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Mae La Refugee Camp and KKBBSC from the Inside Out

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A Glimpse of Mae La Refugee Camp and KKBBSC from the Inside Out

Teaching in action

This past July 17th I went from Chiang Mai, Thailand to the town of Mae Sot in order to cross the border into Myanmar and then return into Thailand. This is one way of renewing one’s visa. After the process was complete I headed back into Mae Sot to the Canadian Diner to get breakfast. It just so happened Dr Simon from the Mae La Karen refugee camp (about one and a half hour drive from town) was in town getting supplies and spotted me walking along the street. Within 15 minutes he committed me to come into the camp and teach. Short three teachers he asked me to something in Christian Ethics for the Juniors. I went into the camp on the 18th and stayed 9 days teaching out of a verse in 2 Cori 5:7 “we walk by faith and not by sight” which is the theme of my new book.

The following are a few quotes from some of the papers I received from my students. They are representative comments on various subjects we discussed in light of the text. With difficulty they wrote in English and in doing so their sentences often appear elementary. *Naw indicates female and Saw  indicates male.

 

Students at Mae La Camp

“Now we live in [Mae La] refugee camp and we have nothing. But we believe in God and God feeds us. God gives us everything what we need. We can walk only by faith in God”

No name on this paper

“The word faith is easy to say but sometimes we fall in our faith – Yes!

“We walk by faith and not by sight because God needs us to do whatever with all our hearts”

(Here the student is thinking about how acting on faith in the unseen exercises not only the mind but heart  – true faith stirs up creative stress that summons the heart.)

By Naw Say Paw

“You teach about faith. Before I am not clear about faith. I cannot explain about faith to others. Faith is very important in my life so you teach very clearly. I like that. I have a question what about during the time of Jesus. They see miracle and see Jesus so do they also need faith?

“I never see angle like Abraham, burning bush like Moses, I never see Jesus but when some people talk about God I realize God is true So that is faith. Faith is to believe in reality even you never see…” [“Faith comes by hearing says Romans 10:17].

By Sorasak

“We don’t know what happens tomorrow but we know who hold’s tomorrow”

By Naw En Christ Paw

“By Faith one day our Karen People will get freedom”

No name on this paper

“Like children growing up must learn to make decision so we as Christian must make decisions.  Because we cannot depend on other people always. We can make a right decision through trust in God. If we cannot make decisions in our lives we will have many problems. As Christians we need to dare to make decisions through faith”

Saw Eh Kalyaw

“Those who walk by sight never reaches a point where he/she has enough. Those who walk by faith however which kind of situation they happen upon they can stand by faith firmly and they can pass through all difficult situations.”

Naw Eh Christ Paw

“God is spiritual so we cannot see him [John 4:24] we can see him only by our faith. Now we become refugee but we have a chance to study and gain education and can worship God free…”

Saw Ta Eh Poe

“In our journey of life we cannot walk by ourselves. And we cannot walk alone by what we see, touch and knowing. We can walk only by our faith in God. We need to put our faith deeply in God. God will prepare everything for us.”

Saw Billy Shell

My experience at Bangkwang Central Prison by Nai Thaung Myint

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Psalm 62:5-8, “Find rest, O my soul, in God alone’ my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust him all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him for God is our refuge.” (NIV)

Bangkwang Central Prison is located in Nonthaburi Province, just the north of Bangkok City, Thailand. When I was transferred from Kanjanaburi Province Prison to Bangkwang Central Prison, in January 1989, it was the only place where they kept the worse and big criminals and the heavy sentence prisoners, such as those who were sentenced from 30 years to life or death sentences. There were 13 sections or buildings and I was sent to live in building#6. It was detained building and high security building and did not allow to go and work or visit outside the building and it was not allowed to contact the other buildings as well. Most prisoners were life sentence and the remaining were those who committed crime or committed inside cases from other buildings. I knew that I was one of the criminals in the sight of the law but my problem that moment was I was in the middle of the worse of the worst prisoners.

Nai in his bedroom/study room/prayer room

Nai in his bedroom/study room/prayer room

Since I was arrested in Three Pagoda Pass Village, Ampur Sankharaburi, Thai and Burma Border, I was lost all my money and properties. So when I came to Bangkwang Prison, I owned one old blanket, 2 shorts, and 2 T. shirts and an old New Testament in Burmese without cover which I brought from Kanjanaburi Prison. Other than those I had nothing including my daily necessities such as toothpaste, washing powder, soap, shampoo etc. I lived in Burma, all my family, relatives and friends were there. They did not know where I was.  Even though they knew where I was, there was no way to reach me. I did not have any stamps, envelopes to contact my family in Burma. No one could visit and help me from outside world.

