Cross the border 02 "why cross thousands of miles to the Thai-Burmese border to do public welfare? The figure of Taiwan on Highway 105

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Mae Sot, a Thai-Burmese border town, is located on the bank of the Mei River (Moei River) and faces Myanmar, which is the border river. Highway 105 from Meiso is roughly parallel to the border of the Mekong River. Along Highway 105 north, there are winding rivers and long borders, land around plain towns is built up with residential factories, while agricultural activity spreads from the plains to the mountains, forests are cut down and corn is planted, leaving only tree trunks and bare black soil.

Under the special border situation of Taiwan, there is little space for the international community to participate in. However, a group of Taiwanese have bravely broken through the political boundaries and, with the strength of civil society, have long invested in overseas assistance on the Thai-Burmese border. From helping Burmese migrant children go to school, to setting up public welfare tours in the name of Thai-Burmese Highway 105, it is hoped that more Taiwanese will set foot on the Thai-Burmese border and narrow the gap between Taiwan and Southeast Asian society from the perspective of public welfare rather than utilitarianism.

The Mei River is the border river between Thailand and Myanmar, but the political and legal borders can not stop the human space created by the flow of people, and give overseas actors a reason to exist. _ Lin Jiyang filmed free cross-border capital and unfree refugee migrant workers

The film "Goodbye Wacheng", directed by Chinese Burmese director Zhao Deyin in 2016, gives Taiwan society a slight understanding of the current situation of Burmese migrant workers, and long-term economic hardship has led a large number of people to cross the border to Thailand in search of opportunities.

Young men and women go to big cities and factories, while farmers at the bottom of society bring their families to work on farms. This group of seasonal agricultural migrant workers, with at least hundreds of thousands of people on the Thai-Burmese border, are struggling to survive in the absence of medical and educational services. Apart from the protracted civil war and stagnant development in Myanmar, a more emerging trend is global agriculture: food trade and bioenergy industry.

Thailand was originally a major grain producer. With the development of international bioenergy, food prices soared, and a large number of nearby agricultural counties in Meso changed to bio-energy crops. The purchasers are large multinational grain companies of Chinese origin, which are mainly provided to international bioenergy producers. The projects purchased are mainly focused on sugar cane, corn and cassava. The higher the oil price, the higher the demand for bioenergy and the higher the price in the international agricultural and grain market. The vast and sparsely populated border rural areas have become a new base for economic grain farming.

Route 105 is 230 kilometers long, roughly along the Thai-Burmese border, parallel to the border Mei River, connecting the border town of Meiso with the Karen traditional areas in the north (photography / Lin Jiyang) who are divided by the political border.

The mountain area of the Thai-Burmese border is the traditional field of the Karen nationality (formerly known as the "Jialiang nationality"). The Karen nationality straddles the Thai-Burmese border and has been a famous "elephant" nation since ancient times. In the history of the Thai-Burmese dynasties, both camps have the shadow of the Karen people.

The Karen people in Myanmar have the principle of "divide and rule" since British colonization, with independent language, culture and substantive autonomy, taxation and army. After the bloody crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Yangon, the capital, in 1988, the junta appealed to the country for a unified crusade against ethnic minorities and adopted a compulsory assimilation policy in order to divert domestic discontent.

The oppression of the junta led to the establishment of the Karen National Union (KNU) to seek armed independence. However, there was a wide gap in strength between the two sides. The Karen army was defeated by government forces. A large number of Karen people crossed the border into Thailand to avoid the war and were restricted to live in refugee camps. Humanitarian aid was provided by the United Nations and international organizations.

(photo of Karen Army, taken from Karen News)

In addition to the Karen Army, there are ethnic groups in Rakhine State, Shan State and Kachin, and the 30-year civil war is an eternal pain in the hearts of many exiles. Even if you are far away from the war zone, you will know from FB or friends and relatives which village has been attacked again.

The teacher in the migrant school told Pak Heng, a Taiwanese volunteer who works as a summer teacher, about the horrors of real war: "when there is a war, all villagers have to leave home to take refuge, because the army, regardless of the old, weak, women and children, will carry out indiscriminate attacks when they see everything that is hiding and moving, and a few students in the school will experience the process of escape."

"in the face of the sufferings of others, what qualification do you have to take pictures?"

In the winding mountain road of Highway 105, you can see one village after another of large refugee camps, in order to manage and prevent these camps, there are all kinds of checkpoints along the way. When getting off outside the refugee camp, Lai Shusheng warned every visitor, "Please put the camera away."

