http://MiaLillan.tigblog.org/ What's on the minds of young leaders from around the globe? en-us http://MiaLillan.tigblog.org/post/644819
She gazes out the window into the pouring rain, hardly able to see past the mango tree just outside. She looks out, as she’s done everyday for the last couple of years. She can hardly remember what life on the outside was like, let alone contemplate how much it must have changed since she last saw it. All she sees now is the inside of her house, grand though it may be, and, occasionally when she feels up to it, the garden. It’s excruciating for her, locked up in her home as if it were a prison. The place where she once felt safe now an enclosure and it’s not as if she were a lion.

What to do each day, to pass all the time? All those long hours spent reading the books she’s thumbed for years, the binding finally failing, just like everything else in her life, especially her. Everyone knows her name, at least she thinks they still do, her legacy must still be out there.

You can look her up in books, on the internet. Sometimes you’ll see her on the news or in the paper. Always as the hero, or, at least, someone who tried to be the savior of a nation. A nation that the rest of the world frowned upon. She was, and might still be seen as, a beacon of light in an otherwise dismal land.

They locked her up. She knew that what she was doing wouldn’t be the best move in her career, but she couldn’t think of another way, they wouldn’t listen to her silent protests. Bringing the issue to the world stage seemed like a good idea at the time, now though, she wasn’t so sure. The government of the golden land, the land she calls her home even now, was always bad, always a dictatorship sort. She was an advocate for peace, democracy and all that stood for. She ended up under house arrest. The government even changed their laws to keep her in her house for eternity, never to see the outside world again. There was a stop sign and military patrol outside her house. The yacht club was closed so people couldn’t sail there. So much for being the light of a nation, now merely a criminal. People outside still see her as the ‘good guy’, someone to help them. What could she do now though?

The last time she saw the outside… it was a long time ago. Then there were military personnel on every second corner, ready to shot with their semi-automatics. Last year she heard there was a protest. Started by some monks, what were they thinking? Their orange robes and chanting for food and redemption had always been a symbol of peace, something the people needed. All of a sudden there was a mass rampage. Of course the government was going to react, they should have known that, but so harshly? The streets already filled with fear, poverty and whatever else lived in those drains, were torn apart by violence. The world looked on, no country brave enough to take action, cowards the lot of them. It angered her that the all the world did was condemn, just like they always had. Only this time, the end result was far worse; shooting was reported only days into the protests. So many people dead, that’s not what she wanted at all. Her name was scattered all over the globe, people protesting in her name. Her aim was for a better nation, not the weight of all those deaths on her shoulders, but maybe that was the only way? She wasn’t sure. It saddened her that people saw her face again, but not those of the common people who had lost their lives for her cause, when she wasn’t even involved. The government said that she had helped with the scheming; put the idea into people’s heads, but that was along time ago. But it was better she take the blame, nothing worse could be thrown at her, not now, even death was preferable to this confinement.

Her views, too radical at the time, now she knew that, a bit late. Why couldn’t she have been a simple market girl? She could have walked around the streets with a basket of fruit precariously balanced on her head, calling to people to buy her produce. But no, coming from an educated family (her brother went to university. In London!) she decided to make her political views heard. She knew that normal people didn’t argue, they knew the consequences.

She felt like all the women in her books, only they were European and much older than she. They too were held back for being before their time, for not conforming, being the black sheep. They all ended up fairly happy, but not she. She found out that life isn’t always a fairytale; things don’t always end up happily ever after. People die, for the wrong reasons, killed at the hands of those who lived life so backwards; she hoped those murderers would die with the blood of all those they killed on their hands, never leaving their conscience. People lived in poverty, didn’t have clean water, died of preventable diseases. People were held back, nations lived under middle age like rule. People were cowards, the world was never there to help. She knew about prejudice, being controlled by those that hated you. She knew that life was unfair, that this didn’t happen in other places.

Still, everyday she would look out her window. Feel the humidity of life pounding down on her. But everyday, through the rain, she would see the sunlight glistening off a single leaf on the mango tree. Sure, there might be snakes in her garden, pythons willing to strangle any creature that got in their way. There might be fog clouding her view, so thick she wasn’t sure that it would ever lift. But she knew that there would always be that one leaf, her only hope was that, one day, there would also be a rainbow.

]]> Mon, 20 Apr 2009 10:33:00 EDT http://MiaLillan.tigblog.org/post/644819 http://MiaLillan.tigblog.org/post/400829
I was wondering if anyone out there knew about a way to get in contact with people in Myanmar after the cyclone? I'm not even sure if communication is up in Myanmar. I am worried about friends and people who are close enough to me to be family in Myanmar's capital Yangon. If there is anyone who knows how to get in contact with people in Myanmar or has any current information about what is happening there it would be great if they could let me know somehow. If you know anything about what happened to the International School of Yangon after the cyclone I would love to hear from you, and if you have any other information (anything at all) I would really like it if you could let me know. I find it very frustrating that there is so little information that the outside world can get from Myanmar. If there is anyone who is in the same situation as I am at the moment maybe we could become friends and help each other through this time because I know how hard it is.

So, if there is anyone who knows anything about the cyclone in Myanmar or is in the same situation I am in it would be nice if you let me know.
Thanks]]> Thu, 03 Jul 2008 00:03:00 EDT http://MiaLillan.tigblog.org/post/400829