I also could not communicate with other prisoners; I could not speak Thai at all. My two case-partners could speak Thai but since they even could not stand by themselves well, they could not help me too. And there were another 4 Burmese in the same building but they too had to struggling badly to pass on day by day to help themselves, so how they could help me. One of them, named Ko Tint Lwin, murder case, with life sentence, from Southern Burma, told me about the missionary who have came and visited prisoners once a month and he introduced me Mailbox Club Bible lessons from Pattaya City and he also handed me an Old and New Testament Bible. He made me to see the ray of hope and it became like the seed of my hope to stand and going on toward my uncertain future even though I had no opportunity for that moment to meet the missionary because of the fetter in my legs. Any prisoners with fetters were not allowed to go and meet the missionary. I was fettered since the day I was judged by Kanjanaburi court into life sentence but the court reduced and approved my sentence into 33 years 4 months, in December 26, 1988. I had to carry the fetter during my new-comers training period and until the authorities in the building #6 satisfy on my behaviors and give the permission to free of it. It was took me time around two months and I was free from the fetter at last and I got the right to meet the missionary like other prisoners once a month outside the building at the prison hall. I started to know Pastor Randy Bell and later Dr, Jim Bryant from Calvary Baptist Church, Soi 2, Bangkok. I started hearing the great and unlimited love of God and the redemptive work of Jesus Christ through the message from the missionaries. And I also did the Mailbox Clab Correspondence Course through Pattaya City Church which ministered and running by Rev. Jack and Glad Martin together Ms. Jane Galle, the grader of the lessons. And I had learned about Jesus Christ and His great work through the missionaries and the lessons and I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and I was baptized in the pool near the prison hall, by Dr. U Kyaw Than who was given the authority to baptize from the Calvary Baptist Church, Soi 2, Bangkok, in June 26, 1989.

I have learned about the wonderful love of Jesus Christ who has given His life to the sinners through other missionaries as well especially who regularly visited the foreigners and later also Thai prisoners, as Charles and Lourdes Holmes and their team. They came and visited us weekly and taught us the Bible and also gave us the Rogma International Bible Correspondent two years Course for a diploma and other Bible courses and also helping us with our daily necessities that we need in prison. And there were also Burmese missionary groups from Calvary Baptist Church, Soi 2, Bangkok, leading by Pastor Too Jar, Pastor Zaw Min, Thramu Naw Tu Lu, Naw Mi Mi, Ko San Aung, pastor Parny Maung, including from the ministries of the Light of Mon People leading by Rev. Nai Tun Thein, Rev. Nai Tun Than, Ko Min Zaw Zaw and some other brothers and sisters in Christ as well came and visited regularly and occasionally and share the message of the love of God through their the words and deeds. I felt the love of God through the missionaries and I also longed and expected to receive the same love from the prisoners around me as well. But I found out that life in prison was just thoroughly different from the life of Jesus in the Bible. Prison taught and guided and pushed man directly or indirectly to be selfish. It looked like those who were more selfish were more suitable to live better life and to be survived in prison. Not only me, there were so many people, some people worse than me, who were in need. Many people wandered around and were talking alone in the building, eating rubbish from the cabbage, drinking dirty water from the drains. I had learned that all those men were just normal like us when they newly come to prison, and they later could not bear the situations and became like half crazy man.

When I was newly come to building #6, there were around 700 inmates and about 8 guards only looking at the prisoners. The guards were not always there; sometime there were only one or two guards and sometimes not even one guard in the buildings. The authorities appointed some prisoners to controls the remaining prisoners. Especially in the dormitory, there were no guards at all; we have to stay from 4:00 pm to next 7:00am. The building #6 dormitory was two stories building, and there was a corridor room at both stories and there were the cells both the left and the right side of the corridor. The trustees and those who can spend money were allowed to sleep in the corridor room and they were the persons who had broken the law. There were a few gangs moving around there especially the gang from Southern Thailand controlled the gambling party and drug (heroin) dealing and money lender in the building. The drug was so expensive in prison so they usually used needle to shoot into the veins to be effective with the small amount and it was one of the reasons transferring the HIV and AIDS to one another. And there were homosexual and man prostitutes as well transferring that kind of disease in the building. And there were many people who have suffered with T.B, Malaria, so many kinds of skin diseases, HIV and AIDS. For those who cause the disease seriously especially the TB, they had separated bed room for them but it seem could not control the infections.

