(Maung Maung Khin, recently
deceased, originally was a student warrior from the Battalion-701 of notorious ABSDF-North
and he acted in 2008 Sylvester Stallone’s overly-exaggerated anti-Burmese movie
Rambo-4 as the ridiculously-sadist Burmese-Army-Colonel Tint. This post is the translation
of his article from KOZAN Blog.)
My head was spinning and light-headed because of excessive bleeding from my wound, my lack of sleep, and all the cordite smoke I’d been inhaling. I also reckoned that Ba Nyar might be feeling the same as me.
After having
sewed and bandaged our flesh wounds our men brought rice and curry for us. The
curry was a beef curry. Once after the meals we began to feel sleepy. So they
let us sleep and when we woke up we were told to go stay at the hospital. So we
went to the field hospital and the Medic there took our names and then showed
us a place to lie down.
Field Hospital in the Jungle
Our field hospital wasn’t like a proper hospital in the towns. It was just a long bamboo hut for the patients. Our field hospital didn’t even have medicines. No Penicillin to cure our light wounds as only the seriously-wounded were given the rare Penicillin.
They even
assigned Kachin traditional doctors to cure us and they collected herbs from
the jungle and treated us old ways. They crushed a kind of medicinal leaves and
gave it to Ba Nyar. For me I had to eat some other leaves three times a day.
In that battle
we two were the least-seriously-wounded among all the wounded as most other Kachin
comrades were badly wounded. And not to make our wounds becoming infected we
were not fed any food except Suntan (pickled-cabbage-leaves) soup. In the jungle
you couldn’t go buy food, so we basically starved.
Luckily we two
had a small can of sweetened-condensed-milk (Noh-zee) we grabbed out off the stores
captured from the army soldiers at the battle. We generously add hot water and
drank sweet milk out of that single can.
But next day
we had to prepare for a long march as the order to immediately abandon the camp
was given by the KIA Tactical Command after a top level meeting at the Command
Psot. Enemy Burmese army now knew we were here after the devastating battle and
they were sending many mobile columns to engage us again. So we were to retreat
back to our camps on China border.
But we had so
many wounded and most were unable to walk at all. So they were to be carried on
makeshift stretchers. On the way the column had to cross a wide lake. As the
time was raining season the lake was filled to the rim with water and when we
crossed the water reached to our shoulders.
Across the Wide Lake into the large
Field of Reeds
It was almost
impossible for the wounded on the stretchers not to get wet even though the
carriers had lifted the stretchers high up to the max with some difficulties.
Comrade Ba Nyar was wounded on his back and so he was to walk. But he couldn’t
just walk across the lake as his back wound would get wet. So we tied a large
plastic jerry-can to his belly and he basically swam on the watertight floating
jerry-can across the lake.
Once we
reached the far side of the wide lake a large field of reeds nearly average-man’s
height welcomed us. The seemingly endless field of reeds made me feel tired and
exhausted. After more than one hour struggling through the reeds we started
seeing ubiquitous In hardwood trees here and there.
My experience
was telling me then that this field of reeds was going to end soon and I was
right. Very soon we came out of the reeds and found ourselves in a small forest
of same tall In trees. We still didn’t get too far as our column was long and
numerous. We still had to march day and night as our wounded comrades needed to
be ASAP at Chinese border where medical facilities were waiting for them.
Sand, A Lot of Sand are
Troubling Us
Two days after
the beginning of our journey many people were straggling behind our long
column. Walking unprotected in constant rain kept us wet especially the lower extremities
of our bodies. Walking through so many patches of water had another troublesome
problem. Sand trapped inside our jungle boots.
By then we all
had sand-rashes on our feet. When we took of our water-soaked jungle boots at
the rest stops we found our foot dried and wrinkled and red and inflamed. If we
walked barefoot even on grass it was horribly painful.
My head-wound
was also getting worse as smelly pus filled in it and came out constantly. Finally
after three days and nights walking non-stop our long column had reached the
mighty river Irrawaddy. On the west bank, of course, and we still had to cross
the river. That night we slept in the jungle on the riverbank for early morning
crossing.
Crossing the Might River
Irrawaddy
One of three Narrows of Irrawaddy in Kachin State. |
When our turn
to cross the river the time was almost 6 in clear morning and sun had come out
and everything was visible. Once we reached the east bank of wide Irrawaddy we
had to continue on walking. We then had to across a small creek entering the
Irrawaddy.
