Poor Burmese girls

Independent Appeal: Burma's girls are victims of China's one-child policy

No one ever expected it to be the young girls of Burma who would become the unintended victims of the one-child birth control policy in China. But two decades on, children as young as 10 are being trafficked across the border from Burma into China as child brides. They are sold into a future of high uncertainty.

Read more at the Independent.

West meets East

I went to Chatuchak weekend market today. It was probably my fourth or fifth visit.

Chatuchak is a very famous tourists destination in Bangkok. A visit to Chatuchak is like an exotic cultural experience for tourists, especially for westerners from developed countries. Everything from Thai silk to modern fake Levi jeans can be found at the clothing stall booths as far as the eyes can see. The shops sell almost everything under the sun --- antique handicrafts and modern furniture, books and collectable items, plants and pets, and you name it.

The visits to Chatuchak made me think about the cultural differences between people from developing and developed countries. Western tourists would look for antique ethnic handicrafts whereas the locals would not even care about those sections of the market.

In my observations, people from industrialized countries tend to appreciate this kind of picture.

Sunset in Bagan (Photo source is unknown and may have copyrights held by the photographer)

Life in Burma (Photo by Rev. Wo Le)

On the contrary, people from developing countries tend to be impressed by this kind of picture.

Shanghai Skyscrapers at night (Picture taken from http://www.cepolina.com)

Developing countries want to develop faster and faster at the cost of natural and cultural beauty. China, for example, is growing very fast at the cost of social stability, the income gap between the rich and poor becoming wider and wider [1]. They even want to build more dams in Burma [2].

Big international businesses are moving to less developed countries not only for cheap labor, but also for less strict environmental rules and regulations.

Developed countries, on the other hand, want to go back to history and preserve natural beauty. To tell you the truth, the air quality in Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA (where I went to college) is better than the air quality in my home town, Mudon, Mon State in Burma. Thanks to cheap Thailand and Chinese made motorbikes and no rules regarding air pollution, the air quality in my hometown in Burma is getting worse these days. The fact that every factory in Fort Wayne, Indiana, has to follow strict environmental rules and regulations has made the environment very nice for the citizens of the town.

I, for one, am looking forward to the days when leaders in developing countries, Asean in particular, will start to talk about putting the interest and basic human rights of their own people ahead of the economic development. I hope that our region will grow without sacrificing our natural and cultural beauty.

Anger and Hatred

I was browsing through some Burmese blogs for information related to Burma. Some blogs are very informative and entertaining. Some are very poetic and imaginative. Some are full of gossips and personal attacks.

Some comments on the blogs did remind me of soc.culture.burma while I was a student in the US.

Back in the days of early and late 90s, Usenet newsgroup were the places where people shared information and ideas. It was before we know the web as we do today.

Anti-junta Burmese folks (they are majority in the virtual world of the Internet) would fight with the pro-junta people (minority) in discussion groups.

Some people just got tired of arguing and defaced www.myanmar.com on August 3, 2000.

People's hatred of the current military government can be seen online since the early 90s. The military has always crushed any calls for reforms in the history (in 1988, 1996, and 2007 as far as my life span is concerned). The people are generally not happy with the military regime. They expressed their anger when they can.

Today's blogs are also just a reminder of how people are fed up with the current situations in our beautiful country.