropping us back at our apartment I mentioned that he should take us out and show us the night life at some point (since he was fairly young and obviously knew what there is to know about the area). His response was “Okay, I’ll pick you up in an hour.” We were super tired but honored by his generosity and always up for a good adventure so we agreed. So began an evening that I would have never imagined to happen – let along in Yangon, Myanmar.

Austin and Alex picked us up in his fancy car after a quick shower and change and swooped us off into the night. Speeding down the road he asked if we would like to have a pre-drink. Sure, why not? He jacked the wheel and did a u-turn in the middle of the busy street and slid into a spot in front of a place called Cask 81. We were immediately greeted by men opening our doors and holding umbrellas for us on the short walk to the entrance. When we came through the doors it was as if we were stepping into a completely different world separate from the dirt, rain, and poverty that was right outside. This place was nowhere like I had seen here, nowhere like I had ever been. It made me think of a smoking parlor that would have been on the Titanic, minus the smoking. The lights were dim; the interior design was Asian fusion; the servers looked fancier than I could any day. We were led to an area with plush true leather seats surrounding glass coffee/side tables. I was so glad that I decided to dress up a bit! They handed us menus of all drinks served only by the bottle – to clarify they were almost all whisky. This was a top of the line whisky place. All of my assumptions of this place were made true in the dollar amounts of the menu items. The only things that were cheaper than $200 were the mixers that were about $5 for a can of soda. At least it was easy to decide what I was going to have since that was obviously the only thing we were going to be able to afford.

Austin spoke easily to the server in Myanmar and he returned with a tasting glass for him, which he sipped and nodded as the man scurried off again. This time he came back with a bottle of whisky – but not any old whisky, a bottle of 18-year-old Glenlivet. They poured a glass for each of us and asked if we wanted a mixer. I ordered sour mix (whisky sours are my absolute favorites) and they gave me the best sour mix I have ever tasted – hands down. We lounged there sipping the amazingness and gabbing about our interests, histories, and restaurant plans. The Glenlivet was the smooth, silky, and beyond delicious. That is what you get with a price tag of $400 for the bottle. Nothing will ever taste the same after that.

Reluctantly I peeled myself out of the comfy state I had settled in as we set off to our next destination. It wasn’t a long car ride before we pulled into a driveway lined with all sorts of fancy cars. Even though it was dark, it was easy to find where we were going due to the blaring music. Stepping through a pair of Porsches we weaved through the people outside smoking and found the way to the door. I followed closely behind our group past the security and into a nightclub. Who would have known they had a place like this here. All of the lights were off and the foggy air (that must have been created with dry ice) was sliced with flashing neon lights. The music was ear-pounding loud and some sort of techno-dance style. Austin quickly found someone to assist him as he must have asked for a table. They quickly escorted us to a very nice high table in a peak area of the room. Shortly another bottle of whisky arrived, this time it was a Johnny Walker Gold Label. I happily accepted a glass. Unfortunately after drinking the spectacular Glenlivet, this tasted like well whisky in comparison. I later found out that they hold the rest of the bottle (that we didn’t finish) at the bar under Austin’s name for when he returns – The Glenlivet they delivered to his house the following day. The night continued with dancing, munching on crunchy snacks provided by the bar, laughing at the actions of the crowd, trying to hold conversations over the music, and generally fun festivities.

I so wish I had pictures of this whole evening but I didn’t want to look tourist-y so I left all of my cameras at home but hopefully my written description gave you a view into the epic evening that it was. It was a night that felt more like a dream the next day – it was so unexpected, so out of place, and so unbelievable. 

Our second weekend in Myanmar was just as busy as the first. Bright and early Saturday morning we met with the other new teachers to get a personal walking tour of the downtown area from Zoe and a few other long-term ISMers. Read all about it and see the very cool pictures I captured here: Downtown Yangon Walking Tour

Sunday we finally had our first full day to relax and settle in, we slept in, went grocery shopping, hung up photos, and had general time to just be. 

