Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra and Rooftop Burmese Rap Music Event

This was one of those fantastic weekends that fills my musical soul. Friday and Saturday were bookended with musical events, in a sort of East-meets-West experience (but each in very different ways). 

Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra at the National Theatre in Yangon.

Being total groupies - photo opp with some of the fantastic hip hop artists at the event on Saturday night!

First, I have to gush about how happy I am about surviving last week. It was rather stressful, as it was my first full week working as an assistant volleyball coach. I was a bit worried about the time commitment, since I will be practicing with them four days a week (including Saturday mornings). I am absolutely loving it so far. I think it helps that it is very different from my elementary music gig. I work with the girls on JV and Varsity, and it's been fun working with high school kids. They are on such a different level. It's also a nice perk that I get to travel with them to a tournament in Hong Kong at the end of next month too! :-) In addition to that, my usual workload, plus my first week in my new grad class, things were busy. Friday culminated in a half day for professional development. I actually presented to the secondary teachers and specialists. I was super nervous; presenting to a group of teachers is hard. We are a critical crowd. But I had a blast doing my presentation: It was a topic that I am particularly passionate about, the teachers engaged in AMAZING discussion, and I got lots of really encouraging feedback! I was over the moon - and completely exhausted - by Friday afternoon.

Screen shot of a shoutout from my secondary principal in his weekly newsletter update. Hopefully that means I did something right!

Friday night I had tickets (they were FREE!) to see the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra. There was a major breakdown in communication and I had a bad experience with a cab driver, so I was a bit frazzled by the time I arrived at the National Theatre. Luckily, I made it in time to pick up my ticket and I had pretty great seat mates (the other music teacher, Katherine, and her partner, John). I settled in to my seat and got ready to enjoy the evening.

In the frazzled state I was in, I forgot to snap a picture of the front of the National Theatre. This was the best I could get on my way out of the concert.

Going up the steps to the main entrance

Inside - stairway up to the balcony

Headed to my seat - they had ushers and everything!

The seats were very good, especially considering they were free! (We're not going to count the very expensive taxi ride I took to get there.)

Beautiful decor on the balconies. Apparently they have done a lot of work recently to the inside of the theatre. I was told there was previously a "bat and bird situation" going on inside the theatre!

Ready for the concert to begin!

They serve a full concession stand here. It was very funny to me how many people were eating and drinking during the performance, much like a movie theatre.

These were the air conditioners (referred to here in Yangon as "air cons"). There were eight of them. For the entire theatre. I was a sweaty, sweaty mess by the end of the concert. But I am slowly starting to learn that the sweatier I get, the more fun I seem to be having.

According to the program notes and the emcees for the evening, the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra is comprised of more than 90 musicians. They are currently on a 3-city tour in Myanmar as a symbol of friendship with the country. Yangon was the first stop, and then they were moving on to Mandalay and then the capital city of Naypyidaw. The Goethe Institute put this concert on, and I heard a great deal of chatter that this was the first time Yangon has seen a concert like this in... well, possibly ever. It was really exciting to be a part of it. When I accepted this teaching position, I knew I would be giving up a lot of things. One of the biggest things for me was the fact that I would not be able to see live music in any sort of capacity - classical, Broadway, or popular - while living here. Imagine my surprise when I got the email about this event! I must say, it was quite a different experience here. It is not surprising that the concert etiquette is different here than it is in the States.

Emcees for the event

As seen in the previous photo, people were eating a drinking a variety of rather interesting food and drink. There were also emcees for the event. They talked a LOT. The welcome message was over 30 minutes long! The woman spoke in English, and the man translated into Burmese, I believe. There were also other very important people from the Goethe Institute who spoke to the audience. The emcees were so very entertaining. They said things like, "The next round..." and "You will be entertained with..." They also came out between pieces and read the program to us. Overall, they probably lengthened the concert by almost an hour. I think a lot of Westerners in the audience were annoyed by it, but I found it endearing. (Also, I REALLY wanted to know if they were commentating for the cameras that were everywhere. Do you think they were saying things like, "Oh, look at the bowing in the second violins! Interesting choices"?) 

