Where to stay

Prices quoted are for a double room based on two people sharing with breakfast (unless otherwise stated)

The Strand The gracious colonnaded exterior conjures up a bygone era. The Strand is to Yangon (or Rangoon as the British renamed it), what Raffles was to Singapore. This colonial landmark has a colourful history, naming Rudyard Kipling and George Orwell amongst its past guests, while in the Second World War it was used as a barracks for Japanese soldiers. Today, it’s still the luxury pad in town: think piano music, snooker in the teak-panelled bar and a lively expat scene at happy hour. Deluxe suites start at £405 but ‘best available rates’ on the hotel’s website are worth checking out: the same room can often start from a far cheaper £185, including breakfast, or a superior suite for £134. Yangon, 00 95 124 3377,http://ghmhotels.com

Ayarwaddy River View Hotel This smart modern hotel on the banks of the river opened in 2011. It has 56 bright rooms and suites, with polished wooden floors offering views of the river to the front, the city to the back – the whole shebang with sundowners on the rooftop bar. Doubles from £35, including breakfast. 23 Strand Road, Thirimalarlar West, Mandalay, 00 95 272 372

Kumudara Hotel Location, location, location – standing out on your balcony here, you can gaze out over the stunning view of the plain sprinkled with temples. This contemporary little hotel is charming, set in four acres of landscaped gardens with a pool. Hire bikes from reception for a spot of temple-hopping, or indulge in a traditional Burmese massage in your room – for around £2.50 for an hour. Doubles from £21, including breakfast. New Bagan, 00 95 616 5142, http://kumudara-bagan.com

Travel Information

The currency in Burma is the Kyat (£1=10 kyat). Visas are required for UK citizens (visit http://fco.gov.uk for details). At the time of writing, Burma has no ATMs and only clean, unfolded US dollar bills are deemed acceptable currency for exchange. Yangon is 6.5 hours ahead of GMT. The best time to visit is between October and March as there is less rainfall (if any) and it is not so hot. May to June bring temperatures of up to 40ºC in Yangon, higher in Bagan and Mandalay. July to September is the monsoon season.

GETTING THERE
Vietnam Airlines (020 3263 2062, http://vietnamairlines.com) flies four times a week from London Gatwick to Vietnam with onward flights to Yangon.

RESOURCES
All Points East (023 9225 8859, allpointseast.com) arranges small, scheduled tours and bespoke itineraries with an emphasis on off-the-beaten-track destinations inside Burma. You’ll explore the country by train, rickshaw, horse and cart, Irawaddy River cruiser, canoe, bicycle, on foot and by road. The emphasis is on world-famous sites and local culture, taking in the bustling markets and regional cuisine as you go. A 14-day tour, flying from London to Yangon, starts from £1,225, including flights. Bamboo Travel (020 7720 9285, http://bambootravel.co.uk) offers itineraries that cover several of Burma’s most important highlights. Ten-day tours start from £1,995, including flights.

FURTHER READING
BURMA - Rivers of Flavor by Naomi Duguid (Artisan, £25). Part cookbook, part travelogue, with extraordinary photographs; Duguid captures Burma’s flavours and regional cuisines with authentic recipes for curries, salads, noodle soups and grilled meats. Her tales of the people who live here really give the reader a sense of this hidden country.

Where to eat

Lucky Seven Think potted plants, a jaunty green awning and little lacquered tables – which are always packed. This pretty little teashop is one of the best places for mohinga. Rock up for breakfast and wash it all down with squeezed lime juice and honey topped with soda. Around £2 per person. 138 49th Street, Pazuntaung Tsp, Yangon, 00 95 129 2382

Feel Myanmar Low tables made from pastel tiles line the verandah of this popular restaurant, an atmospheric place for an alfresco evening meal. It’s the usual format – a curry of fish, mutton, chicken or goat with traditional side dishes. Or you could try the offal – a woman sits outside stirring a huge pan of the stuff. Around £2 per person. 124 Pyidaungsu Yeiktha Street, Yangon