The education system was so weak in my early years in Bangkwang prison, and there were a lot of illiterates among the prisoners. I saw often the beating, fighting, stabbing, and sometimes killing one another or among the gangs. Right after 20 days I reached to Bangkwang prison, there was a murder case in front of me. The man with the fetter used a cement dumbbell and beat the head of another man who was turning his face to the wall and eating his breakfast and as the man fainted and fell down on the grown, he grasped and pulled his hair and lifted the head up and put on his lap and cut the throat with a small knife and at the same time the blood was spurting out and hit on the murderer’s face but it was not disturbed him to continue cutting the throat. After he satisfied what he had done, he just pushed the body down and walked away to the building gate in order to go outside the building and to be surrendered at the central office. All the guards and the trustees at the building gate were run away out of the building when they saw the murderer was walking straight toward them with blood painted face and the whole body. The place where the murder killed the man was far from me only about three meters and the murderer was the same man who was my roommate and who slept close to me and he was from the southern of Thailand with murder and robbery case who was sentenced to life.

Nai and Daniel

I realized myself that I was really in the mid of troubles, I had to worry for myself, for my daily need, for my family, for the secure of life and for my future and so many other things. And the shadow of fear was greatly control my mind and thoughts. I was asking myself and questioning in my heart, “Who can help me?” repeatedly—again and again. This question was pondered in my mind not just now in Bangkwang but since the first night I got my sentence in Kanjanaburi province. I was looking and searching for someone, the human being, who can help me but when I did not find anyone, my mind turn to looking for the supernatural things. I came from Buddha religion background and I seriously tried to practice the meditation to quiet my mind and anxiousness. I tried to pray the Buddha to help me, I tried to read the Bible and I tried to pray God to help me in the name of Jesus.

In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus says, “Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

I had read the Bible verses but I didn’t understand well the real meaning. I kept depending only on myself by the works, by meditation, by praying the Buddha, by reading the Bible, praying in Jesus’ name, by keeping the commandments, by doing the Bible lessons regularly, even after I was baptized. All the works that trying to carry the burdens by myself could not work well. But I still kept going on without realizing myself and just with my sincere heart until the day I met Jesus in my vision in the early morning in my quiet time in October21, 1990. This thing made me to believe and trust Him with all my heart, my soul and my body and had made me to accept Him as the only One Lord and Savior of my life. At the same time I have got the new life and I have been saved both mentally and spiritually. I could say I have been saved physically as well. I was born-again and received the Holy Spirit on that day. My perspectives of life also changed and there was a new hope for the future. I could start to live with a smiling face in prison and the Holy Spirit gives me strength to endure as I had to pass through all the sufferings and temptations and tasting in prison. After I had stayed near ten years in Bangkwang prison, I was moved to Klong Prem Central Prison in Bangkok in April 22, 1998. And I was transferred again to Klong Pai Prison, the Northeastern of Thailand and after that to Nang Rong Prison, near Cambodia’s border again. I had faced different kinds of difficulties and sufferings in the different prisons among the different people and cultures. My faith also sometime was going up and down during those years. But the love of God is never changed and He is with me always since the day I was born again and until now. I had served 18 years and 9 months in prison and at last God answered my prayer and saved me not only spiritually but also physically and God allowed me to enjoy the freedom of life again. I can’t describe by the word how much I thank God but I know that I thank Him never enough from the bottom of my heart for His protections and providences and encouragements during my hardest 18 years and 9 month in the lion den. Today I found out myself as a final year student in KKBBSC Bible College in Burma and Thai border. This thing also was possible, not by my own—but only by God alone, not by my might but by His.

I give this testimony, I just want my beloved readers to know that God of the Bible is a Living God—He is with us, and He listens and answers our prayers in His time. He is so good to all of us.

May God Richly Bless you all always.