The concert order was also changed from what was printed in the program, but I enjoyed every bit of it. The concert opened and closed with Myanmar and Thai traditional music that had been arranged for a Western orchestra, though they added quite a bit of local instruments to the percussion section. I absolutely adored the Myanmar and Thai traditional folk music. I noticed that many people in the audience were singing along. Apparently one part of the Myanmar music was commemorating the area called Bagan, which is full of ancient temples. I thought this was very fitting, considering much of Bagan was damaged in the earthquake that happened last week. The Thai music was called "Sathukarn", which is sacred ceremonial music to welcome sacred beings and spirit teachers to ceremonies. These pieces were arranged in Western textures and tone colors, but you could definitely hear the authentic sounds of the respective countries. I heard lots of audience members comment that it sounded like music from The King and I or Kung Fu Panda. I guess it depends on your cultural connections!

Sandwiched in between the traditional music was Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5, Op. 73 in E-flat Major, "Emperor." The pianist was a German man named Oliver Kern, and I love his interpretation. It still had the light feeling of classical music with enough Romantic flare (think rubato and dynamics) to keep it interesting, beautiful, and appropriate. He was also a great deal of fun to watch. He looked like he was enjoying himself. 

Oliver Kern taking a bow with the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor, Gudni A. Emilson

After the Beethoven concerto, there was an intermission. The emcees came out and spoke some more, but I was dying for water. I braved the crowd, which reminded me of scenes in movies filmed in the New York Stock Exchange. There wasn't really a queue system; it was every man and woman for themselves! That is somewhat typical around here though. By the time I managed to elbow my way to the front of the line, they were out of water. I would have paid so much money for a water at that point. But there was none to buy. My choices were "Burma" - an energy drink with a flame on the front - or Sprite. I chose the one that I didn't think would make my heart stop. I returned to my seat for the remainder of the concert. Many people left during intermission, probably because they were hot and it was getting late. The emcees came out and read more of the program to us, and then the orchestra played Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5 in e minor. The brass absolutely came ALIVE in this part of the program. Time really seemed to fly, and I felt much less uncomfortable in my seat. The conductor made beautiful musical choices, and the orchestra sounded really good. People clapped in between movements, but honestly, that happens in many U.S. concerts as well! There were phones ringing and people answering them, but overall I was completely thrilled with the cultural experience. Just when I thought the concert was over, the conductor came back out onstage. He was joined this time by eight beautiful women dressed in purple. They closed the concert with a final Myanmar traditional piece, and they added local percussionists and dancers. The drums sounded similar to talking drums, and the dancers did beautiful movements with their hand shapes and the rest of their bodies. It was so very satisfying to feed the artist within me, not matter how tired I was on a Friday night!

Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra and traditional Myanmar dancers, closing the concert in a beautiful way

Saturday was also very busy for me. I had volleyball practice with the team in the morning, and then I worked at a choir retreat all afternoon with the other music teacher. I was pretty exhausted by late afternoon, so when my friend asked me to accompany her to meet up with a friend-of-a-friend, I hesitated at first. I decided that I did need to eat dinner, so I would join them. I am so glad I did. We had such a random, interesting night! It turns out her friend was with a group of ex-pats at happy hour on a rooftop downtown. They all had very interesting stories. One guy was in business, another worked for the Myanmar Times, and all of them were very well-traveled. It's funny, because I used to think I was well-traveled. And the more people I meet here, the more I realize how much of the world I have yet to see. I have time though.

My friend's friend had dinner plans, but the other ex-pats invited us to join them at a Mexican restaurant. We decided to go because we were quite hungry. When we were leaving, they invited us to some sort of Burmese rap event at a different rooftop. We were so intrigued, we had to go check it out. When we got to the rooftop bar, they asked for 7,000 kyats (pronounced "chats" - the Myanmar currency). My knee-jerk reaction was filled with attitude because I don't pay to get into bars and clubs, but then I remembered that this was supposed to be some sort of special event. I looked at it as a ticket price (and really, it was only like $7 USD). I am so thrilled that we stayed. It was probably my favorite night I've had thus far in my adventure in Myanmar.

