At the airport as I was leaving Burma, I spent my last few kyats (“chats”) on a souvenir picture postcard of one of the thousands of temples in Bagan, which I had visited just a few days earlier. The color does not seem oversaturated to me. It strkes me as just right. Perfect. Bagan (“Pah-garn”) is an amazing place.

At one time there were over 13,000 temples on this plain in central Burma, on the east bank of the wide and muddy Irrawady (properly the Ayeyarwady) River. About 2,200 of these temples remain standing today. It is not until you climb to the top of one of them that the rest of them are revealed. They dot the landscape like jewels. Really, that’s how it feels!

Climbing the temple. Up here some boys tried to sell me some stones, which they said were jewels, rubies I think. The scraped them and showed that they didn’t scratch. They said they would take anything for them, but I (foolishly) wasn’t interested.

A massive Buddha in the base of one of the temples. You had to wander about, into the shadows, to find the doorways and stairways to the next level. There was a feeling of real adventure about this place. Like Indiana Jones, but that was just a movie!

Panning for gold by the Irrawaddy river.