Psalm 116: 1-6, “I love the Lord, for He heard my voice; He heard my cry for mercy. Because He turned His ear to me, I will call on Him as long as I live. The cords of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came upon me; I was overcome by trouble and sorrow. Then I called on the name of the Lord: “O Lord, save me!” The Lord is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion. The Lord protects the simple-hearted; when I was in great need, He saved me.”

With Love In Christ

Nai Thaung Myint

Final Year

KKBBSC

The New Covenant

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Dear Friends

It has been a month of Sundays since I communicated with you. But my silence was not without a reason. Now I have good news all around.

The first piece of good news is that I am back in the harness. I suddenly became sick but I got better! I fell ill in early February and stayed that way for 3 months checking into a hospital in Northeastern Thailand. Now I am back to my old self and biting down on the 2013-14 teaching season that is well under way here. I thank God and the Union Seminary students of Wenzhou, China who got wind of my plight and carried me with their prayers. Spiritually they were and are terrible as an army with banners. They dubbed me the Paul of Wenzhou and with zeal adopted me.

The second piece of good news is that I have been invited back to China. And today my visa came through. On the 17th of August I depart for Shanghai and from there I will travel to other cities where I will teach courses at four seminaries over a six week period lecturing 8 hours a day.  When I finish in China I take a short break and then go to Cambodia, then Thailand and Myanmar [Lord willing]. The number of schools that exist on a wing and a prayer all over Asia exceeds any one’s expectations and the need for teachers far exceeds their availability.

The third piece of good news is that I started and finished a little book on 2 Corinthians 5:7 “we walk by faith and not by sight”. Finishing something is a big deal for me. I remember doing a memorial service for a man whose son asked for a few minutes to eulogize his father. Of course I obliged but when he ended every one but the son was depressed all the more. He launched into a 25-minute litany of all the things his father started but never finished never mentioning one virtue or accomplishment. I could not help but imagining myself lying in the box and the list of my unfinished projects being shamefully rehearsed to those gathered.

Malaysia Baptist Theological Seminary has agreed to put it to press in a few weeks in September. It is entitled “Existence and Faith: The Doing and Undoing of Religion in America”. In the book my thesis is worked out within many familiar passages and challenges of real life and then extended to intersect American religion and culture. It is over 200 very readable pages full of stories but not lacking in theological insight and weight. The proceeds will go to underwrite my Asian educational mission work. You will be the first to receive word about this work when it’s off the press and there is an offer here in this letter for receiving it.

There is yet one more piece of good news. Just this week I entered into an agreement with an IT specialist who will update my blog and do my posting every two weeks. This means the end of promises not kept! Last year the spirit was willing but the flesh weak. I made a great start thanks to several persons but posting on the road was difficult and my posting skills are worse than bad despite expert tutoring. But now, by the time this letter reaches you existenceandfaith.wordpress.com will have come back to life again! My new editor/poster I will let introduce herself in an upcoming posting. Suffice it to say you may now commence to look for inspiring updates every 2 weeks minimum.

I am confident that the blog’s new energy will immediately come alive with your first read. I already have fresh stories to share. For instance on July 18, just a few weeks ago, for 9 days I went in and taught at the Mae La Refugee Camp in KKBBSC [a college established by a native Karen, Dr Simon, a Baptist preacher and educator, for his people who fled to the camp from the military who attempted to destroy the Karen State in Myanmar].

The log opens with the story of my new friend Nai who is the oldest and happiest student at KKBBSC recently released from 18 years 9 months in Asian jails. His story is amazing and so rich in experience but equally moving are the quotes you will read from my 19 to 20 year old Junior ethics students’ homework. Entrenched, ostensibly so, deep in the valley of the shadow in the refugee camp, these students paper’s express faith and hope with a genuine and earthly simplicity rarely encountered in the West. What does the book of James tell us, something to the effect that those poorest in this world are potentially the richest in faith.

If my teaching mission resonates with you then please support it if you are able. Raising the funds I need to underwrite my teaching work is not my strong suit. Your help last year made the difference. All the schools I am serving again this year exist on very humble means. Because of the turn of events this spring I am behind the eight ball but now I am going forward and booking a full slate of teaching commitments for the academic year in Thailand, China, Burma, and Cambodia.  My address is what it was before with one slight change. Daniel Age C/O Aprile Age 154 Grand Street, suite  6- 8, New York, New York 10013.

God Bless You. Stay in touch, as you are able and please keep me in your prayers. I have not missed thinking and praying for you who have carried me in this endeavor.