Danuphyu Daw Saw Yee Myanmar This traditional Burmese restaurant is a strip-lit white canteen. Choose your curry from behind the counter – fish, lamb or goat – and take a seat. It comes with signature sour vegetable soup (white radish, white radish leaves and tamarind juice) rice and plates of wild vegetables plus the traditional condiments: spicy fish sauce and an incredibly hot and salty fish paste. Lunch is around £2 per person. 175/179 29th Street, Yangon, 00 95 124 8977

Too Too This little spot is very popular. Light and bright (a bit like eating in an open-ended white cube), it serves up the traditional curries. Choose from prawn, fish, chicken or mutton at the counter. It comes with rice, soup and endlessly topped up plates of veg. Try the pickled mango salad: green mango sliced and soaked in salty water for 1-2 days then mixed with sliced onion, chilli, peanut oil and salt. Go for lunch, around £2 per person. 79, 27th Street, Mandalay

Lashio Lay A renowned, if rough-and-ready, Shan restaurant. Pick three dishes from the counter and they come with rice and soup along with dried and pickled mustard leaves with ginger. Try the butterfish wrapped with chopped mint and coriander in banana leaves and steamed – delicious. Fish ball soup is another speciality: flaked fish pounded with salt then rolled into balls and cooked in water with ginger. Around £2 per person. 65, 23rd Street, Mandalay

San Francisco This restaurant in the leafy suburbs of the colonial hill town has been serving Kachin cuisine for the past 25 years. Try the steamed kakadaig fish – the most expensive dish on the menu at around £6. Without the fish expect to spend around £5 per person. 90 Club Road, Pyín Oo Lwín, 00 95 852 1534

Kyi Kyi Swe Delicious lunch or dinner cooked and hosted in a traditional Burmese home, including cookery demonstration. The hostess is warm and friendly, and the food is excellent. We liked the mashed corn. From £16 per person. Bagan, 00 95 616 5067

Food Glossary

Athouq

Spicy salad of raw vegetables and fruit mixed. with onions, lime juice, chillies and peanuts.

Balachaung

A traditional condiment made from dried shrimp, garlic and chillies.

Bein moun

Burmese pancakes sold on street corners.

Hinjo

Sour soup.

Hkuauq-sweh

Noodles.

Kakadaig

A freshwater fish.

K’auq sen Shan

Rice noodles with curry.

Laphet

Fermented green tea leaves served as a snack with fried garlic, sesame seeds, fried shrimp and nuts.

Mohinga

The traditional breakfast dish, a broth of fish, noodles, red chillies to sprinkle, hot sauce, crunchy bits, sprigs of fresh coriander and a squeeze of lime.

Mondhi

Noodles served with chicken or fish.

Ngapi

Fish sauce.

Peh-hin-ye

Lentil soup or dhal.

T’amin

Rice, the staple of Burmese cuisine.

Food and Travel Review

We’re riding the circle line – in Yangon, not London. Here, in Burma’s largest city and the former capital, there are no warnings to ‘mind the gap’. Instead, children hang from gaping doorways, ‘commuters’ leap on and off as the train creaks – brakes squealing, metal clanking – through the Burmese suburbs. After a morning temple-hopping and market-grazing, we weave our way down through the dusty, pot-holed streets to the once-grand colonial station, for a taste of life less urban.

Boarding the old mustard and burgundy daubed train, with its retro, turquoise interior, we squeeze on to the wooden seats lining either side of the carriage. To do a full circuit takes around three and a half hours – and costs about 60p. Swivelling round to poke our heads out of the windows, we chug past clusters of wooden shacks draped with washing drying in the sun, pigs foraging in the mud and villagers bent double in the fields tending their crops.

