The temples at Bagan rival Cambodia’s Angkor Wat in magnificence. The ancient city was built mostly between the 11th and 13th centuries, with more than 4,400 temples to enshrine it as the capital of Buddhist study and to ensure the kings’ own good fortunes. The good fortune didn’t last for long—by the 14th century, invaders overran the country and ransacked the shrines. They lay in ruin for centuries until a 1975 earthquake prompted Unesco to rebuild some of the 2,000 remaining stupas and attempt to make Bagan a World Heritage Site. But the government’s xenophobia forced the organization to quit the country.

As a result, the temples in this 16-square-mile zone have been restored haphazardly. Some have gold-leaf stupas and refinished interiors with their original murals illuminated and visible. Others are untouched. Climbing tight stairways in the dark, surrounded by the acrid smell of bat shit and dampness, the temples feel spooky and thrilling. We may have been the first to rediscover some paintings languishing in dim corners—who knows? Most information about Bagan is anecdotal. There are no official maps. That’s the bright side of underdevelopment. The bad side is the really stupid skyscraper-size museum that rises above the temples like a scar on the landscape. Saw Tun, our guide to Bagan, called it “the tower of bad taste.”

Saw Tun was fiercely intelligent and deeply ironic. He wore a camouflage cap and a traditional longyi, a fashion statement that I interpreted as his commentary on the struggle between the military and folk culture. He had traveled across Asia, and he viewed the decrepit splendor of Bagan as a metaphor for the wrecked state of Burma. “Burmese people demand nothing,” he said. “The generals have successors lined up for the next 30 years. Even when they go, the country is full of spies and informers. Whose side will they be on?”

I asked Saw Tun why he didn’t emigrate while abroad. He told us that before he left, he had to sign a bond stipulating that his son would forfeit his education should he not return. “My family would suffer too much,” he said.

Did he approve of our visit, even if some of our dollars ended up getting funneled to the generals? “You must come,” he said. “Everyone is hostage here. If you don’t come, we are locked out of the world.”

It began to drizzle when we left Bagan, and it was pouring by the time we hit Mandalay, Burma’s second-largest city. Except for the amazing Mandalay Palace, the city is a modern grid of concrete tower blocks, rutted roads, and mud. Even the palace’s immense beauty was sullied when our guide, Mi Mi, informed us that it was restored in the late 1990s by prisoners and forced labor—young citizens compelled to “volunteer” one day of free work each month.

We wanted out of there immediately, but Mi Mi wasn’t keen to jump through the bureaucratic hoops it would take to alter our program. Resigned to a rainy day in Mandalay, we headed up a winding mountain road to a monastery outside town. Until the army retaliated last fall, monasteries were open places where anyone, foreign or Burmese, could visit or stay. We saw young monks performing their ablutions in a communal bath area, lying on bedrolls reading, and slurping bowls of instant noodles. It didn’t feel like a forbidding holy place, more like a relaxed college dorm where everyone happened to have a shaved head.

Buddhism is a less aggressive religion than Hinduism or Christianity—it doesn’t seek converts. Critics blame the philosophy of nonaggression for encouraging passivity. (I’d say that starvation and isolation are the more likely culprits in Burma.) I came to love the alms parade that occurred each dawn, when young monks all over Burma go from house to house, bowls in hand, collecting food. In Buddhism, feeding monks brings good fortune, and I was taken with the idea of a society that is rewarded for literally nourishing its young.

But something shifted last September. Food shortages forced villagers to forgo giving alms, which caused them great distress for shirking their religious obligations. The poverty the monks witnessed encouraged them to take to the streets, where they crouched in front of guns, chanting metta (loving kindness) and singing the national anthem.