Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
the town of
Inywa
river traffic negotiates its way around the
Shweli sandbar
where the Sh-
weli River dumps its heavy load of silt at the river's confluence with the Ayeyarwady.
FastandslowboatsalikestopatTigyaingandTagaung,buttheplacemostlikelytobeofin-
teresttotravellersis
Kyaukmyaung
wherepottersproducehuge
Martabanjars
,usingtech-
niquesthathaveremainedunchangedsinceKingAlaungpayaforciblyrelocatedthousandsof
Mon captives here from Mottama (formerly Martaban) near Mawlamyine in the eighteenth
century. Alaungpaya also left his mark on his birthplace,
Shwebo
, which he made capital of
his new dynasty between 1752 and 1760. Outside Shwebo, the ruins of a far more ancient
city,
Hanlin
, are also worth visiting.
Kyaukmyaung
Some 74km north of Mandalay,
KYAUKMYAUNG
is the last major stop on the way south.
From the jetty the main pottery area of
Ngwe Ngein
is 1.5km south along the riverside road,
just north of the Radana Thinga Bridge. Kyaukmyaung is a sleepy little place, and save for
the potteries and a few pagodas that were badly cracked in a 2012
earthquake
, there's little
to occupy you - which is just as well, seeing as the nearest accommodation for foreign visit-
While Kyaukmyaung's workshops produce a variety of earthenware jars, the most recog-
nizable are the large Martaban jars that were used for centuries by Mon merchants in their
Indian Ocean trade - also known as “Ali Baba jars” after their cameo in
Ali Baba and the
Forty Thieves.
In shady huts set back from the riverside it's possible to see potters shaping
the jars using wheels that they turn with their feet, later firing them in low brick kilns fuelled
by rice husks.
