What about Burma? (Unwinding)
I’m sitting here after Burma VI staring at the screen. I want to do another. My brain says, “You must be nuts. I’m tired!”
There’s a reason this is so exhausting.
Imagine, if you will, watching a movie and feeling like you’re there right in the middle of the action.
Make it 3D.
That’s what is going on while I write this, especially starting now. See, in 1961 when I was 8 years old, some of the events that I speak of here bring back memories of other events, other places in the world, other discussions I remember overhearing that had little or nothing to do with Burma, but had to do with SEATO and the Bandung Conference, things I remember Ethel talking about happening in Pakistan at this time – and her thinly veiled comments about the Western world and their disregard for certain Asian and African nations.
I remember Zhou Enlai. I remember Jawarharlal Nehru. I remember U Thant.
I remember integrity and respect, and sometimes I remember the lack of both.
I remember being so irritated with my mother once when I was 12 that when she said there were starving children in China, I got a shoebox, packed my dinner in it, and was ready to ship it off. If there were children starving, why were we eating so damned much?? I was serious.
My grandfather was once a missionary in Japan. He wrote about that. I have it somewhere in my things.
Aunt Daisy was an ambassador to eastern Europe. Somewhere I still have the letter of introduction from William Jennings Bryan, then Secretary of the State, and something she wrote about Poland prior to World War I.
Ethel worked for the U.N. many places – Pakistan, Israel, Turkey, Egypt, many places in the Middle East. I used to have things she brought back from there. They were stolen.
I remember our friends from Egypt, Korea, and Bengal. I distinctly, in fact, remember what I knew as the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971.
In all cases, I have memories of conversations, discussions, and some very strongly expressed opinions from that time in 1961 through the early 1970s. As I go through this period in Burmese history, up to the present time, they will come flooding back and I will have to stop and breathe. It may take a few days to write because of this, but I am not stopping.
Lael said to me tonight that I have lived a rich life. It has been diverse. It will continue to be diverse because I intend for it to stay that way. God is not finished with me yet, and until he is, I am not finished with the world.
**Additional note: 7 June 2008:
The series will continue. Since I’ve written these parts, much has happened. I was not wrong that Americans in particular walked away from the situation in Burma after a couple of weeks, but then they have come back since the devastation of Cyclone Nargia. America’s appetite for sensationalism has yet to be quenched. They care only that the U.S. makes it look like an attempt was made to help, and that the U.S. government (in the white hats) has been turned away by the evil junta (in the black hats) while the Burmese (the settlers) suffer. The truth is that many NGOs and foreign aid workers have been going in from many nations and giving their assistance. The U.S. could be less stupid about this, give their aid to the NGOs and foreign aid workers and let the process work this way. How much simpler could that be? Instead, we take our chocolate bars and go home in a huff. More on that a little later.
8 June 2008 at 10:45 am
I agree. It’s a disgrace we haven’t helped those people, but the U.S. is now a weak nation with no credibility left in the world.
24 July 2008 at 11:49 am
Good history lesson. Will be even better if cynical remarks about the USA are left out. These well documented USA policy failures are quintessential crowd pleasers. Will only invite agreements that serve no purpose in alleviating the sufferings. Please focus on what as individual one can achieve besides inviting remarks on USA useless policy of sanctions etc. by the readers. Seems like those who make negative abject remarks about USA failure felt absolved and thus do not necessitate them to get involve more positively, as in donating time and effort to comfort the suffering brought about by the government as well as nature. Be brave and advocate a positive course that every body can identify with in a clear concise manner in your next articles as you have done bringing out the historical facts. I have relatives both sides of the borders. Castigating the Junta will neither serve nor benefit the citizenry.
24 July 2008 at 7:19 pm
To Bob: Isn’t it interesting that anyone would say that. Based on your opinion alone, I am not going to change the fact that I have an opinion based on my experiences here, in Kosovo, in Czechoslovakia, in the Middle East, in Asia, in many places. I cannot castigate the Junta any more than history has already done. I report the history, it ends up as a castigation of the Junta.
This was unwinding, and a little reflection on my life that leads me to even write about the things I do, and to have gone the places I went, and to have tried as hard as I did to bring peace and comfort to those in need. You have no idea the suffering I have seen and my many attempts to help alleviate this suffering around the world. As an individual out there, I can tell yiou that running into brick walls like the Junta is heartbreaking and frustrating, and fairly nearly impossible to overcome.
This was not part of the “history lesson”, as you put it, which should have been very evident. I also have a right to my own opinion. I have more courage in my little finger than you have in your entire body sitting in the comfort of your home doing nothing.
If you think I am critical of the Junta, you wait until I write about the KLA. That is an experience I will not soon forget. In fact, I still have nightmares, and every time the U.S. calls them “freedom fighters”, I have the nightmares again.
You have a choice. You can read the rest of the series when I post it, or you can walk away.