Here’s the thought trail this photo left behind:
Woah…surprised 😯
This looks like hard work
Where is he going?
Where did he start?
It looks so cool
Who is he?
What does he have in there?
This looks so typical of this place, Myanmar
I’m so lucky to live here and so grateful to be able to see things like this
This is why I chose to live here
I love this country and all of the dated perks it has to offer that you don’t see anymore in developed countries
Maria would say “this is no longer used in Spain since time ago”
Laugh to myself😄
I wonder if in Galicia they still have things like that. Need to ask her (never did 😅)
Would they have the same or slightly different?
Did he build that himself?
I would love to see how it’s built
I would love to see where it’s built, I’m sure it must be in front of his house right on the street or something like that
Snap!📸
I got a photo of this moment.
All the time I was hiding behind an overgrown branch from where I could stand quietly and look at him doing his thing. I didn’t want to intrude. I didn’t want him to see me, change his facial expression or smile at me because I’m a foreigner or get uncomfortable because I was staring at him with a camera in my hand. Yet, after I snapped the photo, I had another trail of thoughts which was probably motivated by my curiosity in what I was seeing. I wanted to know more about this guy, his story. Why is he doing this? Is it his job or just a chore? Is it by choice or lack of options? It looks like hard work after all. Why would he choose to do this? How long has he been doing this? These are usually the moments where I feel like a total idiot for not speaking the local language well enough to allow me to have this conversation 😪And it’s been 4 years I’m living here...fml
Yangon has a lot of these…it seems they can do anything with their hands and feet. I mean their bodies. Unless something like a motor is required they will have a way of their own to get it done. In Inle, they row boats with one leg while standing on the other. Here a man is pushing his cart filled with barrels and what not to wherever. Food carts are moved on bicycles from one location to another. Bitumen is heated in half barrels and mixed by hand. And then there is my personal favorite, a guy cutting grass for his cows and horses and it goes like this: Wooden plank placed between two trees serving as a table, one end of a long fat rusty blade fixed to the plank and the other end attached with a coconut rope which goes to a wooden-made-foot-pedal under the table and to the top attached to a branch which acts as a spring. Press the pedal, blade is pulled down & cuts grass while pulling down the branch, release the pedal, branch lifts blade up and repeat. How freaking cool is that?!!! I sincerely hope that description allows you to imagine this thing.
The point is, nothing stops them. Something needs to be done. It may not be done by western standards but they will get it done somehow. And if it breaks, they will be able to fix it because they made all of it. It doesn’t scare them to try new things, build crazy things that leave you standing with your mouth agape with incredulity. Why is that? What did this photo make me realize? When push comes to shove, these people get the job done. In their own way, maybe, but hey, that’s perfectly understandable and I admire it!
Cheers,
R