Putao
cherubHikes for shy people in Putao
Putao " is often associated with snow-capped summits and the dream of a hike through untouched mountain wild. It' s a mythical scenery that has been attracting harsh explorers from all over the world to northern Myanmar for a hundred years - humans like the UK flora expert Frank Kingdon-Ward, whose week-long mountain excursions from the 1930' to the 1950' led to the documentary of tens of orchids and other hitherto unfamiliar herbs.
Further unafraid patrons were the US historian Alan Rabinowitz, whose 2001 Beyond the Last Village describes his meeting with the shrinking Tarong Pygmian people, and the unhappy US serpent expert Joe Slowinski, who was shot on September 11, 2001 by a sting of a voluminous herb while he explored the mountains just outside Putao.
Takashi Ozaki and U Nama Johnson from Myanmar were the first mountaineers to climb Mount Hkakaborazi, which at 5847 meters is the highest mountain not only in Myanmar but also in Southeast Asia. Not everyone has the determination or wish to embrace such bold expeditions, of course, but that doesn't mean that the north of Myanmar should be completely shunned by occasional travelers.
The Putao itself lies on a wide plateau, about 80 kilometers southwards from the high mountain range, and the lowlands provide many opportunities for more humble adventure in the shape of unpretentious walks through towns that are home to the ethnical Kachin, Lisu, Rawang and Khamti Shan.
Such a journey led me last February from Khamti Shan Dorf Kaung Mu Lon over two full working nights to the city of Machanbaw, a journey of about 28 kilometers (17 miles). We were organized by Malikha Lodge near Putao, and next to me (an American) our multi-ethnic group was made up of two Yangon Bamiar buddies, a cook from Bamiar, two locals (a Rawang and a Khamti Shan) and Thomas, our Kayin guid.
During our two-day hike we climbed snow-covered Himalaya summits, 3640 meters high and 80 kilometers to the northern side, 494 meters above sealevel, which we arrived at right at the beginning via a brief, sharp ascent to the wooded Noi Zaw Hill. The small upper part of the mountain offers a magnificent panoramic sight of the crystalline Malikha River (which runs southwards to the Namkhan River near Myitkyina, which joins together to create the Ayeyarwaddy River) and the wonderful Kaung Mu Lon.
From Kaung Mu Lon we crossed a small creek and reached the Rawang-Dorf Taram Dam 1. It didn't take long with 200 inhabitants, but a few paces later we were in another town known as Taram Dam 2.
Sometimes the border was so subtile that we had to trust Thomas to tell us when we had passed the unseen border between the cities. That doesn't mean the neighborhoods were all the same.
First of all, the Kachin, Lisu and Rawang, who make up about 70 per cent of the Putao River Basin people, are mostly Christians, and their communities are uncommon in Myanmar because of their shortage of palagodas and cloisters. Christendom was founded in the far north of Myanmar in the 1950' by the US misionary Robert Morse (who also translates the Bible into the Rawang language), and there are numerous Baptist and Roman Catholic denominations in the area.
The Khamti Shan, the primitive colonists of the Valleys, have a tendency towards Buddhism. Khamti Shan towns are not only home to peagodas and convents, but also to vast parks, as the local people are the most important market gardeners in the area. Like elsewhere in Myanmar, in the Putao area, it is used not only as a nutritional supplement but also for the production of essential oils, which are believed to have medical value:
Unique for the Putao area is that it is also used for boiling, just as it is used for vegetable essential oils such as vegetable palms, peanuts, sunflowers and other vegetable foodstuffs. Native people are said to have contributed to turning the Khamti Shan village into a refuge for feral bird ers who seem to realize that in Buddhist settlements they are less likely to be fired from the skies with a conventional sling or cross-bow than in non-Buddhist caves.
In fact, the Khamti Shan communities seem to live with bird song from morning to night, but the birds may just eat the products of the gardens instead of hunting. On the first part of our hike, one of the advantages of our hike through the endless expanse of the town was the opportunity to see the people.
At Kaung Mu Lon we were asked to a home to have a cup of coffee with a Khamti Shan wife and her daugther. We later that night we encountered a group of Rawang - four grown-ups and three kids - who were on the last stage of a 10-day trip from their town near the China-Grandmark.
A few moments later, a buddhistic man repaired his palm trees in his front garden and gave us Californian orange trees (Reverend Morse is also attributed with the introduction of lemon fruits into the Putao Valley after noticing that the inhabitants were lacking in vitamine C).
Overnight in a small Rawang familysodge. We were rewarded for a hiking tour with a meal by candle light (emergency, not romantic) with vegetables-temppura, beans, bay rices, sweetened and pickled pig meat, rawang chickens, long beans, kelp lettuce and pies for desert, all with Myanmar's Red Mountain Estate vin.
At dawn the town was surrounded by thick, damp fog that rolled off the near riverbank. Tranquillity was shaken when deafening Myanmar music from rock broke out of a hi-fi system in one of the villagers' homes, an alert at 6:45 am, which probably only a few neighbors could sleep through. It had come to life since my early dawn outing.
After a cobbled street we left the town and the walk quickly took on a different nature than the one before. While on the first morning we had seen one town merge into another, there were now vast, open paddy farms where animals were roaming freely, forests where bird life was singing in the tree, and clear creeks flowing over cliffs and through pastures.
From the Kachin hamlet of Inwayn Baw we had a great panoramic tour of the Malikha River overlooking the hamlet of Ma Ket Mong. After entering another wood, we drove through the Kachin-Dorf In Bu Baw and found ourselves again encircled by wood. Shortly after lunch we arrived in the big city of Machanbaw, home of Rawang, Kachin and Khamti Shan, as well as officials from all over the state.
It was also the site of the former UK settlement in northern Myanmar from 1913, before Fort Hertz was founded in Putao in 1925. In the surroundings of Machanbaw there are still remains of the former colonies. Situated on a broad meadow on the edge of the city with a view of the Malikha River, it feels like a well-kept, country-style hut.
Completing our little adventures, we climbed the second slope of the whole trail, which was initially not as high as Noi Zaw, but led to a mythical place outside Machanbaw: a rocky promontory that looks like a fossilized kite. Then we photographed and left kites lying asleep and went down the hillside to the end of our hike.