“Homing Pigeons” is the first published work by South African writer Maxine Case. It is showcased in the 2005 anthology African Compass: New Writing from Southern Africa edited by J.M. Coetzee. This story was just the beginning for this accomplished young writer. Her accolades include the 2007 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book for her novel All We Have Left Unsaid.

In the winter of 2009-2010, Case spent three months as a writer-in-residence on Sampsonia Way as part of a partnership between City of Asylum/Pittsburgh and the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program. Case is now persuing her MFA in Creative Writing at the New School in New York City.

Here Sampsonia Way magazine presents “Homing Pigeons,” both in English and Japanese.Yukiko Konosu’s translation originally appeared in Bungakukai magazine. This is the first time the English and the Japanese versions have appeared together.

Read “Homing Pigeons” in English

Read “Homing Pigeons” in Japanese

Read Yukiko Konosu’s afterword to “Homing Pigeons” in Japanese

Mr. Peterson’s body is small and wiry. People say that he looks like an angry, underfed rooster. His house is directly opposite Ma’s. Although Ma and Mr. Peterson have been neighbors for years, they are not what you’d consider friends. When they see each other, they greet politely enough; exchange the usual pleasantries, but no more than that. Ma says that Mr. Peterson is not our class. When I ask her what she means, she just looks at me. But then again, Ma says that most people are not our class.

Mr. Peterson had spent most of his working years toiling as a deliveryman for Sunrise Bakery. Every morning he would get up way before dawn, long before Ma’s chickens would stir. You could hear him whistling “Pedro the Fisherman” in the dark as he pulled his old, faded green Datsun out of his driveway. He would drive all the way to Elsies River to collect his huge bread truck laden with basket upon basket of hot loaves of bread.

Whenever I saw a bread truck passing I would crane my neck, hoping to catch sight of him. I never did see Mr. Peterson in his truck since his route was far away in “the townships.” By the time I came home from school in the afternoon, Mr. Peterson would be at his usual place on the long, wooden bench on his stoep, sucking on his pipe, sipping his tea sweetened with Gold Cross condensed milk from his saucer.

Yes, he knew very well that Gold Cross cost a little more, but it was the one luxury he afforded himself. And so Mr. Peterson sat on his stoep and watched the world pass by, every afternoon until five o’clock when Mrs. Peterson summoned him to the supper table. On weekends Mr. Peterson drove brides in their wedding cars. The extra money Mr. Peterson made from the weddings he saved separately in a special account at the Post Office. Everyone knew that he was saving this money so that he could go overseas one day.

According to Ma, Mr. Peterson didn’t have many expenses as he had inherited his house from his late father. “Now there was a gentleman,” Ma would say. “So unlike his son!”

“What do you mean Ma?” I’d ask.

“His father fought in the war,” Ma would answer with a faraway look in her eyes. “In Italy. Some people say that he had a woman there. A white woman, mind you! Some people say that she had a child from him. A little boy.”

“Really Ma?” I’d ask; thrilled every time I was privy to grown up secrets. But she would not tell any more than that.

Maybe Mr. Peterson was saving so he could go to Italy to find his little brother, I mused.

Still, I thought it ironic that Mr Peterson would fly all the way to Italy to find a brother when his sister lived right next door and they had not spoken to each other for years. The funny thing about their fall-out is that no one can remember what it was all about in the first place. No one can remember a time when they were on speaking terms though. Only a low wall separates the two houses, yet it is never breached. Mr. Peterson does not allow his wife and children to greet his sister and her family, which is really pathetic, according to Ma as the two families still attend the same church in which their parents married and in which they were both baptised.  “… and that is not the way of the Lord.”

Mr. Peterson lives with his wife Mavis, his daughter Lizzie and his son Patrick. Also living in the house is Mr. Peterson’s mother-in-law, old Mrs. Arendse. Ma says that Mr. Peterson spends so much time outside the house because all the women gang up on him. We address Mrs. Arendse, Mrs. Peterson and Miss Lizzie as such, but Patrick is just Patrick. People say that Patrick is the spitting image of his father because he too is dark and thin and wiry. I think that Patrick can never look like his father since his face is smooth and not flecked with old acne scars like Mr. Peterson’s is. Also, Patrick is nice. He smiles and calls me by my name whenever he sees me. Sometimes he gives me a Mint Imperial out of the box that he carries in his pocket. Patrick is always sucking peppermints. Ma says that it is to disguise his breath because he smokes behind the bioscope. She says that it serves the Petersons right since they think they are so high and mighty.

