The country’s largest and most important commercial waterway, the Irrawaddy River flows from north to south through Myanmar. Traveling with the current, a ferry can reach Bagan from Mandalay in 9 hours. I decided this would be a far more interesting way to make the journey than a 30 minute flight.

The river is used as a transportation highway, source of drinking and irrigation water, bathtub, washing machine and garbage dump.

All manner of boat, usually loaded to capacity or of questionable seaworthiness can be seen on the water.

The shores are populated with small villages and tiny family enclaves.

Occasionally a large city pops up complete with a liberal collection of temples and stupas.

Everywhere the locals are hard at work, loading goods, harvesting crops, and tending livestock.

The one thing that I was not prepared to see on the Irrawaddy was the body of a dead child floating in the water. At a distance, I assumed it was a discarded doll and snapped a photo with my telephoto lens.  As it floated closer to the boat it became unmistakably clear that this was the body of an infant boy.  I immediately notified a member of the crew and asked him to summon the captain. By the time the captain arrived a minute later the body was out of sight. Even after showing him the picture on my camera he simply shrugged his shoulders and returned to his post.  I don’t know what I was expecting him to do. I was deeply unsatisfied with his response but had to remind myself that I was making that judgement from my own cultural perspective.  I imagine that this was not the first corpse he had encountered on the river and that interrupting the journey of 50 passengers to search for and retrieve a dead child was not something that he would have remotely considered nor did he have the option to call someone that would come to investigate.  I could not stop thinking about the parents of this boy. Were they sick with worry about his disappearance, unaware of his fate or had they been the cause of his death and responsible for discarding his corpse into the river.  The answer to these questions will never be known. In either case, I will pray for them and will keep the memory of this child in my heart.  May his soul rest in peace.