The temple complex is of course teaming with devotees, pilgrims etc. but it also functions as a community center, with lots of people seeming to spend all day here. And of course there are monks, lots of monks. There's a school for monks here where the boys were all chanting prayers at very high speed. You may be wondering how you can tell Burmese monks from Thai ones? Well, the obvious difference is that Thais wear orange while the Burmese wear maroon. But Burmese monks also just get a crewcut, while Thais are completely shaved, including eyebrows. Theologically there is no difference, as both countries adhere to Theravada Buddhism rather than the Mahayana Buddhism of Japan, Korea, China and the Himalayan cultures.

The stupa itself is immense, which is too bad for the photos' sake, because it's hard to see the amazing embellishment of the structure. Legend has it that the original eight hairs were encased in a small stupa made of gold. This was then encased in a silver stupa, then successive layers of tin, copper, lead, marble and iron. Nobody really knows what's inside now except it's definitely completely solid. Over the centuries each king would pour gold on it, usually some multiple of their body weight. It's now regilded once a year. Because it's so big you can barely see the decoration at top, so it's a bit of a waste, but it's quite elaborate. It's solid gold, with the top hung with gold bells, silver bells and jewelry. At the tip there's a gold flag that serves as a weather vane, covered with 3,000 diamonds and rubies. And above the flag is a diamond orb, completely encrusted with 4,400 diamonds, with a single huge diamond perched at the very tippy top, to use childspeak.

By far Yangon's most amazing sight is Shwedagon Pagoda. The temple complex began about 1,500 years ago, when legend has it eight of the Buddha's hairs were buried here.



The temple is built atop a small hill, and reached by walking up one of four elaborately covered stairways lined with merchants selling amulets, religious pictures, offerings for monks etc. At the top of the stairs is a vast marble floor with an enormous gold stupa at center (next post). But surrounding this main stupa are hundreds of smaller temples, all extremely intricate and very colorful. These serve a variety of purposes. Many were donated by past kings, some serve as schools for young monks and others are donated by groups from other parts of the country. In addition, there are seven small temples scattered around the circumference, one for each day of the week. The superstitious Burmese place great stress on which day of the week they were born, and they visit their birthday's temple as their first port of call at Shwedagon. Overall, the color scheme is reminiscent of the temples of Thailand, but the architecture is quite different, and reminds me more of Nepalese temples.