Beginning in the mid-1980s, growing violence and political repression in Myanmar (Burma) forced hundreds of thousands to flee. Many of them, mostly of Karen descent, fled to refugee camps in Thailand – and many of them remain there to this day, prohibited from leaving, with limited opportunities to work.

Some, though, have managed to get out of the camps and find homes elsewhere in the world – about 50,000 of them here in the US, according to the State Department. The Chapel Hill-Carrboro community is home to hundreds of Karen residents, refugees and the children of refugees – about a thousand in all. (Some of them lived in Thai refugee camps for more than a decade before finally getting a chance to leave.)

Learn more about Burmese refugee camps at this link…

…and at this link.

But while thousands of people were able to escape Burma and make it out of the refugee camps, hundreds of thousands more remain behind – a dire situation, even as Burma’s politics are slowly improving.

What are the Karen residents in Chapel Hill-Carrboro doing?

Some of them are making plans to go back.

Paw Ray was born in Myanmar and spent ten years in a Thai refugee camp before coming to America. Eh Mu Ra was born in a refugee camp and spent her first years there before her family reached North Carolina. Now Carrboro High School grads, they and their friends are raising money for a trip back to Thailand – and possibly even Myanmar as well – to visit their friends and family that remain overseas. (They’re planning to go sometime in 2018: the political situtation has improved in Myanmar and Thailand, but they know many of their friends and family will still be living in refugee camps two years from now.)

Paw Ray and Eh Mu Ra (joined by Carrboro High School teacher John Hite) shared their story on WCHL with Aaron Keck.

 

If you want to help Paw Ray and Eh Mu Ra, visit this page on GoFundMe.com.

Eh Mu Ra, Paw Ray, and CHS teacher John Hite with WCHL's Aaron Keck. (Photo by Paw Ray.)

Eh Mu Ra, Paw Ray, and CHS teacher John Hite with WCHL’s Aaron Keck. (Photo by Paw Ray.)