I dialed the number to Khin Ohmar’s home on the Thai-Burma border with burning curiosity. It had been over a decade since I spoke to my old friend, a petite yet fiery leader in Burma’s democracy movement. I yearned to learn how her life has unfolded as an impassioned leader in the democracy movement.
During the 1988 democracy uprising, one of the most pivotal times in Burma’s history, Khin Ohmar was a leader, fighting for change in her homeland. Like many young women students, she came of age in a time when perhaps as many as 10,000 people were massacred in the streets by Burmese army troops. As she witnessed the army gun down and drown her friends, she found herself climbing on top of campus rooftops with a bullhorn and shouting for political change to cheering crowds. But when military intelligence began camping outside her home and tracking her movements, she knew that if she stayed in Burma she risked arrest and torture.
Wearing a disguise, she and other pro-democracy activists were smuggled by boat to Burma’s remote forests.
Eventually she made her way to Thailand, where, even today, she continues to carry the torch for democracy and light a path for others to follow.
Q: Ohmar, the first thing I have to ask is how you feel right now, physically and emotionally. What is your assessment of Cyclone Nargis and what this natural disaster means for democracy in Burma?
A: Even though I will never let go of my hope, right now I am feeling emotionally stressed and angry. I am frustrated—my emotions are different now, after the cyclone, than they were in 2007 when the monks rose up. In 2007 we felt that there might be another people’s uprising and that we might have the opportunity to push the regime hard into a corner so that a door could open for democracy.
But with the cyclone, people are frustrated and desperate. At first we thought that this was the time the international community could step in to help us do something about this country. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Q: What is giving you the strength and courage to continue?
A: One way I always gather my strength is to think of Aung San Suu Kyi. She has been alone all these years. I wonder, where does she get the strength? I wonder what she is thinking and how has she been so calm for all these years.
But largely, I believe the people of Burma have suffered way too long and that has to end. Our struggle is for the justice and light.
I truly believe that there must be light at the end of the tunnel. I know as we get closer to the light, we will come upon darker areas, and that is where we are now. This is why I am feeling frustrated. After twenty years—I have to say now I see the long view of this struggle and we want to keep going. We have to continue to move on. I will always be there for the people of Burma.
