We were supposed to leave at 8pm.
Then it was postponed until 4am. At 3.30am the trip was cancelled, and at
6.30am I got a call telling be to be ready in 10 minutes, my ride was on its
way. Lucky I had showered at 3.20am in preparation for the 4am departure. I
climbed into the back seat of the pickup truck with my friends (and workmates) Jess* and Ma Aye San*, with Dr Cynthia in the front, and some others in the
tray. We began the gruelling journey down the Death Highway. We arrived at Nam’s* house
around 10am, not too bad really. She plied us with an enormous breakfast of
Karen-style curries, and then Dr Cynthia announced that she was off, and we’d
be spending the day with Nam, inside Burma. Um, ok, sure. See you at 4pm.
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| The peanut harvest drying in the scorching sun. |
We were on this last minute trip
as we thought we were visiting more boarding houses supported by the Clinic, as
we’d been on another such monitoring trip earlier in the week, which you’ll
hear about below, but as it turned out, we’d misunderstood. We all piled into
Nam’s pickup truck and headed to the border. This is the first border crossing
I’ve been to here where the Rim Moei River doesn’t form the border. There were
simply two flags, one Thai, one Burmese, and a small “guard” shack on the
Burmese side with
KNU and
DKBA soldiers sheltering from the blistering 45 degree
sun. That was it. Borders are such an arbitrary concept to me. A made up,
man-made line that changes
everything.
We headed into the Karen State down
a dusty road peppered with holes and giving away evidence of all the landslides
here during the rainy season. After about 10 minutes we stopped in an IDP
(Internally Displaced Person) village and clambered out. It was really hot. We
were at Nam’s clinic. Not only does she spend every moment at home looking
after 50 displaced children (whom I wrote about way back in June on my first
visit to Nam’s place,
you can read it here), but when the kids are at school,
she goes to work as a Nurse. Today marked the closing of a “Mine Risk Education
and First Aid Training” course that had been taking place in the clinic with
about 20 young people attending. There was lots of speeches and prayers and
songs (all in Karen), and then it was photo and introduction time. A KNU Lieutenant
was part of the celebrations, and when he heard where we worked, he was insistent
on taking photos with us (I’d love to post these pictures, but for obvious
security reasons, I can’t), it was very interesting to meet someone like him.
After the closing ceremony was
complete, we headed further into the Karen State to another IDP village, and
walked up to visit their tiny school. As per usual, the kids were stunningly beautiful.
But there is so much dust around at the moment that every tired, desperate,
hungry looking face was covered in dirt, and so too were their clothes. We had
thought that the migrant schools and boarding houses around Mae Sot were desolate
places (schools and dorms in Thailand that cater to displaced Burmese children
or the children of migrant workers etc., who cross the border for economic
and/or safety reasons), but these ones were far worse. The schools had no floors,
just dirt (dust), the absolute bare minimum of school supplies – only one or
two chalk boards in three different schools, most of the time they just used a
piece of wood to write lessons on – and a maximum of two teaches simultaneously
teaching up to 5 different grades.
The options available to these
kids are very bleak. There are no schools available in these IDP areas after
primary level, so if these eager-to-learn children want to continue their
education past about age 10, they will be forced to leave their families and go
and live in Thailand alone at a boarding house. Many of them were not in class
this day as it is peanut harvest time and their parents need them to help, even
the youngest ones of 3-4 years old. They are all tiny and malnourished; we were
shocked to find out that a group we had thought was the kindergarten class are
actually all around 7-8 years old. Nam explained that, in the Thai schools,
children are given milk every day to help them grow. Here, they get nothing to
eat or drink at school, and the staple of their diet at home is white rice. However,
they all had enough energy to proudly sing us songs and recite the alphabet to
us in English. This is the only time in my life that I can remember not being intensely
irritated by Christmas songs.
The people in these areas, including
the children, live in constant fear of attack by government troops. The fragile
cease-fire that is currently in place between the KNU and the DKBA in this area
could very easily fall apart at any time, causing everyone to flee the fighting
that will ensue. Things have only just returned to “normal” here after two years
of fighting that led to the destruction of many homes and schools, and two out
of three of Nam’s clinic buildings. The reality of the risks faced by the
villagers in this area was made clear when we were walking back to the car at
one point, and were told, “don’t go near that field [about 3 meters away],
there’s lots of landmines in there”.
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| IDP Village |
The houses in the villages are
the simplest structures: platforms on stilts with banana leaf roofs, and woven
mats for walls. No match for the mosquitoes at all, it is no wonder that
malaria is at epidemic levels around here. The sun is scorching, and there is
barely any water in the area. Everyone is desperately trying to harvest their
peanuts and corn as fast as possible.
After about 4 hours in this IDP area
of the Karen State, we headed back into Thailand to visit a migrant school. The
difference is remarkable. These kids have wooden floors, educational posters on
on the walls, and enough food to keep them full, most of the time. When they
are old enough, some of them will be able to access the Thai education system
too.
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| A migrant school in Thailand, very different. |
Earlier in the week, Jess, Ma Aye
San and I had been on a monitoring trip to several of the boarding houses that
the Clinics’
Dry Food Programme supports, and we had felt at the time that
these homes and schools were not really all that good in terms of supplies and living
standards – but don’t get me wrong, all the children are happy and cared for,
they all receive a lot of attention and are fed as well as possible, they are
excellent facilities considering the problems that they face – seeing similar
schools in these IDP areas really helped put what we do into perspective, and
reaffirmed how necessary places like the Clinic and our Child Protection
Programmes really are, and therefore how important the work we do is.
 |
| Nap time at one of our boarding houses in Thailand |
It’s quite upsetting to realise
how “lucky” the kids at the migrant schools are after seeing the children in
the IDP schools. All the children are so eager to learn, and are so studious
and serious about their lessons. Comparing them to the kinds of schools I got
to attend as a child makes me feel both sad and incredibly grateful. Nothing in
the lives of these children is ever going to be as safe and easy as my life has
been. It’s a really cruel world out there.
*Names changed. It’s not my place
to identify these people, and doing so could put their security in jeopardy.
