Comments for the crooked line

Comment on When the centipede swallows the human by Shirley Worland

Shirley Worland — Mon, 05 May 2008 07:58:29 +0000

I am a volunteer teacher in an IDP Ksren school on the Thai-Burma border. I am very interested in teaching the students their hts in English both as a means of improving their spoken English and more importantly keeping their culture alive for future generations.
Please tell me where I can get this book.
Shirley

Comment on When the centipede swallows the human by Kyozhou

Kyozhou — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 01:33:25 +0000

I am very interested in the Karen Hta. I am also interested in whether there are neat old books like the one shown above that I could scan or videotape for the sake of a documentary I am working on.

Comment on Tattoos by Htoo

Htoo — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 00:59:04 +0000

hey give us more informations and pictures of the Karen people’s tattoos. i’ve heard some stories simillar to aiontary’s

Comment on What response to these latest protests by Rach

Rach — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 23:50:15 +0000

I know, we have very different ideas of normal, the Burmese military and me. I often think it would be an interesting exercise to record some of the Burmese military’s most outrageous, flamboyant, stupid and blatantly inaccurate comments. There’s some pearlers let me tell you.

Of course the other thing I meant to say in this post is that scrolling through those responses you realise most of it is lip service - which is all well and good - but i think most people from burma, and those interested in burma need something more than this now. Concrete action from the international community remains largely untested, it would be nice to see that eventuate in support of the people inside.

Comment on What response to these latest protests by Sunny

Sunny — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 16:15:17 +0000

Good summary of events. It’s a terrible thing that is happening over there. The Burma representative told the United Nations General Assembly that things have returned to normal, but apparently normal in Burma is a scary proposition.

Comment on Punk on the streets of Rangoon by Rach

Rach — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 00:54:27 +0000

Couldn’t agree more Lars. There are many similarities, not least being they challenge the status quo…and of course they’re both defying the no more than 5 people in a gathering rule.

Comment on Punk on the streets of Rangoon by Lars

Lars — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 12:34:14 +0000

Buddhist Munks and Buddhist Punks…. It does not matter i support their case anyway.

Comment on Burma: how long do they have to stand peacefully? by Alex

Alex — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 14:39:57 +0000

Hi,

Can you contact me asap at alex.mcraeATbbc.co.uk? We’re interested in talking to you about Burma on the BBC World Service and I can’t find a contact email for you on this site.

Thanks!

Alex

Comment on Welcome to year eleven… by Editor

Editor — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:28:44 +0000

This is a bit of a late comment, I’m not sure if I missed this post initially or was just too busy with other things. I read Narinjara News’ stories more than any other service, so my knowledge of events like this is probably tilted more towards Arakan than other states, but, I have noticed that whenever there are these sort of events in Rangoon, there is a lot of backlash in Arakan. Backlash in the sense that the military always seems to take pre-emptive steps to prevent ‘untoward incidents’. After this most recent prayer campaign, law enforcement teams were stationed at major temples to question everyone about why they are there. But, there is still actually a fair amount of participation in these campaigns in Arakan, from what I can tell.

There are also incidents of individual or indepedent action by small groups. Not always peaceful, but still noteworthy and indicative of a level of resistance. I imagine there are similar stories in other parts of the country as well, we either just aren’t able to see and read all those stories, or, they are overshadowed by bigger events. Western Burma has no active insurgency, so perhaps they have are better able to cover these ’small’ stories. Though in my opinion, the sum of these small events is quite significant.

Comment on Hip Hop for the disaffected by Rach

Rach — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 00:43:20 +0000

I would suggest that it’s not that unique at all. Burma has a fairly strong traditional arts presence, something that the military government has started to monopolise in their attempt to place themselves as separate to western influences. However, this movement is strong in itself and there are various independent groups and troupes in Burma that maintain links to traditional artistic pratices. There are also groups who have set up new forms of art that incorporate the traditional with the contemporary, I think Gitameit and NICA are some examples of this.
But like many traditional societies in the world, modernisation seriously threatens the continued practices of traditional ways of art. Art adapts, creates anew and embraces other ways of expressing. You could say that art is a classic example of evolutionary processes particular to current environments and ways of thinking. This threat to traditional ways of art is further entrenched through the displacement of ethnic cultures which makes the ‘traditional’ vulnerable. Burma has been a terribly closed society, it is now finding itself subjected to the ideas of other countries and it is inevitable that their influences will change the way Burmese art and music progress.
I do agree that a massive art movement is possible in Burma and I would even suggest that the basis of this is already in existence.
I’m not sure if I’ve actually made any points here Richard but it’s an interesting debate so keep it coming.