By this, I think that she means that they are God-fearing. Very God-fearing. Our family does not attend church. Not since my mother fell pregnant with me and the minister refused to baptise me because my mother was not married to my father.

Mr. Peterson’s sister is Mrs. September. She is a widow. Her husband died many years ago in a car accident. Her daughters May and June live with her. I call them Miss May and Miss June, just as Ma taught me. They used to give me Marie biscuits out of the biscuit barrel in their pantry whenever Ma sent me over with a message. On Sunday mornings before church, Mrs. September plays hymns that wake the neighborhood as the music cascades from her house. Sunday is the only day of the week that her front door is wide open. She fears that robbers, Muslims, or black men will break into her house, so usually the door is triple-bolted against such threats. Her curtains too, are never open, except for a Sunday when the sunlight steams in as the gospel music streams out.

Once one of our Muslim neighbors complained about the loudness of the hymns, but Mrs. September rightly countered that there was nothing that she could do about it. After all, did she complain when she was woken every morning by the bilal blasting from the nearby mosque? On this point both of the siblings agreed. Ma told me so. I thought that maybe Mr. Peterson wanted to go overseas to escape the silent feud with his sister.

There is another sister. A legitimate one. Esther is the youngest child and the one with the looks, as Ma says. She lives in faraway London. Ma says that she left when she was very young. In those days if you wanted to go overseas you had to go by ship and Esther left on the last voyage of the Union Castle. From this I surmise that she can’t be that young after all!

Soon after she arrived in cold, “it rains all the time” London, Esther met a nice young man whom she married after a respectable time. “A white man, mind you!”

Maybe Mr. Peterson wanted to go to London to see his sister. I had heard that not only was she beautiful, she was kind. Maybe Mr. Peterson wanted to enjoy some sisterly kindness.

Not that he was a kind person. I’d greet him brightly whenever I saw him as I had been taught. Sometimes he’d reply with a forced, “good afternoon girlie.” Most times, however, his reply was more like a snarl, “hernuff.” The children of the neighborhood knew better than to allow our balls to land in Mr. Peterson’s garden, which was not really a garden. It was nothing more than a bare patch of sand. Granted, a neat, meticulous patch of sand, but Ma said that Mr. Peterson did not have the patience to tend a garden.

“When old Mr. Peterson was alive, that garden had the tallest dahlias in the whole of Wynberg,” Ma would say. “He used to give me bulbs to plant. That son of his,” she said, gesturing in the direction of Mr. Peterson sitting on his stoep, “dug up the garden after he died.” With a cynical smile, she added, “Maybe he thought that it was a waste of water.”

“Yes Ma,” I agreed wisely.

Ma says that Mr. Peterson is so rude because he is a miserable man. Maybe that is why he wants to go overseas where no one knows him and his ways.

It seemed that the only things Mr. Peterson really had time for were his pigeons. He built a large, wooden pigeon coop at the back of his house. Every evening right after supper he’d go there to feed them.

Everyone knew that Mr. Peterson hoped to race his pigeons one day. Some evenings my uncle Edgar would sit with Mr. Peterson on his stoep listening to his stories of winning a great pigeon race and of course his trip overseas that he would take one day. Through the lace curtain covering Ma’s bedroom window, I would watch the two men in animated conversation as they discussed the virtues of the various breeds. And the perils and wonder of overseas travel, of course. We got most of our information about Mr. Peterson from Uncle Edgar. When he came home after sitting on the stoep, Ma would start asking him questions until she knew all there was to know.

The rest of the neighborhood was pretty much united against Mr. Peterson’s pigeons and his pigeon coop. They made the most horrendous cooing cacophony. And the smell if the wind blew in a certain direction, or you happened to venture too close to Mr. Peterson’s driveway! And pigeons brought rats into the area. Everyone knew that.

The only thing that interested me about the pigeons was how they would unerringly find their way home after Mr. Peterson let them fly free to exercise their wings. From our front yard, I would watch Mr. Peterson anxiously scanning the sky as he waited for his precious birds to return. I would silently marvel at the precise “V” formation in which the birds flew as they returned to the roost.

Watching the birds soaring in the darkening sky, I wondered whether they inspired Mr. Peterson to fly away.

