Much Appreciated Donations!

Thank you so much to those who have donated and are planning to donate furniture and clothing.  Your generosity is much appreciated and very much needed.  Here are a few pictures from Thursday when we delivered a sofa, sewing table, and table and chairs to two families.

Ku Ku (19 years old, perched on edge of sofa) with Pla Shee (9 years old, 3rd from right) and friends lounging on their new sofa.  Ku Ku and her family have lived in the U.S. for 8 weeks.

Pu Lu (holding Jasmila, 1) and Pa Mu, the proud recipient of a sewing machine and table.

While most of the Karen refugee families are Baptist, there is a smaller group of Karen refugees that are Muslim.  To generaliz, we've found that they seem to have a more difficult time adjusting to life in the U.S. perhaps because it is harder for them to connect to a mosque in the Dallas area.  We've been helping the family below for about 1.5 years, and they have a son, Mohammid, who is only 2 days older than Kai.

This four year old fell off the 3rd floor balcony of his family's apartment about 6 months ago.  He knocked out a few of his teeth, but other than that just scared everyone to death.  Since then we've been trying to encourage families to tie plastic fencing to close the gaps between the bars on the balconies above the first floor.  Apparently the apartment complexes where most of the refugees live do not have to comply with safety regulations and are grandfathered in because they were built before new laws were passed.

Kai and Mohammid getting to know each other.

Weaving

The Karen use a traditional backstrap loom to weave intricate bags, purses, and clothing.  Many Karen women and girls learned how to weave while living in refugee camps in Thailand.  The Karen here in the U.S. still wear traditional woven clothing most of the time when they are at home.  We are trying to get a weaving co-op started that would provide an opportunity for Karen women to socialize, weave, and sell their handmade products to a receptive American audience. 

Below, Ha La, a Karen refugee who has lived in the U.S. for 1 month, demonstrating traditional weaving at the craft fair two weeks ago in Waxahachie, TX.

Karen women in Garland wearing traditional hand woven dress.

A Karen family wearing traditional dress--Aye Aye & Taw Paw with their children,

Hay Blut Moo (3), Moo Kae Blu (8), and Moo Blut Htoo (7)

If this project sounds interesting to you in any way, please let us know--we can use all of the help we can get!
Some of the help we need includes:

• someone who can create marketing pieces such as a website and brochure/flyer
• someone who can find out about craft fairs in the area where merchandise could be sold
• someone to maintain an Etsy store online
• someone who could coordinate the purchase and distribution of yarn
• And many other opportunities!  Just let us know what you want to do and we can make it work!

Weekend Trip to Houston

We have been working with the Karen on some microenterprise projects. To date, we are engaged in building furniture and starting a weaving co-op. On June 5th and 6th, we attended a craft fair in Waxahachie. While we were not very successful in selling our wares, we did make some great contacts. Laura and Joey, jewelry crafts persons, invited us to share their booth at the Winnie (TX) trade days on the weekend of June 12th and 13th. Always looking to capitalize on an opportunity (and visit our family in Houston), we agreed to attend.

So....Diane, Kai, Pu Lue (furniture builder), Pla Shee (Pu Lue's son) and I were off on an adventure to Houston. Pu Lue found several Karen men to watch our farm in our absence (many thanks to Eh Say, Moe Say, and Wah Nay Soe).

The trade days were fine, although we were not as successful as we had hoped ($50 total revenue). While in Houston, we set off to visit some of the recently resettled refugees now living in Houston. How do we find them? Luckily, in September of 2009, the Houston Press published a great article about the refugee community in Houston (see The Burmese Come to Houston ). This article gave us the name of the apartment complex in Houston, Sun Blossom Mountain. So, a quick mapquest search and off we went.

Neither Pu Lue, Pla Shee or I knew any of the recentaly resettled in Houston. You may be wondering, "How do you visit people if you don't know anyone?" Simply put, we went to the apartments, kept a lookout for people who may be from Burma, introduced ourselves and then we were welcomed with open arms. This may seem very strange from an American perspective (How many strangers come to your door that you welcome in?) Let me explain.....

Peoples from Burma engage in a collectivist culture. In short, collectivism is an outlook that emphasizes the group over the individual. This is quite the opposite of what we typically think of "Western Countries" where the needs/rights of the individual takes precendence over the needs of the group. So with peoples from Burma, when one of 'our group' is at our door....it is expected that we will do anything we can to make them as comfortable as our own family.

We met several great families....one Kayah (from the Karenni state) and two Karen families.