Do You Know? The Great Journey of Rural Community Leaders Vol. 5

Easter / Travel Fee Campaign special series

Do you know how ARI participants make it all the way to Japan?
ARI has been running a four-part series following new participants’ journey to ARI as part of a campaign.
As an extra feature in this series, we bring you the stories of graduates from Myanmar, where an earthquake struck at the end of March. We hope you will learn about the multiple hardships faced by the people of Myanmar, which are not easily conveyed in the news, and about our graduates who are working hard to live alongside their people in the midst of such tough situations.

【Graduates from Myanmar】
On March 28, a magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck Myanmar. Its epicenter was near Mandalay, Myanmar’s second largest city and the quake killed 4,410 people and injured more than 11,366 (as of April 16, according to Democratic Voice of Burma). The media showed us tragic images of collapsed skyscrapers, temples, and homes and these are still fresh in our memories.
But I wonder how much you are aware of the tragic situation that has been unfolding in Myanmar for more than two generations, which so rarely makes its way to a newspaper or TV broadcast beyond its borders.

The History of Myanmar, a Multi-Ethnic Country
Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, is located in the western part of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. Since its founding, Myanmar has been the scene of long-running conflicts between its ethnic minorities and the Myanmar military, stemming from the desire of the ethnic peoples in present day Myanmar to return to the autonomy they had before the colonial period.

Myanmar has lived under a military dictatorship since the first military coup in 1962, but in 2015, the National League for Democracy (NLD) won the election and Aung San Suu Kyi became the leader, bringing Myanmar to democracy.
Unfortunately, the political situation changed drastically when the military staged a coup d’état in February 2021, and the country fell under military rule once again. To this day an endless civil war continues between the Myanmar military and the Peoples Defense Forces composed of ethnic minorities.

Immediately after the coup in 2021, Myanmar troops fired indiscriminately on demonstrators in Yangon and other large cities. This was followed by military operations mainly in the mountainous areas where ethnic minorities hold power, such as the Sagaing Region, Magway Region, and Chin State. Air strikes, burning of entire villages, the use of civilians as “human shields,” looting, rape, landmines, chemical weapons, and cluster bombs (which are internationally banned) are all part of the military’s tactics. Additionally, there are unjust arrests and detentions, torture, killings, and forced military service. Speech is strictly controlled.

Myanmar, a Country with Many ARI Graduates
Myanmar is a country with a high population of ARI graduates – 97 and counting.
Myanmar participants tend to be friendly and good at singing and playing the guitar. Even though some of them struggle with speaking English, they often play a lubricating role in the ARI community, with its great diversity of countries, cultures, and characters.

I had two friends from Myanmar in my class, both of whom were proud ethnic minorities from mountainous areas. Just before the end of the training program, I asked one of them how long it would take to get from the airport back to his hometown. The answer was “two days.”
I was absolutely shocked and thought I would never see him again in my lifetime.
Later I learned that it is not unusual for Myanmar participants to take some days to get home.

A Rare Fate
Surprisingly, I had a chance to meet this participant quite soon. In January of 2020,
I joined the activities of a Korean couple in medical service, introduced to me by a member of my church.

After a few days of those activities in Yangon, I boarded a domestic flight for the western mountainous region. At the airport, I was met by a graduate from the previous year, a fellow countryman of my classmate. Since I went by plane, the journey did not take two days, but it still took a full day to get from this small airport to the town of these two graduates.

Their hometown was a beautiful and quiet place, cooler than Yangon and home to a national park with the third highest mountain in the country. My classmate had been working in a remote location and was scheduled to return home during my stay, but he informed me that foreign supporters of his organization had just arrived and needed to be guided, so unfortunately it would be difficult to meet me. With only one day left, I made up my mind and told the graduate who was hosting me that I really wanted to see my classmate. He thought for a minute and accepted my request.

The next morning at 6:00 AM I was on the back of his motorbike zooming into the countryside to see my ARI friend. It was a 10-hour round trip, so we just kept going and going, refueling a few times along the way. When we finally stopped at a town for breakfast, my legs were numb from the cold and the vibration of the bike. Both of us sat silently sipping the hot water that had been served to us. After that, whenever I saw a store selling warm clothes, I thought many times about stopping and buying them, but gradually, as the sun got higher, it got warmer.

