Nothing is simpler than taking the train here, but you still need a ticket!
Burma by train is an adventurer’s dream. It’s slow, it’s long but it’s beautiful and it’s a real cultural immersion. But sometimes, it is necessary to be incredibly patient to reach the journey.
After my eighteen hours on the train, one hour of tuk-tuk on a broken road, I arrive in a small town on the Irrawaddy River, in Khata, Burma
The idea was to take a boat to Bhamo, further north. But now there is no boat.
What about tomorrow? At the port they tell me, no problem, a boat leaves tomorrow morning, nine o’clock. I arrive the next day at the appointed time, bag on my back.
But I’m having a hard time, no boat today. What’s more, they think it’s very funny.
That’s the way it is, it’s Burma.
Maybe tomorrow.
Perhaps.
Well, no then. I’ll go to Myiktyina by train. And then I’ll take the boat trip on the way back.
Because with some maybes, in Burma…
So I ask about trains.
The owner of the hotel tells me that there is one leaving from Nabar (where I came from the day before) at 1 p.m. sharp.
I need a transport to the station, easy: “you go there, there and then you turn right and you will find the “bus station, you take a bus or a tuk-tuk to the train station”. One hour drive. Three thousand kyats
I know, I already did that yesterday.
Thank you very much (Jésudémarai in Burmese).
I have time, I go around the city, drink a coffee full of pomace, stroll a bit in the market.
I pick up my backpack at the guesthouse, a bit early.
It’s another person who is now at the reception and who informs me that if there is a train, it leaves at 12 p.m.
So I am very late now.
I hurry in the direction of the “bus station”. But I can’t find it. Because at the moment there is no bus.
I can find tuk-tuks but they leave in two or three hours.
Then I will have missed the train.
I find motorbikes that ask me ten dollars to go to Nabar… so much to say a crazy price.
I go round in circles for two hours, ask the policeman at the crossroads, the bus driver, the coffee shop, half the town passes by
Each time the same story: “please take me to the station“!
And each time the same answer: “Where do you go?“.
“To the train station! »
“Mandalay?“
“No, Myiktyina“
Each time a different answer: no train, a train tonight, a china train, a train tomorrow, the Eiffel Tower, Zinedine Zidane.
“Thank you very much, but please, take me to the station, I’ll manage afterwards“.
Well no.
An hour later, I almost feel hysterical.
In desperation, I catch a policeman who sends me to see a tuk-tuk who wants to take me NOW, at an abusive rate but I accept.
In the end he doesn’t leave right away. He has to pick up the passengers of the ferry coming from Bhamo!
We end up leaving and I finally start to feel lighter. After an hour of incredible chaos, of overheating, of elephant traffic jams, the station, at last, like an Eldorado
I walk into the tiny teller’s office. It’s because in Burma, if people don’t know the train schedules, they treat tourists really well.
I don’t stand in line like everyone else, no, I just walk into the office with all my burdock.
It goes all over the place. There’s a train arriving in thirty minutes. What happiness! I’m buying! I don’t hide my joy.
But now we have to find the right fare, the right one. I’m a foreigner, I have to pay in dollars and also more.
I hold out my passport, I’m not worried, thirty minutes, I have a margin. How naive I am!
During all this time, my passport goes from hand to hand, from notebook to notebook, from sheet to sheet. Finally, they find the right line, in the column marked “for Christine“, eight dollars please.
With a broad smile I hand her my newest hundred dollar note.
But they don’t have the change. One hundred dollars or five, I can’t do better.
Paying in kyats? With pleasure!
But it’s not possible! They are adamant. I must be the only foreigner who has been here for ages.
The Burmese are impatient at the local ticket office, the Burmese also want to get on the train, which is waiting on the platform for someone to sell me a ticket… and it is whistling with impatience.
Now they are panicking. The train is about to leave. Everyone is getting involved.
The situation is suddenly loosening up, I’ll pay Myiktyina! I take out my passport, they make me my ticket, by hand. I just got it back, I’m grabbed by the sleeve, I have to run on the platform, get into the wagon without steps, throw the bag on the floor before the wagons start moving.
I am exhausted, completely washed out. Fortunately I have ten hours of train in front of me to recover from my emotions.
It’s true, when you travel like that you have to take the rhythm of the country, think local!
Advice to future adventurers: if you have a plane to catch, plan wide!
