Aung Ba Nyo - Prose on the banks of the Taran River

On the other side is the riverbank.

The smoke still lingers in the snow. The big wooden bridge that has been lit all winter still burns brightly. The moonlight still floats on the Irrawaddy River. In the north wind, the sound of Uncle Ho's violin still flows melancholy.

Ah... In reality, we are people who embrace life with love.

Uncle Ho put his violin and flute aside, downed the wine from the thick bowl he had placed on the table, and then sipped his wine and stared out at the Irrawaddy River. The conversation between Uncle Ho and me was dry again.

The night was silent under the darkness. The sound of a dog howling from the north broke the silence of the night. The sound of the dog howling was moving towards the fireplace where Uncle Ho and I were sitting. In the darkness, I knew without looking how deep the heartbreak must be in Uncle Ho's eyes.

"Shh...get out of here"

"Baloo"

I knew that behind the sound of Uncle Ho's knock, the longing and pain could not be hidden or suppressed. What is my heart made of?

Aw... Uncle Ho, Belle, and our riverside winter nights are echoing inside my heart.. inside my heart again.

Winter nights by the riverbank are often filled with longing and joy, and they pass the winter nights with the soft sound of Uncle Ho's violin, the strong smell of alcohol, and the harsh words of life.

Years of forced labor, World War II, the buffalo brothers, bomb shelters, the royal family, polio, dysentery, Uncle Ho's words, and the raw images of Uncle Ho's words, the pain of longing that had struck him so deeply, I tried to heal my life with strong alcohol.

"Belu has been missing for a long time. I don't know if he went with the boat."

Uncle Ho felt nostalgic for Belu. Then he felt nostalgic for Belu's laughter. In fact, Belu had entered our lives with a long-lasting wound.

My mother is illiterate.

I'm like, "Haha...Haha...What can I do? I don't even know if I'm going to study."

Life...

My age, how can I remember? My mother doesn't remember either. Not yet.

Two houses to the west, Daw Ein Myint and Than Yin Ma, the daughter of the deceased, were in and out of the house.

My grandmother has also passed away.

I don't know where his daughter, even if she were a millionaire, would move.

Where should I ask about my age?

Belu's loud laughter is stuck in my heart.

It's like a wound that won't stop bleeding, and it's hard to heal.

Is it Mi Aye?

Where is Mi Aye?

Is my sister cold?

Haha...haha...haha...,

Mi Aye has become Mi Aye.

Oh... I can't listen to Belu anymore. I can't listen anymore. In fact, Belu's parents passed away one after the other, and the lives of his two siblings were in turmoil. Really in turmoil. I remembered how I had been feeding the baby with a straw. Mi Aye was like a housewife in a house of relatives from Monywa. She was like a housemaid.

Oh... now Mi Aye... "

"It looks like xxxx is coming from the southwest..."

It seemed to be raining from the southwest. The sound of the bell, which did not bite on any key, made me come back to the big fireplace where Uncle Ho and I were sitting.

“Sorry Lay Ho and Phoe Nyan... I'm sorry, we couldn't get here because we were in a boat together.”

As Belu spoke, he took out the bottle from his belt -

"This is what Mingun brought, Uncle Ho, let's go and get it."

As I spoke, I was pouring water into both Uncle Ho's cup and mine.

"You can stay away, my dear."

"Uncle, I have a lot of things to worry about, really a lot."

Belu's white face was stained with sorrow.

"This time, when the boat returned, it docked at Mingun as usual."

Belu paused, took a sip of the alcohol from the glass, wiped the alcohol from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, and continued speaking.

“This time, it took me a long time. I missed my wife and child. So I ran home. When I got home, the child was very sick. I couldn’t remember a thing. The woman was also very happy that her husband had returned.”

"It's been about a week since I got sick. I'm also a farmer with a short beard. I don't have any money in my hand, and I can't go to the fields."

“Okay..okay..no, I’ll go and get the money from the boat captain.”

He seemed exhausted from talking. He lit a cigarette from the stove and inhaled deeply.

“I ran back to the marina. The boat captain had already left the Mandalay Forest Office. I was very tired. The boatmen were also very tired, wondering what had happened. No. The child was very sick and had to go up, so I didn’t give the boat captain any money in advance.”

“There’s no co-pilot, bro. The kids are sick and they’re on the boat a lot. Why bother? You have (----) at home, right? If you hit it, it’ll disappear right away.”

"When I got home, my wife didn't find me. The baby was already sitting on the couch, crying. So I took a spoonful of it from the bottle I had in the house."

"What?"

"How... how?"

Uncle Ho and I both exclaimed in surprise.

"Ha... ha... ha... I'm dead."

Uncle Ho didn't know how to feel. My whole body felt like it was falling into a furnace.

"Shout out, duck, duck away"

The Ayeyarwady River is still flowing, the snow is still falling, the moonlight is still dim. I don't want to miss the sunsets. The night is getting darker again.

The sound of a dog barking stopped by the stove. Uncle Ho poured some liquor into the bowl.

"Drink, drink, drink, try drinking, drink, drink"

As we spoke, Uncle Ho threw his violin and his bow into the oven. The riverbank where we were sitting seemed endless.

New Wave Magazine, March, 2009