The Boat from Burma

The bus ride from Phuket to Ranong was five-hours. It cost me twelve Aussie dollars.

I miss parts of Phuket. Not the Russians, and certainly not the Ping Pong shows, but the 100 Baht Pina Coladas at the Patong Beach Markets. Bartering with the Indian shop owners for a fake Louis Vuitton wallet. I was an honest victim of the Phuket tourist trap, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. 

I’ve been in Ranong for two weeks now. Time moves slower here. It’s quieter too – except for the taxi drivers that hassled me as I stepped off the bus on day one. Thankfully, Father Arnold, the man who made my volunteering experience possible, was stationed at the front of the swarm.

‘Are you Patrick?’ he asked me. Being the only foreigner on the bus, I was the logical guess.

‘That’s me. You must be Arnold?’

He took me on a lap of town that Sunday afternoon. It didn’t take long.

Ranong is a small fishing province home to just shy of 200,000 people. Over 60,000 of those people are Burmese migrants who have fled the devastating civil war that has plagued Myanmar – once known as Burma – for nearly eight decades.

The last stop on our tour was the Marist Asia Foundation, where I’ve been tasked with teaching English for two months to over 100 children.

‘Welcome home,’ Arnold said with a warm smile as the wheels of his Isuzu D-Max halted in the gravel schoolyard.

At dinner that night, Arnold and I were joined by Father ‘Larry’ Hermes and a former teacher at the mission.

As I looked out to the Myanmar mountains across a narrow channel, the former teacher told me it was this very channel that he crossed by boat more than a decade ago to escape the tyrannical military. 

‘It was the only option,’ he said, which is no longer possible with a stricter border.

Even in the slim chance that a migrant boat crosses the channel undetected, the oppression doesn’t end there.

Burmese migrants living in Ranong are under constant fire from Immigration Authorities. Police will go door-to-door demanding proof of passport and work permit. If one doesn’t have said documents – which is the case for 40,000 migrants – there’s two options: bribe or deportation.

I’ve heard many more stories in the last two weeks of the adversities that Burmese people face either side of the border. I’ve been told stories of our own students who’ve had to curl up with their brother and sister in a hole that’s barely deep or wide enough to hide one child when the Police come knocking.

From my very first class, the resilience of these kids was truly captivating. Some of them were born in Ranong, others have taken the boat from Burma with their families. But despite any differences, they all share an unwavering passion for learning.  

It’s intriguing to me that the behavioural issues so prevalent in western education cease to exist here. When the next best thing is growing up in a humanitarian crisis, slipping on a clean school uniform in the morning is not a chore but a blessing.

I have six more weeks at the Marist Asia Foundation. I came here to teach, but I’ll leave having learnt so much more. Hopefully I’ll be speaking better Thai and Burmese by that time too.

About MAF

The Marist Asia Foundation provides education to Burmese migrant children, connects migrant workers with opportunities for ongoing education, and supports the needs of those who are sick with HIV AIDS due to poverty, trafficking, desperation and lack of education.

For more information, or to donate to a worthy cause, please visit their website at the link below.

https://www.maristasiafoundation.org/