Special Contribution: I Am a Citizen of Myanmar

Summary

In 2004, when I published my second book in the Myanmar language titled Compromising with the Burmese Generals, I quoted a paragraph from Allister Sparks’ Beyond the Miracle: Inside New South Africa:

I felt myself to be “emotionally stateless”: I could not identify with the land of my birth because it stood for things I abhorred; I felt no sense of pride when I heard my national anthem or saw my national flag.

Sparks, a South African who witnessed and wrote about the brutality of the South African apartheid regime as a journalist, was talking about his feelings regarding apartheid. This was exactly how I felt about “Burma” (which was how I named the country as an exile). Calling Myanmar “Burma” was an act of defiance for me, because I was against what “Myanmar” represented under military rule. Myanmar did not represent me; it was to be abhorred.

There were times that when I was “emotionally stateless”. I remember watching the football final between Thailand and Myanmar at the Southeast Asian Games in 1994. It was one of the few exciting games I have ever watched Myanmar play against its rival neighbour. But while my colleagues, led by Moe Thee Zun — a military regime hater himself — wildly cheered for the Myanmar team at the house we rented in Bangkok (through a Myanmar friend who was a legal resident in Thailand), I was quiet because I was not sure if I should support the Myanmar national team. The Myanmar team did very well but was unlucky in the end as a header from Thai striker Kiatisuk “Zico” Senamuang (former Thai football coach) decided the tie.

The match was the talk of the town for both Myanmar and Thais and my colleagues continued to discuss it endlessly. But I was quiet. I was not even sure if I would celebrate if the Myanmar team had won. That was my problem — I could not emotionally connect myself to the Myanmar team because I felt the team represented a regime that I was against. I thought the team itself was also corrupt with its tainted and biased selection and the national football officials bowing to the whims of the ruling generals.