Arimaddana-pura: City that Tramples on Enemies

Reaching the highlight of this journey, Bagan. The most memorable place and world renown image of Myanmar to the outside world; and for us, the reason number 1 on why to come to visit this fascinating country. The immense place will leave you speechless with the more than 2200 temples scattered in the plateau. And now imagine how its heyday might have looked like with over 10000 temples during the 9th and 13th centuries when the city was the capital of the Kingdom of Pagan. It is by all means the place with the largest and densest concentration of Buddhist temples, stupas, pagodas and monuments in the world.

From the 13th century and until the 15th when the city declined no longer being the capital. And only the most important and famous temples were kept up to date, refurbished and upgraded through the centuries, meaning that many other thousands fell into disrepair and lost. Nowadays only thousands of piles of rocks are their solely remnant of their location. Earthquakes have done their part too, damaging and destroying many structures. Fortunately many hundreds have been questionably restored. And I use the word “questionably” because their restoration did not follow the original design nor features and fittings, hence why the entire place has not made it yet to be inscribed as a World Heritage Site. UNESCO claims that the restoration vaguely follows the original, and for now it remains on the Tentative List.

Bagan, apart from the archaeological site, has nothing else to see or do. And unless you have some plans to get farther to the many great sites nearby, then do not plan any longer than 2 days. Yes it is true the site is vast and you could be spending more days to visit, in the other hand and after visiting the most important temples, the rest are all pretty much the same. New Bagan, located to the north of Old Bagan is just a simple a modern small city where majority of hotels and facilities for tourists are, and residence to the local people. Old Bagan is a deserted place on the early morning and late evening hours. (more…)