The first day of school came quick and ready or not, Monday morning the students bursted through the doors. Even though a small part of me was saying "yeah, you got this, you've done this plenty before" the rest of me was anticipating the unexpected that came with teaching a new grade level (from elementary to high school), a new school level (from public to private), a new school culture (from government run to international, for-profit), a new set of societal expectations (from rural Maine to urban Myanmar), and of course just a new set of students all together. 

I had heard in my research that the students here had a higher regard for their education and I was thrilled to find out that this was true. I told many people when I took this position that there was no way I would be able to teach High School in the States because of the attitude towards education (not being respected, taken for granted, etc.). I am very happy to say that it is different here for many reasons including the fact that this is a private school so parents are paying for their kids to come here and as we all know if you have to pay for something you appreciate it more. Also because teachers in this culture are respected just as monks, doctors, and government officials are. I had been very much looking forward to finally be respected for the career I chose instead of just being passed along and given the bare necessities that so many teachers are. 

And the first week of school did not disappoint. The students were eager and welcoming, their skill levels were far exceeding my expectations, and they were attentive in the way that showed me they were actually interested in being there. We started right off into exploring the element of line in my Art 1 (Art Foundations) class. I hope to soon post the unit in its entirety but here are a few photos of my classrooms and the students creating.

ISM is an all english speaking school that teaches an American Standards-Based Curriculum to prepare students for American (western) colleges. What that means is that I am teaching the same curriculum here as I would if I were teaching at a high school back in the States. 95% of the student population are from local families who are very (VERY) wealthy. The other 5% are children of the teachers here. We have a "normal" school schedule that starts at 8:15 and goes until 3:00 every Monday - Friday with a good amount of holidays/vacation days off throughout the August - May. (Note: we do start the school year about 4 weeks earlier than in the States but we also get out about 3 weeks earlier. We have 190 contact days compared to 185 for schools in the States). The high school works on a block schedule where we have the same classes every other day, but they move around the periods within the day so we don't always have the same class in the morning/afternoon. It can be a bit confusing but I really like it for the most part. 

I teach 3 sections of Art 1 (Art foundations) that is the first art class that every student in school "must" take for their graduation requirements therefore this class consists of mostly freshmen. I also teach 2 sections of AP 2D Design which is an Advanced Placement course where students are working on building a portfolio to submit to the College Board at the end of the year. If they do well on this they can get college credits for the course. Although AP 2D Design can be taught as more of a studio arts course where you do anything from drawing to painting to collage and so forth, ISM asked me to teach it more as a digital arts course. This is very exciting because that means I can finally teach Photography and Digital Editing - two of my strong points as an artist! I am beyond happy to finally be able to share my photography knowledge with young artists. 

To kick off my AP 2D class we dove right into digital photography in my unit called "Beyond Auto" where we learn about the different camera settings and how to fully control our photographs. Again, more to come on this but for now here are a few photos of the students practicing and learning.

For food this week I had a combination of eating on the street at the stalls near school and eating in the cafiteria. Wherever I decide to go it is usually the same types of choices: white rice, fried rice, or noodles - a handful of different meats in oily, often times spicy, sauce (chicken with the bones, beef, mutton, or pork) - and a variety of various veggie dishes, again usually in an oily sauce. These are some of the meals I had this week:

Luckily I have a phenomenal wife who is a phenomenal chef and cooks us equally phenomenal food from home. Kim has been struggling  for the past week or so in terms of trying to find the basic ingredients that she is used to like sugar, flour, brown sugar, pepper, and so forth. Recently, after many trips to different grocery stores, she has realized that they do in fact have such ingredients but they are all named different things or are just in different languages. She is very happy to finally be building up our supply of kitchen goods that she is used to. 