View of the stage

 Dance floor in front of the stage, with a cool graffiti wall

View from the balconey on the other side of the dance floor - that's Shwedagon Pagoda, probably Yangon's most iconic pagoda. The picture does it absolutely no justice.

I couldn't get over this view!

Before the artists came on the stage, they had a well-known DJ spinning from Thailand. He played this amazing mix of house music and old school hip hop. When the event began, there were a variety of artists that came out and performed. I could obviously not understand any of it because it was all in Burmese, but it didn't matter. I couldn't stop dancing because the energy was AMAZING! 

The German guy who rapped in Burmese

 Three killer rappers from Myanmar - the guy in the center was wearing a Brooklyn shirt!

 The German guy who performed was really interesting. His music sounds like Eastern European rap music, but the lyrics were in Burmese. I really liked his style. The second group was a trio that had a very different sound. The drummer was a little behind the beat, but these guys had so much energy, it didn't matter. The headliner of the whole event was so engaging and entertaining that I forgot to take pictures. At one point, he said, "This is for all the white people in my audience!" and he sang a cover of House of Pain's "Jump Around." That might sound like an odd thing to find funny, but everyone loved it. 

When the concert was over, the DJ spun more music. It was so much fun to hear such a variety of music in one night, let alone one weekend. My friend and I were total groupies and got a picture with the trio and the German guy (pictured at the top of this post). It was also really interesting because we met a ton of Western ex-pats. Yangon is a very international place. We met people from the UK and Northern Ireland, the States, Ukraine, France, Italy, and more. We bumped into a guy from Colombia that we had previously made friends with a trivia night. My friend bumped into someone that she used to know when she lived in Bangkok. Everyone seems to know everyone in this ex-pat community, and if they don't know you, they come talk to you. There were also a lot of interesting local Burmese people that I talked to as well. I love meeting new people and hearing about the different paths that brought them here. I am also falling in love with the views of Shwedagon. It reminds me of my time in New York City. I met so many interesting people in my time there, and I am fortunate enough to still be friends with many of them. Also, I lived in NYC for five years, and to this day, every time I see the Empire State Building I smile because it makes my heart happy. I think that's what Shwedagon will be for me here. 

 A dance-y, sweaty night obviously measures how much fun we had. And that pagoda...

Next weekend, weather permitting, I hope to explore that beautiful pagoda. I am so grateful for the memories I've already made and the experiences thus far. I also can't describe how happy I am that I had such an interesting musical weekend! Until next time friends... Ta ta! (way of saying "Goodbye" in Myanmar)

Kyauk Htat Gyi Pagoda, Reclining Buddha, & Nga Htat Gyi Pagoda

Mingalaba! This weekend's adventures took me to Chauk Htat Gyi Pagoda, which houses the Reclining Buddha, and the Nga Htat Gyi Pagoda. I am beginning to understand why Yangon has the nickname of the City of Gold! This post reflects things I am learning along the way. I may not be perfect in my explanations, but I am doing my best to report things as I best understand them.

Just a teaser of what's to come: The Reclining Buddha

For those of you following me on social media, you may have seen some of my posts and check-ins lately with the hashtag #pauling. Let me explain: Paul is a (fantastic) member of our (fantastic) newbie group of teachers here at YIS. He has been teaching internationally for over 20 years and has lived all over the world. "Home" for Paul is Northern Ireland & Ireland. We have latched onto him, and any time we hang out with Paul, we call it "pauling" because he is so fantastic. Hopefully that makes sense to some of you. (Inside jokes are not always easy to explain.)

