Exposure Project

Kachin refugees are seen in rented factory spaces in Yunnan...

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 17:57:00 +0630

Kachin refugees are seen in rented factory spaces in Yunnan Province, China on August 18, 2011. These small spaces are shared between villagers who have fled recent fighting near their village in Kachin State, Burma. No UN or Chinese government assistance is currently being provided to over 3,000 Kachin refugees who have fled attacks from the Burma army. As fighting continues near their homes, the most immediate threats these Kachin face are lack of income, Chinese exploitation, forced repatriation, arrest, starvation and disease.

(Names and exact locations withheld for security)

Name: Lahpoi Ja Seng Age: 36 Ethnicity: Kachin Family: Married...

Fri, 12 Aug 2011 10:08:00 +0630

Name: Lahpoi Ja Seng

Age: 36

Ethnicity: Kachin

Family: Married with 5 children

Before sunrise at 4am on June 10, 2011 Lahpai fled her home in a nearby Kachin village with her 5 children. They were not forced or asked to leave. They fled from fear of arrest, kidnap and potential violence. Her husband stayed at home to look after their house and farm. They walked through the jungle with several other families from her village. They walked for 11 hours, stopping only briefly to rest, eat leftover rice and drink water. They carried a few extra sets of clothes, some prepared food and around 5,000 kyat (US $64). They brought no cooking pots or bedding material. They arrived at an IDP hide site at 5pm that evening. Her children suffered from headache, fatigue and diarrhea. Many other families were staying at that hide site in temporary shelters constructed by the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO). Lahpai and her children were led to a barren stall in a vacated, outdoor market where around 160 other people were staying. They were given a 12’ by 12’ area to sleep and store their belongings. They were also provided food, blanket, sleeping mat and mosquito net. A medical clinic and temporary school is also available to them there. Every 3 days Lahpai’s husband comes to visit and play with the children.

Before she left her home, Lahpai heard gunshots and bombs near her house but did not see any soldiers. She has never suffered any past abuse from the Burma army. She and her family are Christian and her village is made up of Baptists and Catholics. Her church congregation is around 20 members. Lahpai spends her days sitting around with other displaced families and looking after the children. She hopes to go back to her village soon and she worries for her husband, her home and her farm.

“I want independence and equal rights.”

“I am thankful I have never suffered from SPDC before, I know God protects me.”

“The government is not fair and they do not treat us with equal rights. Please pray for freedom and equal rights.”

(Names and exact locations changed or withheld for security)

A Kachin child rests on the floor of a rented factory space in...

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 12:06:00 +0630

A Kachin child rests on the floor of a rented factory space in Yunnan Province, China on July 20, 2011. This small space with no windows and no toilet is shared between two Kachin refugee families who have fled recent fighting near their village in Kachin State, Burma. This room rents for 200 Yuan a month (US $30). No UN or Chinese government assistance is currently being provided to over 3,000 Kachin refugees who have fled attacks from the Burma army.

(Names and exact locations withheld for security)

A family rests on a concrete floor at an internally displaced...

Tue, 19 Jul 2011 10:24:02 +0630

A family rests on a concrete floor at an internally displaced person camp near Laiza, Burma on July 4, 2011. Over 8,000 Kachin civilians have fled to a handful of these locations in a KIA (Kachin Independence Army) controlled area near the Burma China border. Those displaced are receiving temporary housing, food, medical care and basic education by the KIO (Kachin Independence Organization).

(Names and exact locations withheld for security)

A Burmese boy poses for a portrait in front of a wall of trash...

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 16:37:00 +0630

A Burmese boy poses for a portrait in front of a wall of trash in Mae Sot, Thailand on June 1st, 2011. This boy, from neighboring Burma, lives at the town garbage dump with his family in extreme filth. Choosing to spend the days scavenging for recyclables, his family is quick to tell you that this livelihood is more lucrative than their option over the border. The border areas of Thailand are full of Burmese migrants willing to work low paying jobs of hard labor for the hope of beginning new lives in relative safety.

Thaw Thee Htoo, a 9 year old Karen boy from Burma, poses for a...