The interesting thing is that it is significantly cheeper to eat out than to cook ourselves. We can go out and get a meal for $1-$2. The downside is that it is always rice or noodles or noodles or rice and that has gotten old pretty fast. So it is wonderful to come home to Kim's home cooking. Here is one dish she made this week:

Thursday night we were walking back from getting a few things from the supermarket and decided to go for a drink. On the way down to the market we had seen a couple buildings with flashy lights coming from the inside and big signs at the entrance saying things like "DJ" "Spy Wine" "Club" etc. So, silly us, we thought they must be dance clubs. Heading up to the doorway we passed a half a dozen security, which you think would have been our first clue that something was a little off, but the thing is here businesses tend to have a large amount of employees that are just for directing parking. However, when we arrived at the front door there was just a small lobby that looked strange. So we asked the security guy who opened the door for us "Beer?" and his response was priceless: "Yes, yes, bootie bootie." Without skipping a beat we turned and walked back out to the main road. Our laughter lasted all the way to the next building where we decided to play it safe and ask one of the security guards (you think we would have learned by now) hanging around the entrance to the parking lot. Kim: "Beer?"   Guard proceeding to do a foul hand gesture "Titty Bar."

At this point we gave up all hopes at finding beer and just headed back home before we found anything worse. On the way we saw two other ISM teachers having a beer at a nice local establishment and decided that must mean it was safe. After we got our cold drinks we decided to order some fried chicken and what came was probably one of the worst meals I have been served since being here. We got a plate of what Kim calls "fried assholes" because it was a plate of bones from the worst part of the chicken with barley any meat on them. It was pretty ridiculous - even more so when they charged us $4 for them! I know that doesn't seem like a lot but when I can eat a full lunch for less than $1, four is quite a lot for a plate of deep fried bones. At least the drinks were cold. And that was our Thursday night Titty Bar experience. 

To celebrate finishing my first week of school and being in Myanmar for two weeks, Friday night we met up with Shelly and Luis (two new ISM teachers) and grabbed a taxi over to the famous 19th street. 19th Street is well known in town, and in the guidebooks, as a place where the locals come to drink late into the evenings. There are a series of locally owned drinking establishments spilling out into the street with their miniature plastic chairs and tables wet from recent rain. The word was that this was the place to come for a night of drinking festivities on the cheap.

It was a drizzly evening, which made the others that were going to join us decide otherwise, but the four of us decided to make a go for it and I’m glad we did. Because of the rain, some of the places were closed – or at least not as busy as I imagine they usually are – but most had a fair amount of customers with beers in their hands. We walked down to the end of the street, out to the hustle and bustle of a busy main road lined with street carts and vendors in every direction. This may not be an up-all-night kind of place (like Bangkok) but it certainly wasn’t the “everyone is in bed by 8 pm” city that I had read about before coming.

After walking back down to the end of the road we started on, we decided to kick back at one of the places towards the end of the “strip.” Kim and Luis got a draft beer as Shelly and I sipped some wine coolers. Conversations were warm and flowing in strange languages all around us (from other expats and locals alike), our talk revolved around where we call “home,” hopes and dreams for Myanmar, and our beginning impressions of this strange new land. Drinks were cold and smiles were large.

All of a sudden I felt sick to my stomach. Sure that I was going to hurl I excused myself to the bathroom, but before I got there I got so dizzy that I blacked out a bit and half sat/half fell on to a set of steps. I knew that there was almost certainty that I would get sick in the first few weeks of being here but the urgency of which it came didn’t seem to fit that of food poising or the like. Taking a couple minutes to  I then recalled feeling these symptoms before. A couple other times in the past 10 or so years I had these indicators of stomach sickness and sudden dizziness. The relating cause of this, I quickly learned after having a full-fledged fainting spell when I was 15, was the heat. Although I feel like I have a great immune system and I rarely get ill, I don’t even get motion sickness, but something about intense heat makes my body start shutting down. I regained my sight enough to stand up and help myself outside where I sat (on a miniature plastic stool) in the rain, peeling my shirt off to reveal only a skin colored tank top undershirt. The locals stared (they usually don’t show their shoulders, let alone something so low cut) but I didn’t care, I just needed to cool off.

A couple minutes of sitting in the breeze and rain later I was feeling a bit better as we decided to hop on over to another little place just next door. The rest of the evening faded away with $0.80 mojitos and men broke into a dance as a trolley with loud American hip hop music rolled through.