Aung Thin - Don't be afraid of the future

Don't be afraid of the future.

Imprisoned for not having good karma

I will tell you briefly about myself. My father is a member of the Burmese Association, Thakin Nyi Maung. I graduated from the fourth grade when the slogans of "slavery" and "slave education" were still being heard.

There were three types of high schools in our time. English schools, such as the large mission schools, where all languages ​​except Burmese were taught in English. English-Burmese bilingual high schools, and traditional Burmese high schools, where everything was taught in Burmese. Of these three, my father, Thakin Nyi Maung, put me in Burmese high school. Perhaps because of the will of the Lord. The English-Burmese bilingual school (the English school in our town) was a bit more expensive, and perhaps it was because the economy was going down at home. In traditional Burmese high schools, English was still taught as an additional language (whether you wanted to learn it or not), so I could only learn the alphabet and read names.

I will just tell the reader about the basic English I have learned.

I know a little bit about He, She, etc. But I didn't know how to use do, does, etc. at all. Experience

Let's say I only know words like horse, cat, mouse, bird, etc. in English because of the little marks. That's all my basic English is.

After the war, just as every active young man at that time participated in the independence movement, the active Maung Aung Thin also became a "people's soldier."

"Aung Thin" became a member. Later, when he got involved in party organizing, he became a member of the Socialist Party.

At that time, I was still struggling to learn English. But how could I do that, being a young man and involved in politics?

You will be able to live. You will be floating like that. I have to tell you one thing that I remember. Later, whenever I saw the university where I had come to take political courses in Yangon, and whenever I saw the university students, I felt depressed and sad.

Around 1949, when the internal insurgency was at its peak, I was working as a district organizer in Thayet. When Thayet was captured by the rebels, I returned to my native Taungdwingyi. In fact, I knew that if I went down to Yangon, I would be able to escape. However, I was disillusioned with politics. I wanted to get out of the political fray of the party politics that I had become involved in while participating in the independence movement. That is why I returned to Taungdwingyi.

At that time, Taungdwingyi was occupied by the White Army. We were not disturbed in any way. We were allowed to live freely. Later, they said that they would follow us for a while, perhaps because the military and political situation had changed, and they arrested us and put us in prison. There were eight of us in total. I will not list the rest. It was Taungdwingyi Thakin Kyaw Sein, who would become a turning point in my life, who was arrested and sent to prison.

At first, we thought we would be released the next day. Then we stopped expecting it. In this way, we learned English from Thakin Kyaw Sein in prison. Thakin Kyaw Sein had passed the tenth grade before the war and was a lover of reading, so he was very knowledgeable and thoughtful. I also considered everything he taught me to be a great effort. One thing is that in prison, the teacher and the student were inseparable, so if you had any questions, just ask. It can be said that you have a great privilege that you cannot learn from any tutor outside.

Due to the political and military situation outside, we also moved frequently to Magway Prison, Pyay Prison, Thayet Prison, etc. In some places, we were not allowed to study due to circumstances. However, I, who was allowed to study a little, learned. In this way, I spent about seven months in prison, and I was able to study well for about four months. I also reached the point where I could easily read about the tenth grade textbook. When I came out of prison, I found that I could read English newspapers on a large scale. My “prisonmates” and I were amazed that I had made such progress in such a short time. In fact, it was not because I was too smart. It was because of my single-mindedness and strong desire to work hard, because I was put in prison, and because I was able to work full-time without any other distractions, etc.

Then I graduated from high school and went to university, got a master's degree, became a teacher at the university, and then became a writer...

If I hadn't been arrested by the white soldiers in 1949, I wouldn't have been in this situation, at this level.

I often thought that I would never make it. That's why I said, "I went to prison because I didn't have good karma."

If we were to speak from a purely esoteric perspective, we would have to say that the person was tied up, chained, and imprisoned because of a bad fortune or bad luck.

Chinese food

I have to add a little story about the great Chinese scholar Lin Yutang that I remember.

Once upon a time, in a small village, there lived a Chinese old man and his two sons. They raised horses. One day, one of the horses went missing. The neighbors felt sorry for the Chinese old man.

"I'm sorry, you're looking for bad luck." "Why do you say bad luck?"

"You lost a horse, didn't you?"

"Why would you say it's bad luck to lose a horse?"

This was all going on, and the neighbors didn't say anything, saying, "What a shame." And after about a week or ten days, the missing horse, as horses are such friendly creatures, returned. When it arrived, it wasn't just one horse, but a wild horse with it. The neighbors said, "What a shame."

"You're lucky."

"Why?" "You have a horse."

"Why do you say that riding a horse is good luck?"

The old man did not continue to speak the old man's name. Then, while his son was riding a wild horse that came by, he fell off the horse and broke his leg, leaving him with a limp. The neighbors were sad.

"You are unlucky." "Why?"

"You only have one son, and he broke his leg."

"Why would you say that breaking my leg is bad luck?"

They continued to speak in the old way, but they did not say anything. One day, when the state was at war, the emperor of the state ordered all the brave young men in the whole state to join the army. When he was summoned, he was given a decree, and only his son was lame. He was blessed. The neighbors said, "China is lucky."

Lin Yutan clearly meant that when he said, "Unlucky is lucky," time usually decides things. I really liked the story because it was so thoughtful.

The great Brahmin of the monkey family

Once, a great brahmin came to the Buddha and asked him at what age he would die and what life he would enter after death.

He asked for a sermon. The Buddha said, "At what age will I die? After death, I will become a monkey in this forest." When the age limit for death had passed but the brahmin had not yet died, he returned to the Buddha and told him that he had not died at the age the Buddha had told him. The Buddha said, "I have not died."

“You brahmin, what did you do after I told you?” “As the Master said, in your next life you become a monkey, so that you can live happily in that forest and dig ponds.”