The creek had
very little water but its banks were steep and high. Fortunately the villagers
had cut down a small tree trunk and laid it cross the creek. The tree-trunk
bridge had rickety bamboo hand rails on both sides so people could just walk on
the round trunk safely holding onto the bamboo hand rails.
But when we
reached the bridge the trunk was muddy and slippery as so many of our men had
already walked on it before us. With a heavy backpack and the equipment belt
and rifle on me I had a hell of time walking on that tree-trunk-bridge without
falling nearly ten feet down into the murky creek waters.
Jungle Mossies Almost
Disfigured My Face
As soon as I
was on the slippery log-bridge I ran into the cloud of small jungle mosquitoes.
Those mossies bit me like hell and the pain was unbearable as if my face was
sprayed hard with rough sand.
And my skin
was especially allergic to mossie bites. While I was on the bridge I had to let
go my one hand off the bamboo hand rail sometimes and rubbed away the crowded
mass of blood-hungry mossies from my face and my ears so that the pain was
slightly bearable.
It took only
few minutes to cross the bridge but I felt like it was a lifetime as the pain
was killing me. Once I was on the other side and out of that crowded mossie
cloud I had to stop to rub the pain of my face. I had never been bitten by
jungle mossies like that before.
When I took
out a small mirror and looked my face in it I found my face was horribly covered
with itchy bumps all over and painfully swollen. But I still had to catch up
with the column ahead and about 30 minutes later we found them taking a meal
rest at an abandoned-farm.
Since all our
rear guards had already crossed the Irrawaddy River we all stopped at that
abandoned-farm to cook and eat our brunch (Breakfast and lunch together) there.
Running out of Salt to Cook
Mountainous terrain of Kachin State. |
Second day
after crossing the Irrawaddy we totally ran out of salt. When we asked the
NLD-LA and KIA men on our column we found out they were facing the same problem
as us. So we had to walk next whole day eating two meals of cooked-rice and
roasted-hunted-meat without any salt at all.
In the rugged
mountainous country we were in back then, it was exhausting to march on foot as
we were sweating a lot and losing large amount of body salt without any salt
replenishment. We were now so weak sometimes I thought I was going to faint right
there while on my tired feet walking long hours up and down the mountains.
Then I
suddenly remembered an old Burmese poem about using Bamboo ashes as salt from
my middle school years back at home. So when the cooking time came I burned
some dried bamboo and collected the ashes and poured them generously into the
meat stew boiling in our canteen Hangaw.
By then most
of our men were around the fire hungrily waiting for the stew and I asked one
man to taste the boiling stew. He tasted a spoon full and immediately spat it
out complaining that it was so fucking bitter and he wouldn’t eat that shit. So
I tasted myself and found it so bitter I had to throw away the whole hangaw and
start new one without my improvised salt-cum-Bamboo-ashes.
Back In KIA-controlled
Territory
Anyway make
the long story short, after two days and two nights walking non-stop on jungle
trails we finally reached the Narlone Village on the east bank of Narlone
Stream which is basically the western edge of our KIA-controlled territory.
By then we had
walked hundreds of miles across the rugged territory. KIA administration there
at Narlone fed us plenty and also summoned many bullet-carts from the village
to transport our wounded and sick. When our column left Narlone for Chinese
border it was like a long religious procession because of that many
bullock-carts in our column.
And there always
was a small Burmese-army-outpost on the bank of Narlone Stream right across the
village and the enemy soldiers usually took pot shots whenever they saw a KIA
column in their vicinity. But that day they didn’t fire upon us. They might
have thought we were too many and afraid to upset us by firing at us.
We left
Narlone early morning and we reached the village of Laiza on Chinese border
late afternoon that day. Each house in Laiza village accommodated two or three
of our men that night. We left Laiza for our ABSDF camp in Nau-yar-par.
At that camp
we were welcomed by our own ABSDF comrades. After staying only one day at
Nau-yar-par we continued on for our ABSDF HQ at Parjau’s Laisenbong. When we
arrived the ABSDF HQ was busily preparing for the four years anniversary of
8-8-88 (Four-Shits) Uprising.
Back At Parjau and Out Of My Daydream
Myo Win and ABSDF criminal murderers at Parjau. |
Only then I
got myself back from the dreams and came back to our barracks together with
him. On our way the heavy Kachin rain suddenly came down and soaked us both.
Then I remembered my eleven fallen comrades including Comrade General-Secretary
Myo Win.
“Rest In Peace comrades,” I prayed for them in the
rain while inside of me was silently weeping for them.
Rambo Maung Maung Khin’s Fighting Peacock (2)
Rambo Maung Maung Khin’s Fighting Peacock (3)