Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
and an ascetic - encounters that encouraged him to seek a meaning behind human suffer-
ing.
Mon Cultural Museum
MUSEUM
(cnr Baho & Dawei Jetty Rds; admission K2000; 10am-4.30pm Tue-Sun)
Recently renovated,
and unlike most of Myanmar's regional museums, actually worth a visit, Mawlamyine's
museum is dedicated to the Mon history of the region. The collection includes stelae with
Mon inscriptions, 100-year-old wooden sculptures depicting old age and sickness (used
as
dhamma
-teaching devices in monasteries), ceramics, silver betel boxes, royal funer-
ary urns and Mon musical instruments, most of which are accompanied by English-lan-
guage descriptions.
Gaungse Kyun (Shampoo Island)
ISLAND
( daylight hours)
This picturesque little isle just off Mawlamyine's northern end
is so named because, during the Ava period, the yearly royal hair-washing ceremony cus-
tomarily used water taken from a spring on the island.
You can hire a boat out here from the pier at the north end of town, not far from the
former Mawlamyine Hotel, for around K2000 return.
Peace rather than sights is the reason for venturing out here, but you can visit
Sandawshin Paya, a whitewash-and-silver
zedi
(stupa) said to contain hair relics, and a
nearby Buddhist meditation centre. Many nuns, with a menagerie of pet dogs, live on the
island.
First Baptist Church
CHURCH
MAP
GOOGLE MAP
(cnr Upper Main & Dawei Jetty Rds; daylight hours)
Founded by American Adoniram
Judson in 1827, this was the country's first Baptist church. In addition to this place of
worship, Judson's legacy also includes having been the first person to translate the Bible
into Burmese. As a result of his work, today Myanmar has the third-highest population of
Baptists in the world after the United States and India.
