El pueblo donde secuestran a los niños

For: Daniel Landa (text and photos)
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Ésta es una historia sin voz, un relato sin apellidos, un pueblo sin tierra. Cuando en 1948 comenzó la guerra de Myanmar –antigua Birmania- los padres de los padres de los padres de los niños karen no imaginaban que sus biznietos acabarían desnortados en los territorios de Tailandia.

La etnia karen ha sido dispersada y hoy, decenas de miles de indígenas son castigados lejos de casa. A few have managed to establish themselves legally by dragging their culture and creeds to small villages in the mountains., next to the rice fields. They are the luckiest. They have only lost their lands, but they keep their looms, their songs and the dignity of their culture.

La etnia karen ha sido dispersada y hoy, decenas de miles de indígenas son castigados lejos de casa

Others consider themselves lucky - "life is good here", they manage to say- on the other side of a fence. They are the refugee camps attended by some NGOs and government institutions. They are considered "temporary" fields, but after more than a decade, it sounds like a joke in bad taste.

Many children do not know the world beyond the border of the refugee camp. Entire families live crowded together waiting to return to a land they are beginning to forget.

Entire families live crowded together waiting to return to a land they are beginning to forget

Other communities survive upright, exhibiting their customs to amaze tourists, in exchange for a few coins. They are the so-called giraffe women, that deform the neck by adding metal rings along the neck. They are also Karen women and they also come from Myanmar, but they have settled in a human showcase from where they can feed their children.

The image of giraffe-necked women - or giraffe women- has something obscene. It is uncomfortable to see how girls have to live with necklaces, without being able to even lower his head to regret his fate, loading trousseau.

The Spanish foundation Colabora Burmania opened the doors of Mae sot to us, but they never said that crossing them would be a pleasant experience

But they are not the mountain villages, nor the refugee camps, not even the villages of the giraffe women show the open wounds of this people. You have to travel to Mae Sot to understand where despair has settled unceremoniously.

The Spanish foundation Burma collaborates he opened all the doors for us, but they never said that crossing them would be a pleasant experience. Javier García is one of its founders and with him we toured a village of people without papers, of Karen people who have ended up stranded in that place of mud and debris, No Exit, no future now.

Many families are forced to sell their children, hoping to deliver them to a better world

The drama can be summed up like this: exiles from war cross the border illegally. They have no documents, they leave their homes and identity behind. As Javier said "it is as if they did not exist". They become merchandise, caught between war and illegality, lost, with no choice but to surrender to a Thai landowner, a master who gives them a piece of filthy land in exchange for ... in exchange for everything. From his job, of his silence and his destiny. It is a form of slavery that no one dares to denounce.

Many families are forced to sell their children, hoping to deliver them to a better world, hopefully, to a scrupulous family. The smallest disappear in the village. Every month there are kidnappings that nobody can claim because the children do not exist either. They are not documented, there is no possible shelter for them, or almost.

Every month there are kidnappings that nobody can claim because the children do not exist either. They are not documented

Because it is precisely there, in that abyss, where Burma Collaborates. The foundation welcomes almost a thousand children, school them, feeds them, save them.

"Last week one of the students disappeared" the director of a center told us. And no one protests and life without life continues. Here you cry in silence, but it also works without making noise, you fight against misery, nurseries are set up where dozens of children have the opportunity to be, without working as adults, without losing childhood suddenly at four years of age.

Lunch is the best argument to convince parents to let their children go to daycare

Javier told us that the most important thing is to find financing to get lunch. That is the best argument to convince parents to let their children go to daycare.. And once there they teach them. The children take out their notebooks and paint a different world in colors, a parallel life. At least they have time to imagine it. There they laugh and there they play, there they reconcile with a group of people they can finally trust. Beyond the nursery walls, the drama of his other reality spreads, the one that can end up kidnapping a brother who walks back home without mattresses.

The awareness of a future is the most powerful tool to combat the present. Some young people study in other schools of Collaborate Burma. I guess there they will learn where the karen come from and where they could return.

En Colabora Birmania se han acostumbrado a hacer milagros, a multiplicar el arroz y las sonrisas

There is nothing more necessary than men and women with the ability to change the course of things. En Colabora Birmania se han acostumbrado a hacer milagros, a multiplicar el arroz y las sonrisas. Han desafiado a la fatalidad y han levantado escuelas junto a barrios hechos con cajas de cartón. It's too ugly to mix, too sad to settle there. Only exceptional people dare to do so. Only heroes.

Tomorrow many karen will be in debt to them and they, people like Javier, Marc, Mary, Carmen, Rebeca, Sara, Moulting, Aung ... will still be there, while the rest of the world looks the other way.

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Comments (1)

  • Silvia

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    There are people who have to live a very hard life. Unfortunately there are many other peoples in that same terrible situation and what admirable people there are helping them to have a little better life.…

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