Burma's first and oldest capital, Bagan, rivals Angkor Wat for seductive beauty and mysticism - but is largely forgotten. Lying on the dusty Irrawaddy Plain, this ancient religious city, with its hundreds of elegant temples, captivates the imagination with its immense scale and surprising history. Find out what kind of beauty can make poets fall silent and painters put away their brushes.

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Discovering the Real Burma (part I)
The Ancient Capital of Bagan - Lost...and Found

In Burma, nothing is quite as it seems. For many visitors, Burma is only known through its disputed politics. Behind this, however, hides a country and a people that should not be forgotten, deeply religious and dignified. A country of ancient charms not yet infected by western values.

It's easy to lose your way on the time continuum here. No e-mail addiction, no Britney Spears, no trendy sunglasses worn indoors. Surreal? Definitely. But in a comforting way. The world beyond Burma soon begins to feel like a vaguely doubtful rumour.

Spiritualism suffuses everything about the Burmese. No one seems lost (only as a country are they lost, but that's another story...); everything has a purpose and place, as it always has. Except me.

I am in the capital, Yangon, trying to find my way north to the near-mythical ancient capital of Bagan where, rumour has it, stand hundreds of crumbling, sunbaked stupas along the banks of the great Irrawaddy River - a haunting capital that came to a violent, tragic end 1,000 years ago.

But I'm already lost - somewhere. An old Buddhist monk takes pity on me as I occupy a patch of sidewalk trying to look, well, not lost. And after revealing to him my ambitious travel plans, I get this:

"It is better to travel well than to arrive," the monk smiles gently, his weathered face crinkled like a freshly plowed field.

"Remember!" he raises a knotted finger, "people don't take trips; trips take people. So make the journey your goal..." The morning sun gleams through his umbrella, blood-red, as though through the ear of a giant.

"Sir, that's a great philosophy on travelling. Have you travelled much?"

"Not really. Before I became a monk, I was a tour guide. My motto was 'I know - I go - I show'. Bagan? Bus 17." And with that, he flicks his saffron robe over his shoulder and melts into the bustling streets of Yangon.

It is a timeless scene in a timeless place. Well, almost.

Ancient Bagan - Where Time Stood Still...

Bagan lies lost on the dusty Irrawaddy Plains. In the summer months of June to September, the heat rolls from the parched earth "like the breath of an angry god". But in the golden light of winter (Dec.-Feb.), Bagan seduces with a beauty and mysticism only matched by its colourful history.

Bagan was the centre of Burmese politics and culture for two centuries until the city was sacked by Kublai Khan in1287. Little has changed here in the century since it was 'rediscovered'.

Sir James Scott, a visitor in the 1880s, said it well:

"Bagan is in many respects the most remarkable religious city in the world. Jerusalem, Varanasi, nor Rome can boast the multitude of temples of all shapes, colours, and sizes studding this landscape. It is a veritable elephant's graveyard of Burmese culture.

"There is nowhere, perhaps, a sight as striking as the view across the plain of Bagan, one red-brick pagoda after another, with an occasional white spire reaching heavenward, all along the dusty eastern shore of the greatest river in Burma".

Indeed.

Even today, just a handful of farmers work the fields around these towering stupas called pays, but otherwise this place remains deserted. The best way to get around is still by horsecart or bicycle, as the only way to approach these mammoth structures is along dirt trails.

As you weave your way amongst these behemoths, it is strange to think that a thousand years ago, when invading Mon, Rackhine, Siamese, the cultured Khmers of Angkor - and finally Kublai Khan - tried to grind Bagan into submission, there was more at stake than political or martial superiority.

These invaders coveted not the marvelous temples that stretch to the horizon (as they were of no intrinsic value) but something that we might consider far more mundane: lacquerware.