It took years and years, but eventually Mr. Peterson had scraped together enough money for his plane ticket. Our entire neighborhood was ablaze with the news. It was all everyone spoke about for a long time. The night before Mr. Peterson was to fly away, you would have sworn that he was a Muslim man about to go on pilgrimage to Mecca from the amount of visitors he received! Even Ma went over with a plate of kollewyntjies.

“How come Mr. Peterson is going alone?” I asked Ma. After all, he was still married; his wife was still alive. It was most odd.

“Who knows what that man is up to,” Ma said obliquely, but from the keen look on her face, I could tell that she too was perplexed.

“Maybe you can ask Mrs. Peterson,” I suggested.

Ma just rolled her eyes. I should have known better. It was not done to ask such personal questions. Anyway, most people agreed that Mrs. Arendse was getting very old and someone had to look after her. That was probably why Mrs. Peterson would not be accompanying her husband on his much-anticipated overseas trip.

Mr. Peterson’s destination was a bit of an anticlimax. It was London after all. The neighbors—Ma included—made unkind comments about this. It had to be that Mr. Peterson was too cheap to pay for accommodation in a foreign country. He would be staying with Esther in London. And the gifts that people pressed on him to take to her! Some people say that under the cover of darkness Mrs. September left a jar of her famous watermelon konfyt on Mr. Peterson’s stoep with Esther’s name on it. Other people say that it was jam. I still wonder whether it found its way into his suitcase and arrived at Esther’s in London.

The air was still and stuffy the day that Mr. Peterson left. A relentless summer’s day, but beautiful too. Ma said, “Trust Mr. Peterson to go from the heat of Cape Town to the icy cold of London.” Flowers and people wilted under the burning sun as all the neighbors came out onto their stoeps when Patrick drove his father to the airport. We watched as Patrick hefted the heavy suitcase into the old Datsun. Smiled wryly when Mrs. Peterson dabbed her ever-present handkerchief to her dry eyes. And of course we all noticed the slight twitch of Mrs. September’s curtains as she watched the spectacle. None of us could believe that Mr. Peterson was finally about to realize his dream. We had to see it to believe it. With a jaunty hoot from Patrick, they were on their way.

As the weeks passed, Mr. Peterson in faraway London was soon forgotten. Things were changing fast in our country. P.W. Botha of the wagging finger had been forced to resign a few months before, to Ma’s glee. His position was now occupied by F.W. de Klerk—not that it meant much to us, Ma pointed out. The “Nats” were all the same, she pronounced. Yet, now in the new year, there were whispers and rumors that Nelson Mandela, whom Ma said had been in jail for over 20 years, was going to be released from prison. Other people said that our country was on the verge of a civil war.

Then unexpectedly, it was discovered that there was substance to the rumors after all, when it was announced that several political parties were to be unbanned and that Mr. Mandela was truly going to be released. Ma said that it was a pity that Mr. Peterson was not here to share the exciting changes. He was a strong supporter of the government. He had gone around to the neighbors to try to convince them to vote in the tricameral elections a few years back, much to Ma’s disgust.

Everyone was in a buzz the day that Mr. Peterson was due back. Since I was not due back at college yet, I would be able to witness his return. I swept and reswept the stoep, and Ma kept on delaying watering the front garden until it was quite late. We waited and waited. In those days overseas travel was an occasion and those lucky few who traveled were treated like celebrities.

We all wanted to hear about Buckingham Palace and Big Ben and of course whether he had managed to lay his eyes on Princess Diana, whom we all loved. What were the British really like and was it as cold as people said? Of course Mr. Peterson was not the kind of man to share such stories with his neighbors, but we knew that eventually all the details of his trip would get around.

I went inside to answer the phone, so I missed it, but Ma said that Mr. Peterson barely glanced at his neighbors milling around their front yards. Patrick opened the gates and pulled the car into the driveway, instead of parking it in the street as he usually did.

“Something funny’s going on,” Ma said, intrigued.

“Maybe Mr. Peterson’s giving himself airs now that he’s finally been overseas,” I suggested, disappointed that I had not seen him myself. All I had was Ma’s word to go by.

