On arriving at the Myin Ma Htie village, we needed to switch vehicles in order to make the climb up to the monastery. The monastery belongs to the village and they take care of it. Their monastery is 80 years old.

The monk offered us a blessing which he said could be for us or for sharing with others. I opted for sharing his blessing with family, friends, and my electronic travel companions. The monk offered a number of blessings including things like “to be safe”. The most interesting part of the blessings was when the monk said “Not to be annoyed by the government”. I think that says a lot about Myanmar.

After the monk’s blessing and a Q&A with him, he invited us to take a meditation lesson. He said that any position was fine: sitting, kneeling, etc. The monk said that concentration is the most important thing. He said it’s easiest to close our eyes, relax, and concentrate on our breathing. We might want to concentrate on the tip of our nose. He said breathing is like life, we can’t stop it and we can’t always control it, but we can try to concentrate on controlling it and hopefully we can gain an advantage. Nothing is permanent and we can’t control our Karma but we can work towards Nirvana. I’m working on that one…

1. Three of the village leaders drove up in the vehicles you see in the first photo. These are homemade trucks using Chinese made electrical generators for engines. The truck engines double as water pumps.

2. The village elders asked if anyone wanted to try driving one of the vehicles and you probably already know the answer to that. I drove just fine once I got used to the very “loose” steering. I drove six people up to the monastery.

3. The 80 year old monastery is made of teak wood. It’s built on stilts and the stilts are painted with whitewash and lime to keep the termites out of the monastery. The roof could use a paint job.

4. The monk is 48 years old and has been a full-fledged monk for 29 years, after joining the monastery at age 5.

5. Even though this area was very green, you can see the large sheet metal rain gutter in this photo on the inside of the monastery. It is used to collect the rain water off the roof which is then piped into water storage containers.