Will The Ancient Buddhist Temples of Bagan Turn Into Disney World?

NPR | PBS NEWSHOUR
By Jeffrey Brown

The sun rises over the ancient city of Bagan and its Buddhist temples and pagodas.
Photo by Mary Jo Brooks/PBS NewsHour

CHINA---Five-thirty in the morning and we are climbing the narrow steps up to the top of Shwesandaw Pagoda in the dark. That, of course, is the point if we’re to be there in time to watch the sun rise over a plain of pagodas and temples that date back a thousand years — Shwesandaw itself was erected in 1057. Will “Disney” win in the end? Some scholars worry that Bagan will be turned into a kind of theme park. Bagan is clearly being discovered and the crowds are coming. Chief arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown is writing from Myanmar (formerly Burma) as part of a new series “Culture at Risk.” Learn more about why Brown is there in his reflections “Is culture at risk in Myanmar?“ [link]