The Mount Popa of Myanmar

Mount Popa, an extinct volcano in Kyaukpadaung, near Bagan. 

Cliff of Mount Popa is about 2417 feet above sea level with 777 stairs to go up the hill.

The Mount Popa stands in Kyaukpadaung Township in central dry zone. It is an extinct volcano about 4950 feet above the sea level. The mountain is famous for its yellowish flowers called Sagawar and rich varieties of its flora and funna. The cliff of Mount Popa is also famous in the legend of Myanmar thirty-seven Nat stories. There are thousands of vistors to Popa mountain for so many different reasons all around the year. Some are for the Nat festivals, historical research, holidays and environmental research around the mountain. This is one of the earliest community forestry projects in Myanmar. The restoration of habitats in Mount Popa starts around 1970s. In the songs and poems as early as Bagan era (1240s) and up till now, the yellowish flowers from Popa is still famous. The heories from the kingdoms are sent to Popa as messengers for plucking the flowers. The legendary heories in Bagan and Ava were around Popa in the stories with the beautiful girls from Popa mountain. The cliff of Popa is the place in the ledgends where the beautiful girls were waiting for their husband or their beloved. The stories were not happy endings of course. What was the cause of tragedy in these stories? Some people may answer that it is the fedual system. I would like to answer the cause of these repetitiveness of dramatic tragedy is that superstition and unawareness of gender equity. I would like to mean that the Popa mountain stands as Mount Olypus of Myanmar having so many female Nats and stories of repetitive tragedy because of gender inequality. Now, in the days of 21st century, people still carrying the trait of superstition and gender discrimination in a different costumes. Under different skin, ethnicity and colours, we have so many tragedies because of unawareness. How long these beautiful flowers in Popa will still falling with the wind? How long shall we take these tragic histroy along with us? How long shall we still give compensation to our mistreat or unfair judgement to those legendary girls by worshiping or giving respect in our society? Yes, we have so many questions yet not have answer to us in our society.