It was Uncle Edgar who told us the story, told to him in drips and drabs over the weeks following Mr. Peterson’s return. Apparently the overriding ambition in Mr. Peterson’s desire to travel was that he longed to sleep with a white woman. Just once, and at any expense. Snowy white was what he wanted. As snowy white as he was pitch black. Actually, not pitch black. He was more blue—navy blue. “Blue-black” is what Ma thought and she said as much. When he first thought about his desperate need to experience a white woman, it was still illegal to do so. The immorality act was around and was strictly enforced by young, white policemen with flashlights. And there was Mrs. Peterson and the church and all that. It had to be overseas!

Mr. Peterson had heard stories of women who could be chatted up easily and who did not discriminate against dark, scrawny men with pockmarked skin. Yes, it was easy to get a white woman if you went overseas. The men spoke about it on his bread route; they spoke about it at the pigeon racing venues; they spoke about it after their tournaments at the dart club. This was the wild yearning that fuelled Mr. Peterson through the early mornings as he drove his bread truck. This was what got him through one weekend wedding after another. Visions of creamy white or pale pink pudenda with sparse or prolific blonde or red hair got him through the derision of the neighborhood, the critical glares of the three women inside his very house and his sister’s silent scorn. What man more deserved his ambition to come true than he?

And did it happen?  “Sort of,” Uncle Edgar said with a smile.

“It either did or it didn’t!” Ma scoffed.

“Well, the rand is not worth as much as the pound,” Uncle Edgar smiled like the cat that got the cream. “And when you convert rands to pounds, there is not much and you have to pay for these favors as if they are merchandise displayed in the shop windows.”

“Did he or didn’t he?” Ma demanded.

“All he could afford,” Uncle Edgar said wryly, and I’m not sure whether he was enjoying this or not. “Was a look at the goods — what after converting rands into pounds.”

“A look?” Ma shrieked indignantly. “Do you pay to look too?”

“Apparently so,” Uncle Edgar said slowly, twisting his moustache in his fingers. “Apparently so.”

And so Mr. Peterson still goes about his business, ever since he has retired from Sunrise Bakery. He spends his mornings walking to the end of the road and back. He still sits on the stoep in the afternoons, sipping his sweet tea from his saucer and sucking on his pipe. He still gets dressed up in his navy blue suit and white shirt to drive brides around at weekends, although sometimes Patrick does it when the arthritis in his father’s knees gets the better of him. And Mr. Peterson still has the countenance of an angry rooster, unless of course a plane passes overhead. He rises to his feet and stands to attention as if in the army. He sits only when the plane has passed. People say he is going mad.

The pigeons? The pigeons, yes. Some he sold; some he gave away; some died of natural causes. The pigeon coop is empty. These days the door creeks eerily in the late October winds that tease the Cape at this time of the year. The hinges have come undone. The empty pigeon coop is a dismal reminder of a dream that once was.

This marks the first installment of a new series for Sampsonia Way. In Knocking on the Door of… we present interviews with fellow residents of Pittsburgh’s Northside. Our first interview is with performer and teacher Barbara Russell. Make sure you check back in the coming weeks for more Knocking on the Door of… someone you know might get a knock soon!

Photos: Laura Mustio

In the early afternoon of a frigid Pittsburgh winter day, it’s refreshing to be greeted warmly from behind the bright orange door of Barbara Russell’s home in the Northside. Just a block from City of Asylum/Pittsburgh and Sampsonia Way magazine, Russell’s antique three-story home is a colorful example of the lively nature of the Northside.

Born in Black Lick, Pennsylvania, Russell became a prominent figure in Pittsburgh’s performing arts community as part of the well-known comedy duo Brockett and Barbara with local legend Don Brockett. She spent several years traveling the world with Brockett before returning to Pittsburgh to continue the teaching career she started in 1954. She now dedicates much of her time to teaching preschool-age children and their teachers about the performing arts and their role in a successful education.

In this interview, Barbara Russell gives us a glimpse into the life of a Pittsburgh Northsider as a member of a unique community with a big personality and bigger heart.

What made you decide the Northside was where you wanted to make your home?

My husband at the time and I moved here in 1971 after a friend told us about the neighborhood. We had always enjoyed antiques and this house was original in that way. I’m the fourth owner in 180 years. The house was so inexpensive and there were a lot of original things here: the fireplaces, the pocket doors, old wiring that needed to be redone, ceilings that were collapsing. But we just fell in love with the house. Then we learned about the neighborhood, which we felt very comfortable in. The thing we liked most about being here was the diversity; it’s a complete mixed bag in terms of gender, sexual preference, age. I have a lady’s party here once a year, and it’s mostly women from the neighborhood who have become long-time friends of mine. If you’re lucky, you maybe have five good friends in your life to take you to the hospital, to lend you a cup of sugar or a bottle of wine. For me, the women in this neighborhood make it ten or fifteen.