Together With you In Friendship, Fellowship and Service

Daniel Age

[Written from Chiang Mai, Thailand]

The housechurch movement: China

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All but 3 pictured here are young housechurch pastors. Each has started his or her own congregation. This is how Christianity is spreading in China. No traditional denominational structures exist within the housechurch movement. Churches spawn churches. Pastors simply emerge from a cell group and commence to build their own congregations loosely connected to their alliances. The movement is like a dragon with many little heads, which in turn generate more little heads. There’s no place to go to or person to contact who is crucial or pivotal to the movement. If authorities get nervous and arrest a leader the consequences are minimal. Layers of distinction create an antidote to the effectiveness of government intrusion. Uniformity and conformity are not valued but networking is. And while education is valued it is not in order to meet leadership requirements only to build up and strengthen a Pastor/ missionary’s gifts for her work. All the student/pastors here are earning a masters degree awarded by an established, accredited seminary in Malaysia. My surprise with this group was the degree to which their questions were practical. Their interest in and capability for theological thought was very low while issues dealing with church order and government were their focus. It seemed a great burden for them to wrestle with ideas and follow ideas to connect the dots. Late into the course two university students came to listen in. They were bilingual [Mandarin and English] . My work on the “Transformation of Morality by Luther and Paul especially went over well with these two. They begged me to stay in China and continue taking teaching appointments but I refused. My health required a break and the harsh cold in Beijing was no place to get my zip back.

Ideas in translation

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missing pic IMG_0811-1

I was asked to lecture on 2 Corinthians 5:7 in Wenzhou. Half way through the class I restated my thesis and then someone took a picture of it. My translator, a young bilingual English major – very capable teacher in her own right — provided the Mandarin you see. A close look at the board reads as follows: “THESIS”  Part A “Inside faith we suffer two temptations” (1) We try to pull the unseen into the realm of the seen, the future into the realm of the present [now].  (2) We break with the unseen and the future and then fall into the grip of the seen and the pleasures and problems of the now.

Part B “Outside faith the threat is that the seen [felt and immediate experience] and the present, with its pleasures and problems, will swell and becoming the be all and end all  and then will hurt, harm and destroy us. Faith in the NT, especially Paul and the writer of Hebrews, roots and grounds our life in something unseen and something coming.  Thereby protecting us from the overreach of things seen, felt experienced in the here and now. Toxic religion almost always relieves the tension of faith by finding a pseudo-way to get the future into the present and the seen out from behind the veil that hides it.  These of course are not wholly original ideas but they have been building in my mind for several years and now compose 40 hours of lecture discussions. Thanks to my clever and highly efficient translator who recorded my words and her translation many of the discussions are bouncing around cyberspace in China.

Different than any other place in China: Wenzhou

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This is a school that’s taken sanctuary under the wing of a church that operates out in the open in Wenzhou, China. The pastor of the church acts as the principal. The students you see– mostly undergraduate students, with six Masters students– compose the entire student body. Wenzhou is different than any other place in China. It is called the Jerusalem of China. Liberties and religious freedom for Christians exist here but Beijing refuses to interfere. They like what is going on in Wenzhou economically. Somewhere along the way, Beijing lost the battle to control culture here.  In their minds (Beijing’s communist leaders) traditional Chinese culture excludes China becoming Christian but in some places, especially Wenzhou they lost their culture battle and surrendered. There are flourishing churches all over Wenzhou and some of these harbor schools for students that have come from other provinces in China where such endeavors are forbidden. This class especially endeared themselves to me. I came down with a virus of some kind and it was working havoc with me – chills, fever and a chest inflammation. I worked through it but on the 4thday of lecturing it became apparent to them I was struggling. They asked me to stop the class and began to sing and pray for me. It was so powerful. Listening to these 40 students sing felt like Joshua’s trumpets that brought the walls of Jericho down. Later they kept telling me how cold it was in Beijing and how I needed to get a real coat. On the last day behind my back they took up an offering and went out and bought me a very warm coat. I went off to Beijing with a “warm baby” an electric hot water bottle, polar bear bedroom slippers and a very warm coat. Later in Beijing they texted me and told me they had a prayer session for me and that I should be getting better within the hour! They also assured me I was their favorite teacher and waited for me to return.

