Burma Part 1: The Market

About a month ago, after about two days hopping from various airplanes, I returned to the U.S. from a 2-week trip to Burma with my mom.

If you don't know where Burma is, it's in Southeast Asia and borders Thailand.

Here's the back story on my trip.

For about the past year I have been the social media/website manager for my parent's mission organization Firefall International. All of my life, my parents have been invested in spreading the gospel across the world, taking many trip to many different nations since I was very young. I think one of the reasons that I became a writer was because I learned to love listening to the stories my parents would bring back from across the world and the tales the missionaries that would visit us would tell.

So, I have always had a passion for seeing people in other nations come to know the Lord. And it has been so neat to use my passion for social media and writing to help further that cause.

And a month and a half ago I got to experience firsthand the wonderful harvest that is happening in Burma and the wonderful people who are a part of it. (You can read more about my trip here.)

Food aside, I really fell in love with the people. They are some of the most kind people I have ever been around. They are humble and they are so resilient, even in the face of so much uncertainty and turmoil.

So back to food, we had some really great tastes in Burma: from the most delicious chicken broths to crazy milkshakes to avocado sprinkled with sugar for dessert. And I only got sick once, so that was good, too.

Here's part one of my food snippets from Burma: the market.

We visited a market in a city in the mountains where we spent half of our trip. And here are some of the things we saw.

 As in most places in Burma, there are so many people, everywhere! This market was huge to me, and something new was around each corner.

Noodles- so many kinds!

I loved their smaller, but more delicious bananas. We ate so much amazing fruit on the trip and even had fresh fruit juice every morning at our hotel (pineapple, papaya and honeydew melon to name a few).

Yes, that is ginger.

We learned quickly that they use shallots in the place of onions in much of their cooking. Apparently shallots are very cheap there, and what a treat it was to enjoy them in many raw salads served to us by such sweet hosts and hostesses. But I learned quickly that anything that we ate could potentially be super spicy (for our tame American palates).

I loved their faces and features- all so unique and all so beautiful.