Sunday, January 25, 2009

Coming to America

It is still a subject of wonder among those of us who were part of the 2008 Thailand Mission team, that we would travel to the far side of the world, giving and receiving, teaching and learning ... then put all of that to work HERE, on THIS side of the world, in Midland, Texas.

They are members of an ethnic group called the Chin, and they are Christians. An oppressed people and an oppressed church in their native Burma/Myanmar, they have been granted refugee status by the United States government, and allowed to make their homes here. Their plight is much like that of another Burmese ethnic group, the Karen, with whom we worked during a visit to the Mae La Refugee Camp, just north of the town of Mae Sot, Thailand, on the Burmese border. This camp gained worldwide attention late last year, when it was
visited by then-First Lady Laura Bush and her daughter.

Now comes this report from USA Today's Jesse Wright ...

MAE SOT, THAILAND — The bus rumbled to life, and Hsar Say took one last look at the only home he'd known for the past 20 years. The lime green rice paddies, the banana trees, the bamboo huts he shared with the other refugees — they were all part of his past. In a few hours, Say would board a plane to America with his wife and two kids. Whether that was a good thing, he wasn't sure.
Read the rest of the report

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