In 2000, Russell was honored with the Indiana University of Pennsylvania’s Distinguished Alumni Award, and the Pittsburgh New Works Festival paid tribute to Russell’s career in the arts by awarding her their Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007.

You’ve traveled all over the world to perform. Why did you chose Pittsburgh as the city in which to continue your performing career?

My work with Don Brockett originally kept me grounded here. We could continue to make a living doing showbiz here in Pittsburgh, where it would have been more difficult doing so in New York or Los Angeles. Also, people applaud the same way in Pittsburgh as they do in New York. I was able to lead a very comfortable life doing what I enjoyed while also being able to combine my love for theater with my teaching work.

It’s an interesting observation that the sound of applause is the same in New York and Pittsburgh. Are there enough shows in Pittsburgh to experience that applause?

Pittsburgh is not well-known in terms of developing plays, but we have a few equity houses, nonprofessional theaters, and professional houses. There is enough theater for me to go to; there’s enough dance, enough symphony, enough music. The arts are well represented in this city. You can be busy going to all kinds of concerts, even if it’s not considered one of the big “center for the arts” cities.

Do you think there is enough being done to promote the arts in the city?

No, I don’t think so. The arts have been removed from the schools, which is an economic thing, but it’s a big loss. As much as the Pittsburgh International Children’s Theater and Gateway to the Arts are promoting the arts, it’s a drop in the bucket compared to what needs to be done. But it’s all economic. The schools are very open to bringing performing arts programs into the classrooms; you can use the arts to reach children who may not be as skilled academically but are able to think outside of the box. The children solve problems in very unique ways and that is exactly what life is. The arts are humanizing – they let us know one another – and I think it’s important to tap into that for all of us. There are wonderful volunteers, but people need to eat. Without funding, very little can happen to promote the arts, unfortunately.

You play a significant role in Gateway to the Arts, one of the outreach programs that is still successfully running in Pittsburgh schools. Can you describe how you got involved with Gateway to the Arts and your role in their outreach now?

I had heard about it from a teacher at Penn Hills, where I had been teaching. After some investigation, I became one of their outreach people. Now, I am a teaching artist for Wolf Trap, an organization that calls Pittsburgh one of its fifteen homes in the United States. We go into preschools and work with the teachers and students to maximize learning potential of the teacher’s lesson plans using performing arts techniques, like dramatizing books or having the teacher and students play roles within the story. It’s an extension of my theater and teaching work and is something I can do until I’m 107, as long as I can get my walker up the walkway. Teachers usually learn about this outreach through Gateway to the Arts’ professional development workshops, and word of the program spreads from teacher to teacher.

What has drawn you back to doing children’s theater and performing arts development instead of maintaining your career with adult audiences?

I love doing theater because of the camaraderie. You’re a family; you have to respect one another, and I enjoy that very much. As a comedian, the applause is fine, but the laughter is what I’m really after for adult audiences. For the children, it’s not so much applause as it is enthusiasm. Is it more rewarding to work with the children? No, I’d say it’s equal. Whenever children give me a surprise answer, or any time they are creative in any form, though, I love it. They surprise me all the time; it’s one of the delights of working with children. Never underestimate a kid.

Do you think there will come a day soon where you will hang up your shoes and say, “See you later, Pittsburgh; I’ve done my work for you”?

The only thing that’ll do that is physical limitations. Performing has always been a thing that I do, as well as teaching. As long as I can get into the schools and Gateway to the Arts is still around, I can still do that. As long as I’m still upright, I’ll be doing it. I have no desire to stop. And for Pittsburgh, I’m not planning on leaving anytime soon. I’ve got two grandchildren I adore, and too many friends to leave. Do I love to travel? Yes. But I’m very happy about Pittsburgh. It’s a big old town.

Barbara Russell took part in City of Asylum/Pittsburgh’s 2008 Jazz Poetry Festival, leading the show as the emcee. In this video, she reads “I Like Pittsburgh” by poet Florence Fisher Parry.