Thu, 14 Apr 2011 10:46:58 +0630

Thaw Thee Htoo, a 9 year old Karen boy from Burma, poses for a portrait at a safe house in Thailand on April 11, 2011. The growth on his neck is suspected to be a cancerous, lymphoma tumor and has been growing for the last year and a half. After being quoted a price well beyond his range at a local Burmese clinic, Thaw Thee Htoo had no reasonable alternative for treatment in his country. His father knew his son would not have the strength to make the one week trek through the jungle and mountains to Thailand, where treatment would still not be guaranteed.

By the grace of a wealthy business man from the lowlands of central Burma, Thaw Thee Htoo was selected to be one of around 16 different people seeking medical care that would be illegally driven over the border. “It was a harrowing trip,” the driver explains in a long exhale, “I drove straight the whole 18 hours.” Driving through creeks, up rivers and over unmarked jungle paths, the driver was careful to avoid Burma army checkpoints along the main road. “If the Burma army caught us leaving that area, I don’t know what they would have done,” he confesses.

The next day, all 16 passengers and their courageous driver made it safely to Thailand. All travelers were met by their contacts and brought to safe houses where their medical treatments are now being arranged. Thaw Thee Htoo’s story is the story of many seeking medical care from the black zone, shoot-on-site areas of Burma.

These photographs feature 9 of 36 families that arrived at what...

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 04:15:00 +0630

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

Internally displaced, Burma Dec 12, 2010

These photographs feature 9 of 36 families that arrived at what is now a new internally displaced persons site in Dooplaya District, Karen State, Burma. Each family is holding the few things they fled their homes with. All they would come to own. Below is a personal account of being there to capture it.

Burma {Internally Displaced} Talking With The Village Headman

It would be nearly six hours of human pinball inside the cab of a pickup before we reached our destination. The asphalt had forfeit long ago to rutted mud and what was left of that had choked to a trail impassable any farther by car. Not a minute after the truck doors liberated us, my fellow Karen passengers were spitting Betel nut and watering the nearby trees with a revealing nonchalance. Somehow I had made my way into a dark, soupy puddle deep enough to get the rolled up cuffs of my pants a little wet. Lucky for me, I was still in my sandals. I had brought my boots but they were stowed among all my other jungle toting paraphernalia in back. No one ever tells you how to dress for these things.

It had been just that morning that the higher ups on my team received word about an attack via satellite phone. The voice on the other end said fighting had escalated between the Burma army and some armed Karen resistance groups four days earlier, prompting an exodus of villagers in the hundreds. I didn’t know what to expect but I was prepared for the worst. Despite feeling less than tip top and ship shape, I couldn’t complain about the commission. Reports of battle and civilians bearing the burden. It was no question a camera needed to be there and this time, I was the chosen courier. Just a couple weeks earlier, I had returned from a long spell in the jungle but that was hours north from here. I knew this would be much different. With the intel nebulous at best, there were a few things however, I could begin to put together. I knew the Burma army dominated these parts and I had a feeling, as I climbed in the back of a tractor, that this road would be the one less traveled by camera wielding documentarians.

Almost two hours of stunning sunset had passed and the five of us had spent our time mostly in the monotone silence of the engine’s hum only interrupting with an occasional grunt from our labor, hopping out and pushing the tractor through the steeper inclines. Now it was time to walk. This is what I had expected, this is what I was ready for. My pack mounted and my canteen brimming, my anticipation was met with another surprise as I was instructed not to bother donning my boots. After just a few minutes of a largely flat traverse, we emerged from a bamboo tunnel to see what looked like a whole village right there before us. Employed in a variety of tasks from bathing in the creek to bamboo machete hacking, we were what they had been hoping for. Not because we by ourselves were of any importance but just as I was the courier of the camera, so my traveling companions were the deliverers of relief. Relief in this case took the form of 2400 kilos of rice and enough tarps, clothes and blankets to give families something to start over with.

“When we heard the mortars fire,”

the village headman shared, “it was the middle of the day and I had just started to make lunch.” He paused for a moment and spoke slower, “we knew we didn’t have much time.”

For anyone who keeps up with the situation in Burma and the wealth of documented human rights abuses spanning the last six decades, these kinds of soft spoken statements are not at all shocking. I was not surprised, his story confirming what I had expected even before I pressed record. Reflecting upon my notes, I started to disassemble the microphone. My revelation was still another ten minutes out. I finished packing the gear, carefully wiping everything as it had been lightly raining the duration of our interview. My translator finished his concluding remarks with the headman and gave me a questioning eyebrow lift regarding our completion. “Yeah we’re done I said,” but then spurted one last question almost involuntarily to the headman. I asked him if there was anything else he wanted to say. We were standing up now and sometimes with all the equipment hiding, people confess that last line of raw journalism glory, after they’ve had a minute to sit and marinade in everything they just spilled. He offered no such moment but instead inquired as to a simple request.

