Burma: Crying out for the world to hear

 

burma

There are things we want to abandon and forget, but when a situation presents itself, we find ourselves embracing same concerns we tried to archive or relegate in the recycle bin. When these concerns present to us, shying away from them negate of who we are, and therefore, make us less human and fully alive. Running away from these issues contradict our very essence.

My friend once said: “ You can fight against the rest of the world, and perhaps win a few and lost most of the battles, but you cannot fight against yourself, you will surely lose.”

Another friend who is a businessman cannot back off from the concern of his small and remote place. The chairman of the barangay has been harassing and threatening the people aside from the plunder of the public coffer. This friend, despite that he is too busy with his business, has to take up the cause, with the protestations of his wife. He told his wife, “ Is it alright if we rake in more profits and yet close our eyes to the plight of our folks?”

Indeed there are things which, no matter how we try to cover our eyes, we cannot help but see and be affected by the situation. No matter how we resist the urge to get involve, we are ending up taking the cause because it is what defines us, our core.

These past weeks, the horrors of Burma, not Myanmar as the military junta would want us to call, keep flashing in my mind even if I pretend that I no longer care of issues of this nature. In my dreams, I see young students, monks, and plain folks being gassed, kicked, tortured, and the least fortunate, killed.

How many more should die?

Every time I think of Burma, past events flashback in my mind, as if in a race. The Philippines regained democracy in the now famous bloodless revolution on February 25, 1987 in EDSA. It was hailed as the most peaceful revolution when Ferdinand Marcos, the dictator for two decades, was booted out from office, without spilling blood.

But revolutions, even that in EDSA, is not a product of one isolated event. The events leading to EDSA which saw the overthrow of Ferdinand Marcos was prefaced with series of bloody events. There were people close to me who died. There were nameless activists who died in the horrific misnomer of all, “salvaging”, which actually meant killing in the military parlance. There were famous names who were assassinated like Leandro Mercado, and the most famous of them all, Ninoy Aquino.

When the protesters in Burma were struck with truncheons, I cannot help but relive the pain of being beaten, and the gnawing fear of being possibly atrociously “salvaged”. At the time when protesting against Marcos was not still mainstream, there was this loneliness of an activist that somehow, the people for whom he put his life on the line, did not even care nor understand the reason for the movement. I see the faces in the protesters in Burma longing for understanding from their fellow Burmese, and perhaps a plea, that they too like them, flood the junta government with passion for democracy. When I saw over the CNN the young, beaten face, I saw more than the face: I read the message for help from us, outside of Burma.

The internet has made the peoples on earth closer, to be exact, only a click of the mouse away. Online, we share our jokes, exchange ideas, make friends, and even have petty quarrels. Through this medium, we feel the heartbeat of humanity miles away from us, and likewise, we feel too the pains of the people in Darfur, the violence in Iraq, and the agony of the Burmese. But the virtual world we carve has a real world outside the box. The laughter of the person who receives our jokes through email is as real as the beating of your heart. There can be no disjointed virtual and real universes, unless you choose to live a farcical life.

The Burmese who are rallying in the streets, and who risk their lives are answering to the call of the core of their being, that denying this call is to negate the very persons they have become. In fact, the struggle of the Burmese transcends the protesters’ dream; theirs is to give birth to nationhood, that without it, they will lose their identity, and ultimately their individual selves.

I wanted to close my eyes, and shut my ears, and forget that I too experienced the pains of the protesters circa 1980s. But I recall my friend who said, “ You cannot win against yourself.” Not to blog about Burma, and to call on my online friends to write something about what is happening in that country, is to fight my innermost self.

Monday October 8, 2007 – 10:17am (CST) Edit | Delete | Permanent Link | 4 Comments