‘That’s morning glory,’ our guide explains, pointing at one of the fields. ‘It’s a bit like watercress. We eat it steamed with garlic. In the south they fry it in peanut oil, in the north, soya oil.’

Street hawkers, in longyi, traditional sarongs, jump on and off with buckets of deep purple corn-on-the-cob. Young girls smile shyly, their faces decorated with patterns made from thanakha paste – part make-up, part sun protection. The heat is stifling despite the glassless windows, until… splash! A sudden watery explosion drenches half the carriage. We leap up, laughing and spluttering – it seems we have arrived just in time for Thingyan, the annual Water Festival.

New Year is celebrated with water in Burma. The festival isn’t due to start for a few days, but a handful of over-excited children are making water bombs from plastic bags and catapulting them at startled passengers. Each time we pull into a station, a bucket of water or a few hand-made missiles fly through the windows.

Burma has more to celebrate than usual this year, of course. A tumultuous few centuries saw years of British colonial rule, followed by the struggle for independence, achieved in 1948, followed by decades under military dictatorship, characterised by human rights abuses, economic sanctions and isolation. But now the first tentative steps have been taken towards democracy. After elections in November 2010, a quasi-civilian government was formed. Another round of elections have just taken place before our visit, seeing the National League for Democracy (NLD) leader, Aung Sang Suu Kyi, (whose father, General Aung Sang, was instrumental in the independence movement) making history by winning a seat in parliament. The changes mean she has revised her stance on tourism, encouraging people to visit ‘in the right way, by using facilities that help ordinary people and avoiding facilities that have close links to the government’.

Ironically one of the problems now facing the country is how to cope with the steadily increasing stream of tourists with a fledgling and already overburdened infrastructure. For the traveller, Burma is not without its challenges: mobile phones don’t work, there are no AT Ms, if your $100 bill has so much as a hairline crease they won’t change it, and internet coverage is sketchy at best.

However, the rewards outweigh the disadvantages. In the cool early morning we meander the little backstreets. Locals huddle on stools on the pavements at tiny makeshift teashops, tucking into mohinga, a traditional breakfast of fish broth mixed with rice noodles – in the running for Burma’s national dish. These basic teashops cluster at the side of the road or spill out of traditional shop fronts. The tea itself is an acquired taste, served in tiny cups with condensed milk, the coffee, black with a squeeze of lime.

We pull up a couple of stools at an open-ended little joint and a plate of pastries appear in front of us: mutton, chicken and bean puffs. You pay for what you eat, but the green tea is always free. Every teashop has its own speciality: here it was fried bread and egg swimming in a milky, malty broth.

This teashop is Indian. The Burmese culinary scene is more smorgasboard than melting pot – a bit like the country itself. Two per cent of the population are Indian immigrants, three per cent Chinese, and there are 135 native ethnic groups within its boundaries. The country is made up of seven states and seven regions dominated by the various ethnic minorities; the name Burma, in fact, is simply a derivation of Bamar, the largest ethnic group, comprising about 69 per cent of the population. An estimated 10 per cent are Shan, around seven per cent Kayin, the rest Rakhaing, Mon, Chin, Kachin, Kayah and Wa. This mix, with its simmering antagonisms brimming over into conflict with the government, has added its own complexities to the country’s tangled history.

It is also the reason that the cuisine is one of regional variations: Shan cuisine has been compared to that of Northern Thailand, with noodle-based curry dishes. Mandalay is famous for its desserts (sticky rice cake is a delicacy) and salads such as the Mandalay Nangyi, rice noodles with garlic, chilli, curry and chicken. At Inle Lake, fish in tomato-based sauces is the local speciality. ‘There are more tomato sauces here than in Italy,’ laughed our guide.

However, the basics of Burmese cuisine are quite simple: curry, rice, soup and vegetable side dishes. The curries are incredibly oily, but the layer of oil protects the dishes from airborne bacteria and can easily be skimmed off the top. The soup is usually an Indian-style lentil dhal, a sour soup or hinjo (a clear broth with leafy vegetables).

