Democracy for Vancouver

Unlike most white folks from the South, Burma has been a part of my consciousness since I was in kindergarten.

My education began in the first kindergarten class of a new, progressive-minded Episcopal school. St. Stephens back then was tiny: fewer than 200 students in 13 grades, and six of those students were Newhalls.

And two of the Newhalls were Burmese.

Jimmy and Johnny were identical twins, adopted by Dr. and Mrs. Newhall while they worked on a medical mission in Burma. According to Sue Newhall’s memoir of that period, The Devil in God’s Old Man, the local belief was that in any pregnancy there could only be one soul. So when twins and higher-order multiples were born, since there was no way of determining which child bore the soul, all of the multiples would be killed.

The Newhalls rescued Jimmy & Johnny from this practice, adding to their already large brood of five boys.

Because St. Stephens was so small, we were all more like siblings than classmates, and knew far too much about each other’s lives and histories. And because Jimmy and Johnny were part of this village, we all knew about their escape from fate, and about Burma.

While most “news” is bad news, whether natural disaster or man-made catastrophe, I cannot remember over the last 30 years any report of Burma that was other than tragic: The military’s refusal to cede power after democratic elections. The house-arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi, and her forced separation from her husband and sons. The madness of the junta who sought to cheat fate by changing the country’s name to Myanmar.

Burma is back in the news, again for bloodshed and brutality.

I can only hope that, as Bob Harris notes, these latest atrocities will keep Burma in the news long enough for someone - the U.N.? China? - to be shamed into action.

But hope never seems to live long in Burma.