Yesterday, I was fortunate enough to have lunch and a day of culture with my friend Paul. We ate at a delicious lunch spot and then decided to try to find something nearby to do. After a quick search, we discovered that we were close to something called the Reclining Buddha, which is housed in a Buddhist temple called a pagoda (pah-go-duh). There was also another pagoda right across the street from it, so we decided this would be a good place to do some exploring. We walked from the restaurant for about half a mile through a very quiet neighborhood that felt more like the rural country than a neighborhood in a big city. The roads were very windy and it was probably not the most direct route, but we eventually came to the backside of the pagoda.

Since we were in search of something cultural, I made sure to dress very conservatively that day because a lot of places around here have very specific rules about attire (especially for women):

Attire requirements: Basically, cover your shoulders and knees...

...and remove all footwear. (Considering how squeamish I used to be about 

my feet touching things, this has been quite the adventure so far!)

As soon as we entered the pagoda, we were both very pleased with our choice. The statue  of the Reclining Buddha is absolutely stunning. It is 65 meters long and about 16 meters high, and is incredibly ornate. I learned Buddhists believe in karma, so many wealthy people donate gold and jewels to temples and other religious monuments in order to do good deeds with their money. Around the pagoda, there were many other relics and works of art, along with inscriptions in many different languages to explain the teachings of Buddha.

These were statues of very important monks. Sometimes their remains are

buried with these types of statues, but there was no information (in English)

about whether or not this is the case.

They were incredibly lifelike (almost a little TOO lifelike!), and in front of each statue

there was a small box with relics of that monk. The inscriptions were all in Burmese, so 

we couldn't read much about them, but they were very cool.

This was at the entrance to the area with the statues of important monks.

More statues - perhaps some of the guardians of the temple.

Teaching of Buddhas: 

"Not to do evil,

To cultivate merit,

To purify one's mind."

Outside, there were some lovely views of the neighboring pagoda. There were also other statues and smaller prayer rooms along the walkway:

A mini-Buddha!

"Ever loyal" - we were told that the woman is the protector of the pagoda.

Another smaller prayer room where others could enter. Interestingly, the woman 

was the only statue that had an English transcription.

From what I understand, the Myanmar people are very connected to astrology. They follow a lunar calendar and have animals associated with each day of the week. There is also some sort of connection to planets and energies, but I am still learning about those beliefs. I do know that there are eight days in their week, with Wednesdays being divided into a.m. and p.m. The Wednesday a.m. and p.m. animal is the elephant - one with tusks and one without. There are specific qualities and characteristics associated with being born on a certain day of the week, much like the Western zodiac signs. In the pagodas and other religious temples here in Myanmar, you will find an area with the animals I described. Each place has a slightly different aesthetic and setup, but it's always in the same circular shape and in the same order. You can go to your day of the week and pour water on the statue in order to pay a sort of homage to your day of the week. We learned previously that you pour one cup of water for each year that you have been alive. I've also heard that you pour another one for the coming year. At this stop, I did the extra pour, just to be safe. It was a very hot and humid day, but as we were pouring water on our respective Buddha statues, Paul and I both experienced this strange cooling sensation. It was interesting, to say the least.

 The eight days and their animal statues.

I was born on a Friday, which is the day of the Guinea Pig.

Paying my respects to Friday.

#pauling on Thursday

And now, the highlight and my FAVORITE part of this stop: The Reclining Buddha. There was a small stairwell that you could climb and take a picture of the entire statue. There wasn't a bad angle in the whole shed, but this was definitely the best view! 

The Reclining Buddha.

According to an English translation nearby, the feet have 108 inscriptions that represent the three worlds: Okasaloka (the inanimate world), Sattaloka (the animate world), and Sankharaloka (the world of the conditioned). According to an inscription near the statue, "The essence here is that the Buddha is greater than all three worlds." 

View from the floor, near the head. Everything was so ornate.

