Karen: Ba So Daka Me A Dithako

Ba so daka me a dithako

“Mosquitos are my friend” is the name of a deep Karen country song sung by our commander La Shee at 4am to wake us up. It was really annoying, kinda funny and unfightable. At 4 am in deep Karen Jungle the sun still won’t come up for hours. It is the middle of dew reproduction so all your clothes are damp, the temperature has dropped in half and it's pitch black crawling with nocturnals. It’s a mildly rude awakening for the first week. It’s tedious to remember little things like carrying a flashlight everywhere because bullet ants and spiders might creepin up your junk while you take a morning leak.

(Meet La Shee, our commander. He likes to sing play on his phone, punch banana trees in half and be generally hilarious at all times.)

In total there area 7 brigades within the KNDO (Karen National Defense Organization). We man the KNDO 6th brigade. Together, 13 of us patrolled the barracks of Golamie.

Commanders

La Shee

Lah May Say

Neh Oh Tu

Sa Du Du

Soldiers

Tha Thoo

Po Hwa

Li Go

Pu Koh

No Duh

Gu Cho

Ma Tu

Ah Pree Tu

Me (Yoo Ha)

Waking up is a process. We all come from different parts of the area and come toward the campfire by the kitchen. There’s nothing to sip on or eat on so we all got a cigarette in our mouths and both hands by the fire. After the rice is boiled by campfire they mutter "Yooha, ohmi." which means Yooha, eat rice.  We'd each eat a couple pieces of pumpkin on top a small bed of rice mixed in with chillies and msg. I couldn’t handle the rice because it was too hot to touch and couldn’t eat the rice because the chillies were too spicy. They loved this about me till the very last day I left them. That’s how we all got our morning groove on. After you're done, you wash the dish and hang it up. I’d walk always coughing up chilies into faded light of the campfire and I’d hear them laughing from far away. Success.

 

(breakfast of lue kay doh (pumpkin stems) awesome…

After breakfast I'd go off onto the flat dust and do my push ups and 2000 jumprope reps. I had to get as strong as fast as possible. In Karen society, all types of strength are a virtue. It was important to pursue strength especially if you knew you didn’t have it. This is one of the pillars that generates respect in their world.  After a morning sweat I'd go upstairs to prep my AR-15. It breaks down into 4 mechanical steps that I can reassemble with ease now. La Shee accepted no failure in learning this task perfectly. If I were to fight in battle it’d be done in legit KNDO fashion. My gun reads "colt, property of the us gov, serial number 847319". My gun probably came from vietnam, was sold into the Thai black markets and then rebought by the Karen. There’s a lot of money to be made and the Thai’s exploit the price. $1800 for a 30 year old AR-15 and bullets a dollar each. That is the economics of Karen weaponry, and the extremely weary journey of this gun. The Karen genocide has just entered it’s 63rd year making it the longest civil war in history. It has a darker meaning for them. For them it means one full generation has passed.

(“My AR-15 pronounced AYARA in Karen)

I spend the mornings thinking about Karen life until they scream "yooha! teh peh pobula town!" which means, yooha let's go pick peanuts in pobula town. It’s our way of making money. I hurry but the local dogs ate my shoelaces so it takes me a while to catch up. The day they found out a dog ate my shoelaces was like a camp holiday because earlier during the week a dog ate all my eggs as well. Dogs ate all my shit and I’d always find out last. It was the running joke for weeks and they told everyone about it and I’d joke back saying “tomorrow a dog is gonna eat my shirt!” Once villagers saw the soldiers and I laughing together and having our little moments, there was a sense of peace that I was gonna fit in and maybe stay for awhile. That I was actually thinking of a way to change their landscape, but really it didn’t matter if I could solve anything right now. It was enough to be a part of thier moment.

(O cho. Shot in the leg years ago is now the town doctor. He says "tabloo" every time I help him pick peanuts without pay. Oh and tabloo means thank you)

I had no Karen contacts prior coming to Thailand and my first one ended up being General Nerdah Mya. The general of the KNDO (The Karen National Defense Organization). I discovered him through a hostel in Mae Sot, Thailand and he agreed to meet with me in person. Our first meeting we discussed the poor leadership within the KNU (Karen National Union) and how the 2013 ceasefire served as a way for Burma to re strategize it’s takeover of the Karen people. We clicked on all the Karen issues and he decided to take me to the Karen side of things. He said bring 3 things "a phone, a sleeping bag, a mosquito net". Nothing else was necessary.

The next day we spend 5 hours crossing into a strategic border location known as Oo Kray Kee. It is the entry point of Kawthoolei (the name of Karen State), Headquarters to the KNDO and streams into the other brigades of the KNLA (Karen National Liberation Army). Here he'd drop me off and requested that I build a restaurant with a concrete eating patio. He introduced me to the town pastor, left and said he'd be back after 3 weeks.

It seemed very odd. I thought people that had suffered, seen hard times would be happy to see someone that wanted to help out. They didn't give a shit. They could care less that I was there. What was I gonna do for them? I was just another little guest foreigner the general brought to camp that they had to respect in his sights. But that wasn't me.

(day after day of busting ass means the same thing in any culture)

I woke up and got to work. I worked harder than anyone in that village that I could see and did the labor without a sign of weariness. It was hard but I didn't want to be weak. Everyone laughed at everything I did and when I’d try to talk to them they’d just walk away, but that's a good sign. It means they’re amused, confused, starting to wonder who you are. That's what people do when they can't understand. So now it is up to you to fill the void. That is what I’ve trained my whole life to do.

