About four hours north out of Chiang Mai (Thailand's second largest city) there are some roads that wind up and up and up; round and round and round (if you're in the back of a Thai pick up staring up at the sky through the canopy of the tall conifers and occasional remaining hardwood trees, the hairpin turns make the sky twirl vortex-like). These roads bring you closer and closer to the border area between Thailand and the Shan state of Myanmar. It is an area of conflict and hardship. It is an area of determination and loss. And if we (CPI) are heading up there (after a two year absence -- last year there was too much military action to consider the trip), that loss will likely include the limbs of Burmese refugees. For those unfamiliar with the very basic facts: a number of the ethnic minorities of Myanmar are subjected to forced labor, prostitution, and enslavement. If they protest, they are hunted down by the military in the jungles as they flee from their villages, their ancestral lands. Their villages and subsistence crops are burned to the ground and the land is mined. Those that are fortunate enough to survive make it across the Thai border and end up in refugee camps. But their suffering is far from over: they are not granted refugee status ~ they have no legal status, no freedom to leave the camps, no ability to earn a living. Their choice is life behind barbed wire or death.
We arrived at a refugee camp whose name would translate as "Happy Hill" outside of a mostly Shan settled town called Peng Lo. There are a number of military check points to clear ~ they are ok with folks visiting the local Shan orphanage ("Mary's orphanage"). Two years ago, the camp inmates had been living in very rough conditions, beneath blue tarps high in the Thai mountains. At that time, we were informed that just two weeks prior to our arrival, the camp had been shelled and bombed (makes perfect sense: it's far easier to wipe out a group of people that are all collected conveniently in a group behind barbed wire then when they are dispersed, invisible in the jungle...) -- within Thai borders! There had been about 300 inhabitants and life was far from easy in the muddy and saddening camp. This year (after visiting the wonderful, small Shan orphanage in the same village) we found a fairly well built, considerably larger (now 600 inhabitants) camp. The ground was still all mud and stone, but there were thatch roofs to the homes, there was a class room with very earnest pupils struggling to pronounce English words. We sat under one of the thatch roofs sipping tea with the camp council's director. i asked if the camp would continue to grow, "Only by births" (within the camp). Over the border, in the surrounding land their were no more civilians, only landmines, soldiers and devastation.Back when we left Phnom Penh, i had split off from the rest of the group to join a dear Cambodian friend and remarkable man, Samel, pay respects at the funeral of his friend's father on the east coast. He was also making the journey to Sihounakville to bring his mother some medications. From this eastern edge of his country, we would immediately turn around, drive back into Phnom Penh and continue on to the second largest city (Battambang) near the western border to rejoin the others. Samel was making this second journey simply because helping the poor, the disadvantaged, the suffering population of his country is so close to his heart. Whenever we have come to Cambodia he is there in any way possible for us. He was 5-6yrs old when the Khmer Rouge swept to power and imprisoned, worked and starved millions to death. The drive was, uhm, adventurous. There are no lighted roads, it was raining, and we had to make good time. "No, there are no speed limits in our country. In fact, i'm working on draft legislation for that matter right now..." The speedometer bordered on triple digits as we pulled blindly into the oncoming lane around the spraying wheels of heavy transport trucks. There are times when the Buddhist practice of non-attachment comes a little easier...
We left Chiang Mai on bus for the six hour journey to Mae Sot ~ on the western border between Thailand and Myanmar. We boarded a very pleasant modern upscale bus, travelled about 5 blocks, pulled into a parking lot and were herded on to a creaking hulk with wobbly fans and bench seats. Oh well. It was a long haul -- seemed like the last three or four days had been all spent with the dulling whine of wheels on rough roads in our ears and minds. Here in Mae Sot we help to support the Prosthetic clinic at the Mae Tao Clinic (please google it) and we also support the "Care Villa" -- a kind name for a plaited bamboo and thatch hut in the Mae La refugee camp that houses landmine survivors that need a higher level of care. Many of them are double amputees that were also blinded by their encounter with the munitions. They are yet another mind expanding, heart breaking group of individuals -- many of them are musical and have performed for us in the past (watch for a possible disc from CPI of landmine survivor/performer music).
Visiting Mae La is a tremendous experience. It is a vibrant place of life: there are people going to places of worship, there are kids playing sports, there are classrooms ringing with kids reciting. It is huge: 50,000 inhabitants and it has been in existence for roughly 16yrs. One can get the impression that life isn't so bad -- they have medical care (MSF-- medicins sans frontiers/doctors without borders), spiritual centers, schools... And yet, and yet, as we drove away last year there was a line of small kids, toddlers, little tikes whose tiny hands wrapped around the wire -between the cutting barbs- to watch us leave. This is a generation that lives and breathes the knowledge that there are people -themselves- that will never leave, can never leave; and there are those -us- that drive away at will. i hate that. i hate that kids grow up within such a reality. i hope that in some way they learn that people want to change that. That people care and are working to change that.
Thanks,
wolfgang brolley
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