With our translator adjacent, he stood in front of me, his shoulders square to mine. He stared me straight and humbly asked if he could get his hands on a printed copy of the portrait I had quickly snapped of him upon finishing the questions. I, of course agreed, replying with an instantaneous and up-beat “yeah sure.” It was in the stillness of the seconds that followed when I sobered. He thanked me for the conversation, asking me to forgive the many villagers that had been difficult to film as they were absolutely awestruck in the presence of a foreigner. Most all of them had never seen someone who spoke English he went on to explain. Our hands met, shook and let go. I took a knee to sling my pack around my shoulder and he shuffled back, dragging his sandals as he stepped. Back down the trail a hundred meters or so to where he and the other families had cleared jungle and taken up residence. The same trail he had followed a relief team down less than a week ago to the relative safety of what a little distance and some dense jungle cover could afford.

This was the trail that, the other way, led back through heavily mined wilderness to his home, his farm, his animals and everything he owned.

I stood there with my backpack on, watching him go back to his one room shelter, freshly constructed two days prior. The bamboo that made its entire composition was still bright green and wet from the rain. He was one of the fortunate ones who had an old, weathered tarp for a roof. Many others were not so lucky and not so dry. I reflected upon his request, the images of him carrying everything he now owned on his back swirling through my mind. I imagined the photograph reaching him and him holding it proudly, his family admiring it. In my mind, I could see his young daughter puzzled at the sight of this strange new thing, probably having never seen anything like a laminated 8x10 before.

I could not comprehend the depth of his request. A man with no more food than what will last him a couple days and now no longer any livelihood to provide for his family. A man not overwhelmed in sorrow or incapacitated with anger but a father and a farmer, hopeful enough to thank me for my time spent with him. He walked away satisfied and grateful. I believe the photograph to him represents something new for himself and his family, a sort of starting over for his village. The intensity of his eyes looking into mine, the sustained embrace of our shaking hands, the meekness of his wish, the villager disclaimer and the sincere expression of gratitude. These things tell me that the photograph will remind him of a day when relief and opportunity found him in his hardship. A day when his voice was given a megaphone to be heard by more than only the people in his village. That picture is a reminder of when he told his story and spoke not for himself or even his family. Not even for his village but for his people and the struggle they endure. The struggle of a suffering nation battling an oppressive, military regime year after year. He entrusted his testimony to people he knew cared to listen. People who had led him to safety. People who had arrived with food for him to eat and clothes for him to wear. People who had made their way to the place he sleeps and stayed the night with him where he was at. People who came to hear his story and who promised in truth that it would be shared and not forgotten.

The next day right after I took these photographs, this man and another would again thank me for my arrival and ask that I

“tell the world what is happening.”

I nodded with both agreement and an overall lack of any articulate answer, bid them farewell and walked in the direction of the tractor. Once on top, the pull start ignited the engine and the same meditative rumble as the day before returned to the air. I sat back feeling strangely satisfied and in restrained amusement as the sun again made its decent, painting the sky with hues of fire.

A family eats meager portions of rationed rice, chilies and a...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 11:55:00 +0630

A family eats meager portions of rationed rice, chilies and a wild foraged cucumber in their new, temporary home in Dooplaya District, Karen State, Burma on December 12, 2010 . After fleeing from a Burma army attack, around 36 families were left with little to eat but what could be carried on their backs or found in the surrounding jungle, leaving them no food security or safe farmland for the weeks to come. (Names and exact locations withheld for security)

A man carries a bag with rice and clothes in Dooplaya District, ...

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 17:23:00 +0630

A man carries a bag with rice and clothes in Dooplaya District, Karen State, Burma on December 12, 2010 . This man, along with over 200 others are living internally displaced as of earlier this month, leaving behind their homes and everything they own that could not be swiftly carried. Seen in the background are the temporary shelters they will call home for who knows how long, constructed of only green bamboo and a single tarp. (Names and exact locations withheld for security)

A man boils water from a nearby creek in a...

