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Pilgrims leave behind problems for Kyaiktiyo trustees

Porters carry a pilgrim down from Kyaiktiyo Pagoda on a palanquin. Road access to the Mon State pagoda is limited, making it hard for trustees to deal with the rubbish left by the 20,000 or so pilgrims who visit each day at peak times.

The busy New Year season brought with it a headache for trustees at the famed Kyaiktiyo Pagoda: what to do with the mounds of rubbish left behind by pilgrims.

U Tin Nyunt, a member of the pagoda’s board of trustees, said plastic bags were the main rubbish problem. He urged pilgrims to take as much of their rubbish home with them as possible to preserve both the natural and manmade environment.

“It’s really like a human sea on the pagoda at this time of year,” U Tin Nyunt said last month. “That means the pilgrims are leaving behind a lot of rubbish. Many of them can’t even find a spare bed in a guesthouse, so they have to stay on the pagoda platform, which is part of the problem.”

He said the mountainous location and basic infrastructure – a single-lane road joins Yathetaung bus station, near the pagoda, and Kinpun village at the base of the mountain – makes it difficult for garbage trucks to get in and out. U Tin Nyunt said about 20,000 pilgrims come to Kyaiktiyo each day on the busiest days in December and leave behind the equivalent of five truck-loads of rubbish.

This is mostly put into landfill, while a small amount is burned.

“We can’t collect all the rubbish that people leave, it’s just impossible and the problem has gradually got worse and worse,” he said. “People need to be aware of the consequences of their actions.”

He said the board of trustees would like to see Kyaiktiyo declared a “plastic bag-free zone”, as authorities have done in Yangon, Mandalay and Nay Pyi Taw.

“If the authorities do this, we would make sure the rule is enforced. The rubbish is an environmental problem, as the plastic is degrading the soil.”

Another problem is the lack of accommodation, he said. While many guesthouses have been established on the pagoda platform with the agreement of the board of trustees, there are still many pilgrims who can’t find a spare bed in the peak season.

Prices also reach exorbitant levels, with some guesthouses charging K45,000 a night for three or four people and K80,000 for a larger family, one pilgrim told The Myanmar Times.

“We have no chance to get a room in a guesthouse at this time, there are too many pilgrims, so that’s why we had to sleep on the pagoda platform,” said 27-year-old Ko Thiha from Tarmwe township in Yangon, who was visiting Kyaiktiyo with friends.

U Tin Nyunt said trustees are unable to construct any more guesthouses at the moment because the soil on the mountain is not stable enough.

“We need more buildings but we can’t do anything about that at the moment, we just have to manage the pilgrims carefully,” he said.

U Ko Ko Kyi, the joint secretary of the Myanmar Engineering Society, said both trustees and vendors around the pagoda needed to be wary of the threat posed by mudslides.

“Because of the sandy soil on the mountain, there is a risk of mudslides and the soil giving way, especially in the rainy season,” U Ko Ko Kyi said.

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