"I hope for peace in Myanmar"
Editor’s note: These posts are part of a collaboration between Tea Circle and Insight Myanmar to publish Report #3 by Real Stories Not Tale’s (RSNT). To read RSNT’s Report #1, visit Tea Circle’s posts here and Insight Myanmar’s posts here. The full RSNT Report #3 is available here. For all posts by RSNT featured on our site, check out the full list.
“I witnessed lots of women’s leadership in the demonstrations, and they were as successful as men. I am so proud of them. I also observed that discrimination against women wasn’t as present during the protests.”
Mangai is a teacher in Mandalay region. She was interviewed on January 12th, 2022.
"When the military coup happened, I was working as a teacher in a church-based school, in the Mandalay Region. It is a boarding house where teachers and students study and stay together. On the morning of the military coup, I woke up to use the internet and noticed it wasn’t working! I thought there was a problem with my phone, but after a while I noticed everyone around me had the same issue. When I realized there had been a coup and witnessed the internet shutdown, I felt troubled. As a teacher, I did not know what my future career would be like, and I didn’t have enough experience to know how to handle the situation. I was also studying online at that time and realized I probably couldn’t continue.
Later on, the political situation became rather miserable as we continued hearing about people being killed and that news made me very sad. The worst thing is that there were many educated people being murdered.
The political situation is getting worse and worse. We couldn’t decide whether we should keep running our school or if we should close down. But after a while we decided to keep going. Sometimes, we heard gunshots not far from our place. Whenever we heard gunshots or the situation seemed to be getting unstable or dangerous, we would tell the students to turn off the lights and stay calm during the night. Despite the challenges and difficulties, we continued running our boarding school. I had to act as a leader for the other teachers although I was quite afraid of the situation myself. There were uncountable inconveniences leading the school. As young children, I was fully aware the students wanted to play and go outside. When they were not allowed to go out, they got bored, and their interest in their studies declined. As for me, I had to be so cautious, and I was afraid; day after day I got more and more tense.
Traveling around Myanmar has become very unsafe because of the chaotic political situation. Although I am innocent, I am still afraid of being questioned or interrogated at every checkpoint. I have regular contact with friends, and despite our conversations being non-political, I still worry for them. We live in fear, although we mind our own business and are doing what we can until the situation gets better.
My contribution to the protest movement as a woman was taking leave from my job. Sometimes, I cook curries for those fighting for our country. I pray for them every day. That is what I’ve been able to do for them so far. Sometimes, I feel guilty because while the others are sacrificing their lives, I haven’t been able to do anything special for my country.
Some women joined the protests with me. In my opinion, there was gender equality and unity during the protest movements against the coup. I witnessed lots of women's leadership in the demonstrations, and they were as successful as men. I am so proud of them. I also observed that discrimination against women wasn’t as present during the protests; for example, people used to gossip about hanging women's skirts in certain places, but now in protests they used our htameins as powerful symbols of resistance.
Now there aren’t many limits on women’s participation in the protests; there are many ways that we can protest against the military coup.
I hope for peace in Myanmar and more opportunities for education and jobs. I mostly hope to have good leaders in our country."
Real Stories Not Tales (RSNT) is a dedicated team in and out of Myanmar that aims to bring awareness to the reality of young people’s lives since the Myanmar military staged a coup on February 1st, 2021. Stories are collected through interviews with each protagonist by the team, either in Burmese or in English. Each character is drawn by a professional illustrator bringing a visual context to the story. RSNT is an anonymous name that is used by the group to guarantee security to all parties involved in the collection of the stories.