By the time we arrived, it was already noon. My classmate introduced me to his colleagues, and then suggested that three of us go to a restaurant for lunch, explaining, “It’s a little far, about 10 minutes away.” My intrepid motorcycle driver replied, “What are you talking about to people who drove 5 hours to get here?” and we laughed a lot. Seeing my classmate, my friend from Myanmar, slowly leading us on his motorbike, helmet in hand, I was warmed by the fact that he had not changed since our time at ARI.

Perhaps I was overworked by this bullet trip, because I suffered from a stomachache and diarrhea the next day, but nothing could replace the joy of meeting a classmate I thought I would never see again.
Looking back, I can only call it a miracle, as it was just a month before the pandemic of COVID-19 closed all the borders.

A Sudden Coup
In February of 2021, a coup d’etat by the Myanmar Military changed the lives of the people of Myanmar.
My friends’ social networking sites immediately filled with photos of them protesting the military with three-finger salutes and videos of demonstrations, but due to intensifying repression the network was shutdown. After that, I was unable to contact them for a period of time, and I worried daily about their safety. When I could finally reach them again, they sent me many photos and articles. I was shocked to see how the towns I had visited had been destroyed – burned trees in national parks, innocent civilians killed in their homes, terrified children, churches razed to the ground.
Most people fled the town, which had become a war zone with regular clashes between the Myanmar military and self-defense forces. They ran away to live as refugees in tents at a monastery on the state border or in places in the jungle. Local volunteers, like my classmate carried food and other supplies on their own backs and delivered them to those in need, to places that even UN officials could not go. The Myanmar Military did not take kindly to such activities, and if found, they risked arrest, so providing humanitarian assistance was a life-threatening situation.

ARI also received donations from supporters who were concerned about Myanmar graduates.
The words spoken by Steven Cutting, a staff member of ARI’s Graduate Outreach section, left a deep impression on me.
“The graduates are leaders in their communities. When their people suffer, they also suffer. When their people run, they also run. But they are still leaders and act as leaders. They still care for people as much as they can.”
Never have I felt more than at this moment the meaning of ARI training to nurture those born and raised in rural areas and encourage them to work in their homelands.

Myanmar has been fading from people’s memories due to many other wars that have broken out around the world, and international aid groups are gradually withdrawing from the country because of the military’s attitude of suppressing humanitarian assistance. However, my classmate, in cooperation with several local volunteers, has continued to support internally displaced people from his hometown until today.

After the Earthquake
When I heard that a big earthquake had struck Myanmar, my first thought was the impact on the civil war. I wondered if this was an opportunity for a ceasefire and for the international community to take another look at the situation to see if it could be brought under control.

However, on April 1, General Min Aung Hlaing, Commander-in-Chief of the Myanmar military, declared that they would continue to fight resistance forces throughout the country despite the devastation caused by the earthquake. He sees this as an opportunity to retake territory and continues the bombings.
According to my classmate, they do not care about the victims at all.

A Life to Love What I do, Rather than to do What I Love
Even under these circumstances, my classmate still never gives up helping others. This is largely due to the environment in which he was raised and the social perceptions that have been cultivated in that environment.

He strongly believes that helping others is helping oneself. Culturally, helping others is perceived as “storing blessings for one’s kids.” Meaning that if one is helpful to others, others will be helpful to him/her or his/her children in the future (even if s/he has passed away).
His great grandfather used to tell him, “Never fail to help people in need even if s/he be your enemy. Love shall prevail in the end.”

In the Gospel of Mark chapter 10, there is a scene in the Bible in which the disciples are arguing over who will sit at the right hand of Jesus when He is lifted up to heaven.
To these disciples, Jesus said, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles Lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant,and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
As a Christian and follower of Jesus Christ, this bible passage always reminds him of “how greatness should be made.” It is all about sacrifice based on love, care, and compassion.

What he really likes about ARI is “putting actions into words,” meaning “action first” and that action is put into words. For example, people “first farm in a sustainable way” and then “talk about sustainable agriculture,” and ARI “first produces commodities on its own land” and then “talks about food self-sufficiency.” All words are coming after actions!!
Leading a rural community where “people believe more on action than words,” servant leadership is an effective tool that breaks the boundaries of hatred and enmity.

He has not given up his dream of building a sustainable and self-sufficient community, a model for sustainable community building, in his community when things are back to a new normal.
His belief that people can still help others despite their own difficulties continues to inspire us a lot.

Written by Makiko Abe (Fundraising ＆ Domestic Programs Assistant / Community Nurse)
English editing by Steven Cutting (Graduate Outreach)