As the new year begins, the team at AMS are getting out and into the field to visit some of our supported development projects throughout Asia and the Pacific.
On Sunday afternoon I flew into Thailand to spend nine days visiting three projects that we support which all work with one of the most marginalised communities in Thailand – Burmese refugees and migrants. The three projects are all very different in their scope and how they operate but the thing they have in common is that they seek to provide education to Burmese youth so that they have the opportunity to escape the grinding poverty that their families experience as refugees and migrants in a foreign country.
Myanmar, formerly known as Burma (demonym Burmese) is a country whose people suffer from widespread poverty, a flailing economy, corruption and human rights abuse. Despite a democratically elected government taking power in 2015 with well known human rights activist Aung San Suu Kyi as State Counsellor, who was under house arrest for 15 years under former regimes, it is the military that still rules the country and holds the true power. The optimism that the international community held for Myanmar has largely faded with an estimated 1.4 million Burmese still displaced in Thailand.
Samut Sakhon is a large bustling town on the outskirts of Bangkok where the Marist Brothers run the Marist Centre for Migrants. In Samut Sakhon alone there are estimated to be around 200,000 Burmese who have fled Myanmar in search of a better future for their children. They speak openly about their dislike for where they live and the work they do but they do this to survive as there are no opportunities in their repressive homeland. The majority of Burmese men in Samut Sakhon work in the large fish processing factories where they are paid minimum wage and work under stifling conditions. Fourteen hour days are not uncommon and many more are lured out to see to spend months on a fishing boat where they are unwittingly entrapped, abused and unpaid. BBC have documented this horrific but all too common story in this article http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-25814718
Burmese women can also work in these factories but often they will work in markets or food stalls from dawn to dusk. With many Thai schools refusing to enrol Burmese or even making them pay for using a desk and chair, this leaves children as young as four at home by themselves or left to work with their mother. Unable to gain an education the children will never be able to break out of the cycle of poverty and more distressingly, makes them easy prey for child traffickers and local gangs.
The Marist Centre for Migrants provides free education for Burmese children who are unable to enrol in Thai schools. Up to 125 children aged between five and 16 attend every day and learn a curriculum that is similar to primary school level in Myanmar. There are children as old as 16 completing grade four as they have been out of school for a number of years while their family travelled to and settled in Thailand. While the centre is not an official primary school, it is hoped that by educating these children they may be able to one day reintegrate into schools either in Thailand or back in their homeland. The centre is one of three in Samut Sakhon overseen by the Archdiocese social service centre.
I arrived at the centre on Monday morning with Br Andrew from Malaysia and Br Alex from India. On the way we picked up several children who jumped in the back of the pickup. Once we arrived Andrew went out again on another pickup run while another car driven by a staff member also did two pickups. I met the five teachers at the centre, who are Thai and Burmese, but also include a teacher who was born in Myanmar to Indian parents and when he was an adult married a Burmese lady and then they eventually migrated to Samut Sakhon searching for a better future.
Eventually all the children arrived and school started at 7.50am with an assembly and a milk drink for all the children. After singing both the Thai and Myanamar national anthems the students commenced class. Throughout the day you could hear the recital of English happening in classrooms while other classrooms were silent in their learning. The road next to the centre hummed all day with traffic and horns blaring, the winter sun beat down on the centre at 32 degrees Celsius, while the wind blew in a pungent odour from the fish processing factory next door. Morning tea and lunchtime (all provided by the centre) saw the kids expend their energy in the small play area at the back of the building with Alex being the victim of a group of small children trying to upend him. The children showed me the centres pet rabbits which they all carefully and lovingly stroked. I was soon the target for the small boys energy but was saved by the slap of a stick which indicated time for class again. At the end of the day some children were picked up by a parent, some walked home, and the rest were driven in the four daily busloads. The less fortunate children are sent home with leftover lunch packages for their family.
On top of this regular activity for primary children, the centre offers programs on the weekends for young Burmese adults to upskill them for the workforce. The centre also plays host to human rights workshops where the children and their parents are given information about basic rights such as child rights, work rights and the law. Additionally, every Tuesday and Wednesday the Brothers visit many of the family homes to see the parents and engage them with their child’s education.
We returned home in the late afternoon and in the daylight I could see the full surroundings of where the Brothers lived. Andrew tells me there are 52 apartment blocks side by side here, each containing 48 rooms. To me they look like communist style concrete buildings often found in China or big social work housing projects of the past in the UK or Australia. There are over 5000 people living in these buildings with the overwhelming majority being Burmese. The entrance to this group of buildings is guarded by surveillance cameras and Thai security. I can’t help but think these buildings act as social dividers and serve to keep the Burmese contained and under a watchful eye.
In the relative quiet of these buildings I was able to reflect upon the day that had been. For years I had seen pictures of the Marist Centre and of the happy smiling children that learn there, but pictures can only show so much. It struck me that the role of the Marist Centre for Migrants is not just education but is far more than that. The centre acts as a safe place for children where they are free from danger. It is a community hub where they can retain their cultural practices and mother tongue. And more importantly it is a place where, despite being displaced from their homeland and being forced to live harsh adult-like lives, children can be children and laugh, play and get up to mischief. It is a place of joy.
Written by: Ashley Bulgarelli, AMS Projects Coordinator
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