The fullness of the ‘empty’ and the emptiness of the ‘full’: Thai-Burma border

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At the Mae La Refugee Camp there is a thatch dorm for handicapped Karen men who suffered land mine accidents and violence at the hands of the Myanmar military. I was invited to visit these men. On my arrival they rallied and sang to us wanting to give something to us. After their music, wanting to give something to them, I talked about faith, hope and love in the midst of the brokenness of life then we prayed with them and visited each one. One member in our group who had come to visit the camp that day, a writer from Sweden, an unbeliever, was greatly moved – on account of their courage and serenity; and the thoughts of faith hope and love in the depths, when life appears beyond redemption. He had come to Thailand for fun but decided for a day off to visit this camp. I ate lunch with him after our meeting it was clear he was stirred and shaken. The fullness of the ‘empty’ and the emptiness of the ‘full’ had wedged itself into his mind.

For the Karen not only is hope needed but the transformation of hope: Thai-Burma border

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These are seniors at KKBBS College at the Karen Mae La refugee camp 67 Kilo from Mae Sot, Thailand. I was their teacher for 2 weeks. I’ll remember this class for their questions.  For instance, they wanted to know the right relationship of Christians and the church, to political power.  A large percentage of the Karen people are Christians so much so Christian and their ethno-cultural identity have merged. The political fortunes in Burma/Myanmar are shifting and they are keen to know if and how as Christians they can move the process along in their direction.  The Karen groups that were run over and fled are now, more than in times past, flirting with hopes of a return to their homeland. In the not-so-recent past the Karen carried on guerilla warfare in defense of their towns and villages, which had been overrun by the military. I urged them to play with new images of their future in the emerging Burma, less separated as before whilst no less distinct, or true to their values, customs and culture. I quoted Chalcedon “union without fusion distinction without separation”. It maybe that for the Karen people not only is hope needed but the transformation of hope  – a new solidarity with distinction, distinction with solidarity. The old hope – the return of highly separated almost parallel peoples within the new Burma may be dated. Hope, like all prayer, rarely if ever returns to us from our God-sent petition in kind. Do we receive our answers in the same form we send them to Him? More often than not, Life teaches us otherwise. These are seniors and they were feeling the weight of their impending futures, soon they will graduate and then what, where, how? At the close of my two weeks with them they took over the class and ask me to sit.  They proceeded to have one of their musicians play the guitar and sing to me while they filed by one by one and shined on me blessing me and thanking me.

Irrepressible energy and beauty: Mae La Refugee camp

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These are juniors at KKBBSC (Karen Kahoolawe Baptist Bible School & College in the Mae La Refugee camp. They are all Karen peoples from Burma living and studying in the camp. While many have been in the camp several years, the energy and beauty that these youth introduce into the camp life is irrepressible. Every morning they emerge from little thatch dwellings (lean bare dwellings with the meanest cleaning grooming facility) looking like a million dollars -always downed in their traditional ethnic dress. They reminded me of a Proverb in Scripture “sons grown up in their youth, daughters polished after the similitude of a palace”. Here in this remote camp on the edge of nowhere one stumbles upon rare grace and maturity. I looked forward to this class because they were so spirited and totally present.

Justice, hope, equality, human dignity, peace and reconciliation: Thai-Burma border

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I’m here with Dr. Saw Simon the founder & principle of KKBBSC –the college inside the Mae La Refugee Camp at the Thai Burma border. He’s been in the camp for 22yrs. His work on behalf of the Karen People is now known far and wide. Madeleine Albright has been to see his work as well as Aung Sang Sui Kyi Burma’s rising prophet of hope. Prominent UN & religious leaders have made their way to his humble abode where he lives with his wife along with 50,000 other refugees in small thatch and bamboo dwellings. The school (now 450 students) is Baptist (as are most Karen).  Because of the plight of the Karen people, the shape and fabric of their religion has been woven into many fine social strands – justice, hope, equality, human dignity, peace and reconciliation. One must wait for Dr Simon to speak. His brevity and quiet way tests almost all visitors and is sometimes misunderstood. But if a guest is patient, lets the bucket down into the well and waits, wonderful tales and stories are forthcoming. Hidden away in the remote mountains, ostensibly removed from the world Dr Simon has his fingers on political and religious movements far and wide. He remembers dates, events and personalities and their histories with uncanny precision. And he is testing the winds for the Karen whether the times of change they have prayed and waited for are now emerging. At his invitation, I taught for 2 weeks at the school.