Aye Yin, Myanmar: “I pray we won’t starve to death”

More than five months after Cyclone Nargis slammed into southern Myanmar, leaving close to 140,000 people dead or missing, survivors continue to pick up the pieces.

But for many – including Aye Yin, 62, a resident of Kyonegadu, a village in Myanmar’s Daededayal Township – the recovery process is taking longer than most. Her family is now dependent on an eight-year-old boy.

“I lost my daughter-in-law and 11-year-old granddaughter to the cyclone. Now, there are only three in our family - my son, 42, his son and me.

“We aren’t able to cope on our own, although some in our village are managing. Our family business is farming, but this year has been terrible. We lost everything to the cyclone, including all our tools.

“Although the monks provided us with paddy seed, few of the plants actually took. In fact, most of the seeds failed. Even with fertiliser, the plants simply didn’t take or died. Some say it’s because of the salt water that inundated much of our fields. I don’t know. In any case, it doesn’t matter now. The rice planting season is long over.

“Now all we worry about is how we will survive the coming months. Without any paddy fields, we will have nothing to reap during the November and December harvest period and won’t even have rice. I pray we won’t starve to death.

“Still, the monks have encouraged us by saying they will help us again – and rice might be the one thing we need most from them. They haven’t been around for a while and we are eagerly awaiting their return.

“Their last visit was a couple of months ago. They told us they would go to Yangon to get donations, but have yet to return. My son still cannot cope with the loss of his wife and daughter, so we had no choice to send out my eight-year-old grandson, Phone Wai Yan, to work instead.

“Each day he wanders the streets in search of empty water bottles, many tossed from the cars of people visiting from Yangon. My grandson sells them to bottle-buyers here and on a good day can earn up to 1,000 kyat [around US$0.80].

“We try to buy some vegetables with that, but sometimes we have to buy rice as well. We get rice from the World Food Programme [WFP], but it’s not enough. We need money to fill our bellies.

“My son and I are now dependent on an eight-year-old boy, but regret he isn’t in school. He should have a chance. If he were in school, he would be in the third grade, but we have failed him.

“Perhaps when the monks return, they will send him to school for us. He should have been back in school in July and I worry whether he will ever be able to catch up. His destiny and ours could well depend on the monks.”

lm/ds/mw