Has every Pole been in Czestochowa? Has every Pole seen the Pope? Has every Pole seen the St. Mary's Church in Cracov?
Similar dilemmas have 47 million Burmese people who have three very important shrines for Buddhists: the Shwegadon Pagoda in Yangon, that belongs to the wonders of the world , a complex of several thousand temples, pagodas and stupas in Bagan, and the Golden Rock at the top of the Kyaihtiyo Mountain.
Probably every Burmese person should, but not everyone can afford to visit these places .
We are just at the top of the Kyaithtiyo, as we had seen the other places previous trips. Here is the most famous rock – The Golden Rock, which hides one of the hair of the Buddha.
(The number of relics in the country indicates a lush head of hair of the Prophet. )
The pilgrimage (because I need to call this an expedition to the Mount of the crowd of the faithful and the curious) begins with a ride in the back of the truck, which crams exactly 42 people .
The car drives sharply uphill and does not brakes at the curves, so sitting in the back, we tilt dangerously to the left and right.
The ride takes about an hour, as the truck stops several times en route so that the pilgrims could coax more donations for purposes that could not understand.
Today in the “local Czestochowa” there were no crowds, so we quietly observed the behaviour of the pilgrims and took numerous photos.
We ourselves became a curiosity and we were asked sever times by the local people to let them photograph us or to take photos with them together. It was a nice experience.
