A short but valuable trip to Taung-Fi-Lar

by

Tun Min

Before I was transferred to Yangon University of Education, as an assistant lecturer serving at Sagaing University of Education, I had to live and work within the campus. Our university is situated in Padamyar Quarter which is at the foot of Minwun Mountain Ranges and is about a half hour drive from downtown Sagaing. During the regular semesters, I have to teach several subjects to student teachers of different year levels everyday. I am also responsible for carrying out other duties including invigilating exam halls, checking exam papers, supervising M.Phil students and doing some clerical work at my department.

Dama-Ku Pond

During the first half of the previous October, I was busy teaching B.Ed correspondence students. Fortunately, there was a public holiday on 5^th October to commemorate the Full Moon Day of Thadingyut. Therefore, one of the senior B.Ed students who had not gone back home after his exam, and I enquired about going to the famous Taung-Fi-Lar Hermitage and Dama Ku Pond. Surprisingly, although the place is a historic one, there were only a handful of people who have been to that place. What is worse, some people I have happened to talk with have never heard of Taung-Fi-Lar Sayadaw, a monk well-known for his integrity and wisdom during Nyaungyan Period of Myanmar history! From my point of view, lacking knowledge of this famous name is considerably understandable to those living miles away from Sagaing. However, it should be a known fact for the local people and for those who have lived in this town for a couple of years.

How I channeled negative forces into positive ones

Some motivational writers suggest that one should forget and never disclose one’s horrible past experiences as they will dig up the covered woes in one’s heart and depress them terribly. In my opinion, I partially accept the idea. Through my experience, I come to realize that whatever difficulty we may have had in our past, the way we tackle them can make who we are today. In other words, we can learn a lot of guiding principles from our past. I had personal experience concerning how to channel negative forces into positive ones to be on the right track on our life journey.

When I was seven years of age, my father passed away, leaving bronchitis-prone mother with seven children as well as with a lot of debt. Three of my siblings had to drop out of school to learn to pursue other professions. Mother had to do a lot of odd but honest work to make ends meet. Whatever difficulty she would have, she always showed her smiling face to us. She withstood the life perils boldly without marrying again despite her youth. She lived her life solely for us, her beloved children. She always encouraged us to study hard by reciting her quote: “Look at the mirror for your beauty; you study hard for your life.” Therefore, we studied hard although I did not make as much exertion as the other siblings of mine.

Ramree Island on the literary stage of the world (Full English-version article)

Ramree Island on the literary stage of the world

(ကမာၻ႕စာေပစင္ျမင့္ထက္မွ ရမ္းျဗဲကၽြန္းအေၾကာင္း)

byZwe Thit (Rammarmray)

Ramree Island is the biggest island in Myanmar, with a width of 1350 square kilometres which is nearly twofold of the size of the Republic of Singapore. With a wealth of natural resources like natural gas and petroleum nowadays, it is also now known for Shwe Gas Project at Kyaukphru at the northwestern part of the island, for which there have been a lot of complaints arising from local people.

This island is also famous for the Ramree Island Battle during the Second World War between the Japanese Army and the Allied Troops in 1945. It has been even more vivid in the minds of the people all over the world for ''Most number of fatalities in a crocodile attack” as recorded in the Guinness Book of Records. While the Japanese Army were retreating into the jungle, nearly 1000 Japanese soldiers were killed by saltwater crocodiles there.

This fateful event has inspired several writers all over the world for decades. As a result, they wrote novels and novelettes on the scenes. Some of them are as follows:

1) Dragon of the Mangroves (Yasuyuki Kasai)

2) Meat (Lee Laughead)

3) Sunset on Ramree (Robert Appleton)

4) The Mangroves (John L. Cambell)

They are popular books among the world readers, especially Sunset on Ramree by Robert Appleton which won EPIC Award in 2011. Out of the four books, the first one "Dragon of the Mangroves" was written by a Japanese writer. The second and third books are novelettes while the other two are novels.

Recently, I heard a good piece of news concerning the Ramree Island. A famous Hollywood film company named "Erik Sun Productions" will come to Ramree Island and make a film about the Guinness-recorded crocodile attack on the Japanese soldiers and the Ramree Island Battle according to a piece of news on Pyi Myanmar Journal dated 26^th March, 2015.The title of the movie will be "Into the Quagmire". No doubt it will be a good movie! Ramree Island is a beautiful island. It is expected that its beautiful spots will also be seen along with some exciting plots in the forthcoming movie.