Mon, 13 Dec 2010 15:46:00 +0630

A man boils water from a nearby creek in a newly fashioned bamboo container over a fire in Dooplaya District, Karen State, Burma on December 11, 2010 . This man, along with over 200 others are living internally displaced as of only 5 days ago, leaving behind their homes and everything they own that could not be swiftly carried.

For fear of being arrested into forced labor or human minesweeper duty, they have fled from their villages through heavily landmined areas as an additional 3 battalions of Burma army troops arrived. Far from safety but well hidden among dense jungle, this new IDP (internally displaced person) site rests a mere 9 miles from the heart of the fighting in this area. (Names and exact locations withheld for security)

A KNDO (Karen National Defense Organisation) soldier’s...

Thu, 09 Dec 2010 22:35:00 +0630

A KNDO (Karen National Defense Organisation) soldier’s tattoo is seen in Kler Lwee Htu District, Karen State, Burma on November 19, 2010. The tattoo reads “Karen Blood” in Karen language and is adorned with the traditional buffalo horns and drum. (Names and exact locations withheld for security)

Naw Moo Wa recalls the events and emotions of a January 17, 2010...

Thu, 09 Dec 2010 18:35:00 +0630

Naw Moo Wa recalls the events and emotions of a January 17, 2010 Burma army attack on her village from a temporary home in Kler Lwee Htu District, Karen State, Burma on November 21, 2010. Naw Moo Wa lost her husband to a gunshot wound during the attack. Her home and all of her possessions were destroyed and burned by the Burma army. She escaped with her six children.

The Karen or Kayin State of Burma, inhabited predominantly by the Karen people, is along Burma’s most eastern border, neighboring Thailand. It is the area recognized by NGO’s to contain the most atrocious, widely spread and frequent human rights abuses in the military ruled country of Burma. (Names and exact locations withheld for security)

Burma {Development or Destruction} Work in Progress..

Sat, 04 Dec 2010 16:10:00 +0630

Villagers deep within Karen State, Burma are finding the livelihoods of traditional agriculture they have known for hundreds of years to be ever evolving as lower elevation, plain areas fill with unannounced water from massive SPDC hydropower projects. In contrast to the usual, more abrasive work of Tatmadaw guns and soldiers, residents of the Leh Wa Township are this time being passively nudged from their farms and villages day by day as a murky, creeping water that arrived only 2 months ago continues to steadily swell. Washing away and eventually wholly submerging the sole income for thousands of families, compensation is only inadvertently offered for those entrepreneurs quickest to adapt in what could be the birthing of a new marine economy.

In town only for a couple days before I head back inside,...

Mon, 29 Nov 2010 19:40:00 +0630

In town only for a couple days before I head back inside, updates in video, photo and text will begin the second week of December. Thanks for checking in, many stories in progress. Here’s a teaser. Be back soon..

Today was the second day of what will be a four day training...

Tue, 26 Oct 2010 18:07:00 +0630

Today was the second day of what will be a four day training workshop, focusing on Visual Storytelling. A wealth of material, eager Karen students from Burma and fair shares of coffee and fried rice make for long days in the classroom. More than an academic approach alone, this workshop focuses on the hands-on, technical aspects of building a story from an idea and steering it through the production process until it arrives at its desired target in final form. With elementary equipment available, simplicity is key. Practical theory, technique and ethics all as directly applied to the work of an independent visual journalist in an area of conflict.

Burma {Orphan & Outcast} The Palong

Thu, 21 Oct 2010 03:05:00 +0630

The Palong tribal people have long fled from their native soil in Burma seeking safety and refuge in the protected mountains of Northern Thailand. Although now distant from the bloody crossfire between the SPDC and the Shan State resistance armies, they face the new challenge of expatriation in a less than welcoming nation. It is here they remain stateless, separated and in staggering populations estimated at less than a combined 250,000. Burdened by lack of social support, local prejudice and the common woes of extreme poverty, special homes for children can be found among the villages in hopes of providing increased safety and greater access to education. Such homes struggle to sustain even in what income can be earned themselves, received from their ethnic community and graciously given from few and far between NGO’s.

This home in particular is seen amidst a forced relocation as Landlords raise rents in the areas immediately surrounding Chiang Dao. Constructed of little more than bamboo and second hand tie-wire, the home is fortunate to salvage easily.