Pictures don't really do this place justice. It was such an incredible stop. Like I mentioned before, it was quite hot and humid yesterday, so Paul and I stopped at a little cafe on the way across the street to the other pagoda. Cafe 20 was very hip and modern inside, and they have a very tasty milkshake! Apparently they have an upstairs rooftop as well, which I am sure has a stunning view (especially at night).

Short break from the heat.

We crossed the street and made our way to the entrance of the Nga Htat Gyi Pagoda. It had an electronic welcome sign that informed us that the pagoda was built in 1901. That's relatively recent in this part of the world! 

The entrance to Nga Htat Gyi Pagoda.

The pathway up to the Nga Htat Gyi Pagoda.

Inside this pagoda, there were many more stunning statues, works of art, and inscriptions. The highlight was the sitting Buddha statue. It is 14 meters tall, or about five stories high! Paul and I both walked in and sat down, just gazing at its beauty. There was a lot to take in.

 

The guardians from the Heavens, sent to protect the Buddha.

The Sitting Buddha. Absolutely stunning! A note about the hands: One hand faces down, to 

connect with the Earth. The other palm faces up, to receive light and energy. This is a

similar practice I have seen in yoga classes over the years. The jewel in the middle of the 

forehead is a giant diamond, donated in efforts and traditions of karma.

 I tried to get a cool shot sitting in front of the Buddha, but this was 

the best I could do.

There were many other ornate works of art and inscriptions around this pagoda as well. A local Myanmar man told me about some of the statues, so the captions are according to what he said because all of the inscriptions were again in Burmese:

Myanmar Santa Claus

Myanmar Harry Potter! (I think I may have misheard him, but the idea makes me really excited.)

The Teaching of the Buddhas (seen in the previous pagoda as well).

Buddha with a long line of followers dressed in red robes. The large bell is held by Naga Snake, believed

to protect Buddhism. 

The bell.

Another example of the small prayer rooms scattered around the temple.

Outside the pagoda, Paul and I toured the grounds a bit. There was a monastery that houses many monks from all over Myanmar, as well as other structures where children and female monks study. You can definitely see the British colonial influence in the architecture on these grounds:

The monastery.

Views of the grounds.

This building was the newest on the property. The original building 

was destroyed in a monsoon in 2008, but has since been rebuilt in the same style.

A bit of a bamboo forest outside one of the meditation areas.

For the females who study here - apparently a scene of a movie was shot here, but I 

didn't quite catch the movie title.

After Paul and I explored the grounds a bit, we went back inside to walk around the Sitting Buddha statue. In this pagoda, the statues for the days of the week are placed around the Sitting Buddha. We stopped again to pay homage to our day of the week, but we did it in a slightly different way this time. We noticed that other local Myanmar people were only pouring a few cups of water before bowing and pausing to pray. I asked one local man why they were doing it this way, and he explained that there is a sort of "short cut" that only requires five pours: One for Buddha, one for his Teacher, one for his followers (the monks), one for your family, and one for your Teacher. I was told that the location of the pour does not matter, but this is how you pay respects in a slightly different way. Paul and I went this route in this particular pagoda, and our arms were much less sore from the pouring (but it was equally authentic and meaningful):

The location of my Friday Guinea PIg statue.

#pauling

After paying homage to our respective days of the week, we walked around the rest of the statue. We glimpsed more views of the surround area, and it was quite beautiful.

Views of the surrounding areas and rooftops - look at all the green!

(And the storm cloud rolling in. After all, it is the wet season, so it rains every single day here.)

There are no glass window coverings in this pagoda, but there are very ornate designs (possibly made of iron?). I like how they look against the views on the outside.

Back inside, we took one last look at the Sitting Buddha. It was quite a stunning day of culture. And just when I thought it couldn't get any better, some of the monks came in to sing part of their worship in front of the statue.

One last glance!

Singing monks.

I am still absolutely in love with my new city, and I cannot wait to explore more! There are countless pagodas, along with many other cultural experiences. In the meantime, I'm going to continue loving my job and where I live, and I will start my new adventure as an assistant coach for the high school girl's volleyball teams!