Yangon is the culinary capital with its teashop culture, vibrant street-food scene and traditional open-fronted restaurants. The markets and stalls in Chinatown and the Indian quarter add an extra dimension to the culinary map. The city owes much of its crumbling grandeur to the British colonial era, as in 1885, after the Anglo-Burmese wars, much of the city was rebuilt.

Exploring the downtown area, you can get your bearings from the Sule Pagoda, a golden dome rising up from the traffic. Weaving through the crowds, we graze from stall to stall. Rice paste crêpes sizzle on giant hot plates. These sweet pancakes made with palm sugar, coconut strips and steamed beans are served, hot, light and delicious in a newspaper. A green metal wheel presses juice from strips of sugar cane, while an umbrella shades a seller and his huge pot of beef offal soup. Mounds of silvery dried fish and shrimp on the pavement shimmer in the sun ready to be fried in coconut oil and eaten with steamed or sticky rice. The piles of fresh, sliced green mango, dipped in the ubiquitous spicy fish sauce and sprinkled with chillies, look more appealing.

Down by the district court, we mooch around the fruit market, its stalls piled high with exotic offerings such as the shocking pink spiky dragon fruit. A popular lunch spot, locals cram around nearby tables, the dessert stalls matching the fruit for rainbow hues.

The Burmese have an incredibly sweet tooth: the sugary concoctions on display ranging from a giant egg custard, to coconut milk jelly, tapioca puddings, purple sticky rice in plastic bags and emerald green rice noodles swimming in sweet coconut milk.

Second-hand bookstalls line Pansodan Street, the wide avenue leading down to the Yangon River. On the waterfront, the Strand Hotel – an icon of colonial times – remains the luxury place to bed down in town. Stumbling into the cool foyer is like stepping into another world. Lounging in the teak-panelled bar, we sip a cold drink
while jazz plays, taking a welcome break from the heat.

The temples and parks also offer escape from the city streets. We jump in a taxi up to Kandawgyi Lake for a misty early morning walk, joining the joggers on the teak walkway snaking around the lake as the sun rises. In a pavilion, an old, white-bearded yogi leads a group of devotees. Afterwards we cross the road over to the Shwedagon Pagoda, a gold vision shimmering above the city’s skyline and the most sacred Buddhist site in the country – and the oldest pagoda in the world at more than 2,600 years old.

Slipping off our shoes at the eastern entrance, we climb the dark stairway emerging into bright sunlight in front of the dazzling dome. Soaring 98 metres into the sky, it’s covered in gold leaf and topped with a gold sphere studded with 4,531 diamonds. Wandering around the complex, we soak up the colourful Buddhist initiation ceremonies parading past, chatting to monks in saffron robes.

From Yangon, we take the road to Mandalay – or rather a flight. The train north to the central lowlands takes 16 hours; by plane it’s just a short one-hour hop. The legendary road to Mandalay was, in fact, the Irawaddy River (also called Ayarwaddy) immortalised in 1890 by Rudyard Kipling in his poem Mandalay.

It’s not, however, the sleepily romantic place you might imagine: it is big, bustling and modern, the streets full of scooters. Whole families screech past, mothers sitting side-saddle, helmets unbuckled, clutching babies. Down by the sluggish brown river the pace is slower, but life on the sticky plain can be unbearable in the hot season. The British would take refuge from the intense heat in the little hill town of Pyín Oo Lwín on the Shan Plateau. In the lowlands, rice is the main crop, but up on the plateau, the cooler climate means everything from cauliflowers to pineapples are grown.

Winding up to the Shan Plateau, we stop at a rest point for the engine to be hosed down – and a plate of samosas. This is also the main route to China, just eleven hours away by road, used by trucks exporting marble Buddhas – and importing Pringles and pop.

