It was the year 2005. I was sitting in a ground-floor internet café in downtown Yangon researching universities in the US, UK and Singapore, the three countries I’d shortlisted to go to. I was also applying for scholarships and collecting materials to practise for the IELTS language test.
I used Google to research those things. Nothing surprising there. But under the iron grip of the dictatorial government, we were not allowed to use Google. If I directly typed Google’s address in the browser bar, a big red warning sign would pop up that said simply BANNED.
But among the youth of Burma, we found our own way of accessing any site we wanted. It was always the boys who managed to figure these things out. I only made friends with them (or kept bothering them as they were just reaching the climax of their games) and they would tell me which proxy to use to access the particular sites I wanted. For us, there wasn’t any site we couldn’t access. We always knew how. We were also using gmail, yahoo, hotmail and other email platforms which were all banned under the paranoid government.
The more they gripped us, the more resourceful we became. When I say “we” though, I wasn’t one of the clever ones. It was always the boys who hung out at the internet centres. I was just a smart cookie. Why bother doing it myself when I could just let them do the work? Because of my good English, I was skilled at researching information which I then shared with whoever wanted it. Because of their paranoia, the government was breeding more hackers, programmers and bloggers who always found a back way to access what they were not supposed to access.
We were able to look at anti-government sites where people had managed to record photos, video captures and political songs. The Irish rock band U2 were banned because they sang a tribute song for Daw Aung San Suu Kyi who was under house arrest at the time. The generals waited a few days to see if U2 would come up with a tribute song for them too. But they didn’t. So, they harumphed, sulked and threw their toys out of the pram. But U2 still didn’t come up with any song for them. So, the military decided they would take their revenge by banishing U2’s songs and videos from the face of Burma. So, U2 became quite popular among us. We wouldn’t normally have listened to them: we had our favourite Burmese bands. But we listened, just because they were banned. And the American comedian Jim Carrey praised the lady in one of his interviews. The next day, after hearing that he didn’t praise them too, the generals banned all his movies. This group of burly men in olive green uniform with the whole army behind them ready to shoot anyone they didn’t like found it hurtful when someone praised a small unarmed lady with nothing but steely courage in her hands. It seems, while the generals were in kindergarten decades ago, the part of their brain which controls their emotions got out to stretch its legs. But it went a bit too far and never found its way back in. So, those brain bits are still sitting in their old classroom twiddling whatever passes for their thumbs along with the new set of children. And the generals never seem to realize that those bits are still waiting for them in their old schools.
Anyway, the movies and music the government banned were benefiting from extra attention among us. Some of the young people became so bold that they made it to the government black list so that they couldn’t leave the country anymore. Some of them even ended up in prison.
Still, they couldn’t stop us using the internet and finding information. I’m ashamed to say I didn’t pull my weight much. I wasn’t brave enough to put my future in jeopardy.
The bravest thing I ever did happened one evening in the 2007 revolution. The monks got involved in the uprising. As a result, the military released an ultimatum that said any buses or taxis that allowed monks to get on board would be punished.
I was driving with my mum on the way back from my class. We saw a group of young monks trying to hitchhike. They had obviously been involved in the protests. No buses or taxis dared to let them on. They would lose their licence if they got caught. There were a few other private vehicles who dared to take the protesters in and give them a lift. I stopped the car and asked the monks where they were going. My mum and I decided to give them a lift.
When we got back, my dad was home from work, extremely worried because we were later than usual and the city was in chaos because of the protests flaring up everywhere. My dad scolded us. He thought it was foolish of us to give the monks a lift because I’d just managed to secure a visa to come to the UK and I was due to leave in a couple of months. It was difficult to get a student visa because of strict regulations and the disreputable government. It took me at least a year to get to that stage. We were worried that if the military found out, I would be banned from leaving the country and it would ruin my future.
Students were natural enemies of the military so the men in green would look with suspicion especially at the ones going abroad to study. They wouldn’t let them out of the country if they found the student had participated in any form of anti-government activity or let them come back into the country if they had been found doing the deed abroad. If they had been loud abroad, they’d better not come back. They would mysteriously disappear from the face of earth if they did. And Harry Potter would be unfairly blamed.
That night, we saw a military procession go past our apartment blocks. I remember switching all the lights off and peeping through the living room window to see truck after truck of soldiers fully equipped with guns as if they were going to a battle ground. They were on their way to the monasteries in the suburbs where they had heard the monks had got involved. They went there in the dead of night to set fire to the monasteries and arrest the monks. Yes, even the revered monks were arrested, stripped of their robes and titles and tortured and sometimes killed by the military.
As we looked at the row of army trucks, fear arose within us half expecting some of them to stop and turn to our apartment to arrest us for giving the monks a lift.
We didn’t sleep that night. We sat there watching and listening from the darkened room for any signs of soldiers or any footsteps coming up the stairs to our apartment. The next few nights were spent in a similar fear-ridden way because we heard news that the soldiers had been raiding protesters’ homes in the dead of night to catch them off-guard and also to instil fear among the population. Fear and anger were both on the rise.
A couple of months later, I was safely in the UK. I no longer needed to use a proxy to access the internet. Things in Yangon went back to normal as this latest uprising was yet again squashed. Activists including monks, students and members of the National League of Democracy ended up in prison or dead.
But slowly the military thought it wise to loosen their grip. Even though the military is still very much in power to this day, things finally changed in 2015 and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s party formed the majority of the new government. Although there’s still a very long way to go, things have improved tremendously. The last few times I went back, the immigration clerks no longer dared to ask for bribes. Old worn-out buses that I used to see everywhere were replaced by new modern ones. I was able to use the internet on my phone. Everyone now has a mobile phone with internet. No need for proxy. Google, BBC, Youtube etc are all streaming fine. In fact, no need for internet cafes anymore. The numerous internet centers I used to go to are now shut. Looking at the ground floor flat which has now been transformed into a grocery store, I can’t help wondering with slight nostalgia where those resourceful boys are now.
I hope that they’ll never have to use their skills that way again and their children will never experience the fear we knew so well and will never forget.