By the third week they called me by my name "Yooha" and wanted to learn everything about Korea. They wanted to learn all about K-pop. I just wasn’t that guy that listened to K-pop and danced around like a little top. During the nights I would teach them to sing really random korean songs Iearned growing up and more proper american songs. In exchange I'd learn traditional Karen songs. They’re all stylistically deep country songs that are lyrically about all the things they do in their daily life like trying to love a girl, being too drunk or not having enough money. They hated most of my music but their favorite song was "mo money mo problems" by Notorious BIG. Oh and out of all the American artists they had on their phones, can you guess who? Taylor Swift.

(Nerdah returned to exactly what he wanted. I was becoming on of the people and we were all doin it to mo money mo problems. Thanks Notorious)

Nerdah returned with another foreigner 3 weeks later. A respectable Dutch lawyer that the people had seen many times before, but they never approached him. I thought it was a bit odd but realized it’s because he never went out of his way to get to know them. He only dealt with Nerdah, and had little interest in making any sincere eye contact with the people. I don’t think that it’s because he didn’t care, he just didn’t know how to walk in their shoes.

The lawyer situation showed that Nerdah is doing the right thing for his people but it’s just not happening quickly and powerfully enough. The Karen need big international allies to combat the power that Burma is drawing in from the west. This is their only hope, and it always looks bleak because what can the Karen offer. Freedom really isn’t free and this is the life they’re always going to have unless they draw in powerful nations. The Burmese hope to defeat the Karen by means of other global support. The Karen are resilient and hope someone will do the right thing. In the meantime, you will never see a pride like theirs to keep their guns and be prolific with them. A soldier is the best thing in Karen society when the world in general is made of horror.

That night I told Nerdah I accomplished everything I needed to do here and that I wanted to join the KNDO. He agreed but said it would take a month. He summoned LaShee and that is how he trained me. The next morning we would begin our walk to Golamie, the place where I was born.

We walked for 3 hours without a watch. It was the best time of my life. The soldiers looked so fucking cool. Professional, ready to execute, disciplined and dedicated. Everything I wanted to be for the Karen people. A strong leader.

It was rough in the beginning getting to know each other. The langage barrier was huge and my indentity ambiguous, so one saturday we took a 40 minute walk through the jungle and cornfields to Ga-nae-gla. I got everyone drunk and happily smoked but it didn't get their respect at all. The thing they loved is that I tried to hit on the prettiest girl in town. Her name was Mu-eh-klee. I found out the next morning she was 14 and it became a running joke that I loved her and would kill anyone else who did. Really immature stuff but this is how we started bonding and joking with each other. One of them even went through my iPod pictures and found a picture of a friend. She became our Brigade’s pin up girl.

I had fight training with Neh Oh Tu one night and he beat the shit out of me. He told me to kick him, slap each ear as hard as possible and then hit him in the stomach twice. By the end of it blood was coming out of our ears and we were fighting by this fire in the night while everyone else was sleeping. It was great. He was strong, but always concerned. He made a great soldier but in the modern world he would have made a great athlete. I’m sure of it.

(Neh Oh Tu is like Psyduck but is going to kill you with a gun, not a leek)

There was a night another commander, Sa du du and I were laying by the fire in hammocks and he could sort of speak english. I asked him how he felt about his wife being in America and he said he'd rather be here as a soldier. He misses his life but, he likes being a soldier. He holds his hands to frame the nature around him. This is freedom to him. He asked me if this was freedom for me? I didn’t know what to say so I asked him if his friends had died in war. He said many, and then very sadly and slowly said, "Yooha, we slept together, we ate rice together..." and then it got silent. These were intimate things for the Karen people when life was such. It literally meant the world to eat rice with your friends and sing in a field of peanuts and joke about someone’s lame new shirt. It meant the world to be in our hammocks together sitting by a fire we made.

During our final days, we all played this huge pseudo game called “balanawa”. Basically if you did or said something stupid you’d fake punch this person and if you flinched everyone would bombard you until you had to run away. I was the worst.

(Car balanawa sucks cause if you get swarmed you might fly out of the truck)

The final day was sad. It felt more like the end of a time than the end of a visit. Sa du du, who would barely look at me in the beginning, who came to share rice, build fires and play games with me stood beside me when we all celebrated christmas together. We celebrated in a barracks lit by tens of tiny candles and sang songs. It didn’t even matter if it was in season. At the end of our ceremony, I told the Karen people “thank you, you have all changed my life. I will never forget you.”

In this moment. General Nerdah Mya thanked me and told me “my soldiers love being around you. you can never leave. you are one of us now.”

(You are one of us now)

Nerdah watched me grow with his people and on the final day sat me down and told me,

“you must help me help my people

you’re business is just a bussiness

this is the lives of 50 million people.

"you are now the American representative of the KNDO in America

"help us fight Aaron."

I’ve never been asked desperately by a man to help him save his country. It was an incredible demand and I didn’t think I’d ever get asked again. I said yes for many reasons.

A lot happened in the end, but the only real important thing was after our final meal in Thailand  when Nerdah said

"See you later. We must keep moving.”

It was time for a young man who was turning into an older man to keep carrying the weight of his people. It was time for him to put on the same heavy coat and wrap himself in fuzz of his scarf and walk out the door. He’s still wearing boots that seem like they just won’t come off. He’s fighting for millions of things even though a small part of the world thinks he’s fighting for one thing, his people. He’s giving his all in general. He’s just the kind of guy that gives everything and leaves it all out there on the floor. Genocide is cresting once again and ready to break upon his people in 2015. The soldiers are ready and now I’m part of the struggle. Their pressure fell on me, and I’m glad. We will never surrender.

I hope one day this kid and I will be older and the uniform will be out of style.

“The Karen struggle is an armed struggle.”-General Nerdah Mya