Pyín Oo Lwín is nicknamed the ‘city of flowers’ and its old colonial streets are lined with vibrant purple jacaranda and vivid flame trees. On the road we pass scooters toting giant bundles of roses and marigolds to the markets, while the 350-acre National Kandawgyi Botanical Gardens, modelled on Kew, provide shady parkland, manicured lawns and beds brimming with hollyhocks.

In the huge indoor market, we squeeze down cramped alleyways picking out the pungent ingredients for the famous fermented tea leaf salad: a mix of pickled tea leaves, fried peanuts, peas and butter beans which is traditionally offered with green tea. Hanging from hooks are bags of fresh shampoo made from tree bark, jojoba and lime, and piles of betel leaf and slices of betel nut. Our guide picks up a stick. ‘This is thanakha.’ Grinding a small amount, he mixes it with water to make the distinctive facepaint.

For lunch we are going to sample Kachin cuisine. Poking our heads into the kitchen we watch the drama unfold: chefs ladling water into huge, wok-style pans, sizzling and steaming them clean between dishes, chopping fresh herbs, chicken and fish with machetes. We order kakadaig, a melt-in-the-mouth meaty freshwater fish, steamed with the herbs. In the next wok they whisked up a quick stir-fry: chicken, ginger, garlic, mint and green chilli all chopped together and fried in peanut water, with more fresh mint sprinkled on the top.

From Mandalay, we head to the ancient city of Bagan on a small cruise ship called Malikha 2. On the upper deck, wicker seats are shaded from the sun by an awning, while inside the cabin is air-conditioned. The journey normally takes around seven hours, but this is the dry season and the river is so low that the boat has to zigzag downstream to avoid the sand banks. After nine and a half soporific hours gazing out over flat, sultry plains, passing fishermen in makeshift shelters and small dugout canoes, the first sprinkling of the famous Bagan temples (stupas) looms into view.

There are over 3,000 stupas in an area of 42 square miles. It’s a magical, otherworldly place, but is not, however, a World Heritage Site – excluded by Unesco because so many temples have been ‘restored’ (read: rebuilt) by wealthy benefactors wanting ‘credit’ with Buddha. That doesn’t detract from the atmosphere. Old Bagan, with its dirt roads and tree-shaded cafes, is on the tourist trail with Mandalay and Yangon, but has a laidback sleepy appeal.

It’s also one of the few places you can get a behind-the-scenes glimpse of Burmese cooking. Kyi Kyi Swe (pronounced Tee Tee) has just started offering home-hosted lunches and dinners. She welcomes us into her house scattered with carved wooden furniture and local lacquerware, with the traditional pickled tea leaves and green tea, then leads us into the kitchen.

Shredding cucumber and onion, she mixes it by hand with the ubiquitous fish sauce, dried shrimp, chicken, peanut powder and sliced garlic, finishing with a squeeze of lime and sprinkling of fried onions. Moving to a low-slung table, we sat cross-legged on the floor as a feast is laid out in front of us, and she explains how the different dishes are made: butterfish curry with tamarind leaves, pork curry with garlic, fried spinach with sesame seeds, dried shrimp with onion and mint leaf, bean and vegetable soup and the usual spicy condiments, fish paste and green chillies. A dish of ‘scrambled eggs’ turned out to actually be mashed corn.

‘The corn is grated then fried with onions and garlic and sugar. We then add water to soften the texture,’ she tells us.

The next morning we rise early in darkness to cycle to the temples in time for sunrise. ‘From the alternative circle line to something similar to a Boris bike,’ I was thinking as we pedalled down the bumpy dirt track, head torches cutting through the inky blanket, swerving to avoid a random goatherd. Clambering up the rough stone, we gaze out over the stupa-pricked sandstone landscape as the misty ethereal early morning light bathes the pagodas in a soft gold. We sit in silence for a while soaking up the scene – until our stomachs tell us it’s time for mohinga.