First, a joke:
"An American, an Englishman, and a Burmese meet and boast.
The American said, 'We, the Americans, have climbed Everest with no legs.'
The English said, 'That's easy, man. We the English have crossed the Pacific without arms, twice!'
Then, the Burmese said; 'Your efforts are nothing. Our country has been governed without a brain for 18 years."
The joke is credited to Zargana, AKA Thura, was a trained dental surgeon who came to prominence in the 1980's for poking fun at the then Burma Socialist Programme Party junta. The comedian has been jailed twice for his social and political activism, first as a political dissident in 1988, then again in 1990. He was freed in 1994 on condition that he no longer practiced as a comedian. [As received in my email]
Second, a link:
Mizzima TV
Third, another, somewhat old but still interesting article link:
The confession of a jail warder of Burma’s Tharawaddy Jail
Finally, a link to a blog about a film and the filmmakers working within Karen State and on the Thai border area:
Refugees Within