SNAFU

June 8, 2007

Man, it's good to be back in my hometown. Though Philippine Airlines ruined everybody's day by making us wait for  hours after our scheduled flight from Manila to Davao. I mean, if they're living up to their name as Plane Always Late, they might as well ask for contact number of each passengers so they could call us or text us beforehand informing us that the plane would be late.  

Consider this, my flight schedule was for 10:30 a.m. so I woke up at around 7:00 a.m to beat the traffic from my motel in Quezon City to Centennial airport. Unfortunately for me, there was no traffic so I was already checking in by 8:00 a.m. Then they inform passengers that the plane would not be arriving until 12:00 noon and wouldn't take off until 1:00 p.m. So, all in all I waited for five hours. Fucking great.

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My one-month travel in Bangkok and Jakarta was a good learning experience for me. I learned that although I'm not averse to spicy food, Thailand stretched my tolerance level to near breaking point. After about a week of eating spicy foods, I had to find other not-so-spicy-which-means-more-expensive foods.

 The first thing to do was to learn the phrase "Mai pet" which is roughly translated to "ease up on the chili you son of a bitch!" If you like your food hot, however, you can say  "pet mak," again roughly translated to "put more chili in there you son of a bitch."

 Hey, what can I say?  They curse a lot. 

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I heard a bit of sad news though. I made some friends with Shans, an ethnic minority in Burma, who are working without papers Chiang Mai, about 10 hours by bus in the northern part of Bangkok. That transgression will earn you a time in jail or a hefty fine if you're lucky.  Most of them are deported back to Burma where they face certain persecution and reeducation. Reeducation, of course, is a euphemism for torture to milk information out of you. 

My Shan friends are not freedom fighters. They are in Chiang Mai to escape harassment and (some say) ethnic cleansing in Burma. They are all of 23 to 24 years old.

During my last night in Chiang Mai, I treated them all to dinner in a trendy restaurant to thank them for their hospitality.  One of them, Mr. Seang Yord was quite hesitant to eat there after browsing through the menu. "Maybe we should look for another restaurant, it's expensive here," he said.  

"No, it's Okay. Order what you want because maybe this is the last time we would see each other," I quipped. 

I didn't know how painfully accurate that statement was. Five days later, their headquarters was raided and they were all arrested. Now I have to live with the guilt that maybe I was followed and led the police to their lair.  

 

 

 

 

 

Dracula, 28 weeks later

May 25, 2007

My Burmese roommate and I were bored out of our skulls yesterday sleeping together on a single bed (this is not brokeback Part 2 I assure you, it's a long story), so we decided to watch a movie. He really wanted to watch "28 weeks later," the sequel to Danny Boyle's surprising zombie movie hit 28 days later released in 2002. 

28 Weeks Later is really a dark and gory movie which made me wax nostalgic about the zombies of yesteryears who were very laggard and the opposite of graceful, outrunning them was way too easy. You couldn't empathize with the actors who had no difficulty in killing the undead.  

The zombies in the 2007 version are not only fast, they run you down.

So anyway, we were watching the movie and he was very animated. Always telling me how scary the movie was and everytime the zombies caught somebody, and that means human sushi, he always had a comment. Either "very good" or "Ahh, good, good." I just smiled at the snide remarks of the bloodthirsty fool.   

For the most part, however, he was mostly silent save for the occassional jolts he makes during scary moments. I really thought he watched 28 Days Later and was able to follow the series. Halfway into the movie and after a prolonged silence, he leaned towards me and asked:

"Are they draculas?"

I was laughing so loud that I couldn't even throw a sarcastic reply. On hindsight, maybe it's probably better that laughter overshadowed any wisecrack I might have said. I like the guy. In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is a cyclops.  

 

Hero driver

May 18, 2007

 

Meet Ms. Charm Tong. In 2005, She was adjudged as Time Asia's Heroes for advocating Shan people's human rights in Burma. At barely 18 years old, she addressed the 200-strong meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva to report the atrocities committed by the Burmese regime.

"At age 16, Charm Tong began working with human rights groups, interviewing sex workers, illegal migrants, HIV patients and rape victims. The following year, she spoke in Geneva on their behalf—and still speaks, in four languages, with the poise and confidence of a mature woman," says the Time report.  

 Five years ago, she established a school for Shan State Nationalities Youth located in Northern Thailand, which has become her second country. The exact location of the school is secret being that the Shans have no legal personality in Thailand. Technically speaking, they don't exist and those that do exist are in prison or deported back to Burma where they face certain persecution or even death.  

Her group, while regally known as SWAN, does not emulate the renowned graceful characteristics of the large water bird with white plumage popularized by the children's tale The Ugly Duckling. Unless Swans have fangs, that is. SWAN along with the Shan Human Rights Foundation published a report "License to Rape" which detailed the systematic rapes and murders of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), a misnomer if I ever see one since the words "peace and development" are not equated with the Burmese junta.

Because of that, Charm Tong was officially regarded as an enemy of the state and I'd imagine shot on site. The SPDC has done worse for less offense.      

It's quite a long introduction I know, but I want everybody to appreciate the context of this entry. Last Thursday, I was riding on the back of her motorcycle while she drove around Chiang Mai. It was a very surreal experience. Sure, I've seen modern-day heroes on TV, read about them in the papers, hell I even talked to some of them. But how often have you had a hero giving you a ride?

As I settled on the back seat, I noticed her right foot rest was broken but I never bothered to ask why. As we were cruising, our conversation went like this:

Me: Well, this is rather weird.

Her: Yeah, I know.  

Me: This certainly is an experience. I've never been driven around by one of Time's Asian heroes before.

Her: Maybe that's why we're called heroes.

In the Time article, 19-year old May, a girl from Burma's Kachin state described Charm Tong as a "candle in the darkness." "She never behaves like she's superior or better. She is like our sister, and the school is our family," says May. 

Indeed. A sister to some, a driver to mine.