"Why can't you shoot?" The traveling companion was puzzled and asked questions. "Why can I take pictures?"

Lai Shusheng, who has been engaged in humanitarian relief in the refugee camp for a long time, showed a rare defensive posture in the face of commonweal tour members. For him, the camp has too many heavy memories. In the face of the sufferings of others, if you are not in it, you may not be able to deal with it naturally except to be silent or turn your head.

The Karen need more humanitarian assistance.

As the Karen settlement is located in remote mountainous areas, the Thai government adopts a laissez-faire attitude, regardless of water and electricity, or even basic education services. Lin Liangshu, a veteran overseas aid worker, mentioned the description of a French priest: "when the Karen people get sick and go down to the mountain for medical treatment, or go to the local government to do business, they are treated like animals because they do not know Thai."

Both Lin Liangshu and Lai Shusheng have been engaged in humanitarian relief work in refugee camps for a long time. They recognized that due to international political factors, the refugee camps would receive assistance from the international community, but there was a lack of attention to the situation of the Karen people, and that international assistance must be able to take root in the local community.

At the behest of Pi Watit, a Karen community work partner, Lin Liangshu and Lai Shusheng gradually shifted the focus of running schools from the refugee camps to the Karen mountain tribes. For the Karen people, if there is no traditional culture and self-identity, ignorant pursuit of economic development and modernization, the Karen people will not be able to retreat.

Overseas assistance from Taiwan supports the Karen tribes on the border to run schools, so that the next generation of children can strike a balance between traditional culture and modern knowledge, so that they will not lose their way in the future. _ Lin Jiyang photographed Taiwanese volunteers working with Karen partners to promote community development

Lin Liangshu, Shusheng and Karen partners jointly established the Thailand Dafu Border Child Assistance Foundation (Tak Border Child Assistance Foundation, TBCAF) in 2005 to promote education programs to train Karen youth as teachers to promote community development and cultural heritage.

Lai Shusheng has a profound reflection on "international aid" or the so-called "development": "Local partners cannot always be accustomed to receiving foreign aid and foreign leadership." In this awareness, Taiwan's overseas aid organizations and local partners support each other, establishing a benign community of mutual support between international donors and local community grass-roots organizations (CBO,Grass-Roots Community-Based Organization).

Lai Shusheng (far right) works with Karen partners to promote Karen culture and education (photography / Lin Jiyang) Chimmuwa weaves traditional culture and also weaves community partnerships

When Lin Liangshu was running a school with the Karen tribe on Highway 105, he also noticed that there were hidden risks in the way Karen farmers moved towards market-oriented crops.

Grain purchasers and pesticide and chemical fertilizer providers are the same multinational company, obtaining seeds and pesticides and fertilizers do not need to take cash transactions but adopt an accounting system. Farmers want to get high returns and use a lot of materials, but the more they invest, the greater the risk. Once the market price collapses or the natural disaster fails, the only land in the hands of farmers is reduced to collateral, and everything is lost.

In order to encourage farmers not to use pesticides and retain the traditional natural planting methods, Lin Liangshu co-founded the social enterprise Chimmuwa brand with Karen weaving craftsman NorNor in 2004 after leaving overseas aid full-time work, and began to buy these fabrics in various villages, not only to improve the livelihood of the Karen people, but also to allow Karen women to retain the traditional Chimmuwa knitting process of "hand twisting" and natural plant dyeing.

Lin Liangshu has more than 30 years of experience in Taiwan's overseas rescue work on the Thai-Burmese border, laying a profound foundation for Taiwan's friendship with the border. Courtesy of Glocal Action and photography by Ye Yinlong

In the original meaning of the Karen nationality, Chimmuwa specifically refers to the traditional white woven dress that the "unmarried girl" must wear before getting married, which symbolizes the "pure and flawless" identity, which fully shows the Karen culture's ideal pursuit of sincere spirituality.

With the improvement of traffic, commodity input and the establishment of network base stations, modernization has a gradual impact on the Karen way of life. Young people also yearn for prosperous cities, but according to the observation of aid workers, most of their experience in cities is injured.

The name Chimmuwa not only represents the traditional weaving technology, nor is it just a brand of social enterprises, but for overseas donors, it also represents a harmonious symbiosis between human development and traditional culture in the process of modern adaptation to the natural use of land.