Pittsburgh Magazine featured City of Asylum in its March issue. “Meet the New Neighbors,” by Christine H. O’Toole, is not only a walk on Sampsonia Way, it´s also a glimpse of its writers, neighbors and the magazine that bears its name.

Burmese writer Khet Mar and her husband, painter Than Htay Maung, in front of Maung’s mural.Photo by Martha Rial

A gleaming 1950 Plymouth mounted on dozens of barefoot black feet. A brown clapboard house scrawled with graffiti in giant Chinese characters—and nearby another sprouting wooden wings. A vibrant mural on a brick row house that entwines shapely Burmese calligraphy with elegant figures.

Taking a turn onto Sampsonia Way in the Mexican War Streets neighborhood of Pittsburgh’s Northside is like stepping through the looking glass. It’s the only alley in the city where the houses actually talk. Boldly inscribed with the words of defiant writers from around the world, the 19th-century buildings speak—loudly—for the artists who live and work there, connecting Pittsburgh to a courageous worldwide community of ideas and ideals.

For writers from China, El Salvador, Burma and other strife-ridden nations, Sampsonia Way is the last place they expected to live. After political threats, imprisonment and even torture in their native country, they have taken refuge here on a tiny one-way street that’s become an unlikely international enclave.

Read the whole feature by Christine H. O’Toole

Buy March Pittsburgh Magazine issue

In this video, Sofi Oksanen reads an excerpt of her novel Purge, in which a young woman escaping the sex-slave trade ends up in the backyard of an Estonian woman who survived sexual assault at the hands of Soviet occupiers.

Purge was ranked No. 1 on the Finnish bestseller list when it was first published and it has been translated into 25 languages.

Oksanen visited Sampsonia Way on April 27 of 2010 to give a reading with Christos Tsiolkas and Tommy Wieringa. The event was sponsored by City of Asylum/Pittsburgh in partnership with PEN/America.

While she was here, Oksanen sat down for a conversation with Sampsonia Way editor Elizabeth Hoover.

Read Oksanen’s interview

Transformative voices at Sampsonia Way

Carter G. Woodson, founder of what became Black History Month in 1976, wrote: “[Racial prejudice] is merely the logical result of tradition; the inevitable outcome of thorough instruction to the effect that the Negro has never contributed anything to the progress of mankind.”

Carter G. Woodson spent most of his life collecting writings and artifacts to raise awareness about the impact African Americans have had on history. Likewise, in commemoration of Black History Month, Sampsonia Way recognizes the African-American authors who have contributed their transformative words to our pages.

Here are just a few…

“All the Way Live” a poem by Terrance Hayes.

Poet Claudia Rankine on Wounds We Shouldn’t Forget

“We Are Not Post-Racial” an interview with Toi Derricotte

“Make the Ordinary Extraordinary” an interview with Colleen J. McElroy

Sapphire on Precious’ Emancipation

Yusef Komunyakaa on Racism as a Mental Illness

Two Members of Aung San Suu Kyi’s Party on Recent Events in Burma

In this conversation, two followers of the National League for Democracy (NLD) discuss the implications of the 2010 elections, the release of NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and how the international community has responded to the junta’s refusal to make meaningful democratic reforms. Moe Chan is the executive director of Burma Point in Woodside, NY, and Nyunt Than is the president of the Burmese American Democratic Alliance in Albany, CA. They spoke with Sampsonia Way through Skype in December, and the dialogue was completed via e-mail in subsequent weeks.

Read more about recent events in Burma.

What did you think of the November elections?

Moe Chan: Since 2009, many of us who support the opposition party have been voicing our concern that recognizing the 2010 elections would jeopardize the democratic reforms we have been pursuing for the past 20 years. From the beginning, we began condemning these elections and urging the international community not to recognize or legitimize them.

Nyunt Than: From our perspective, the true election occurred in 1990 when Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy won by a landslide. The regime has refused to hand over power and has tried to override the legitimacy of the people’s mandate by conducting this sham election. The 2008 constitution, on which the 2010 election was based, is unacceptable. It states that the chief of army can appoint 25% of the seats in parliment. It also grants many contingencies under which the chief of army can take power by will. He is pre-pardoned from being prosecuted based on those actions. These elections were designed to legitimize military rule and protect the handful of military leaders, their families, and their interests.

Nyunt Than, president of the Burmese American Democratic Alliance in Albany, CA. Photo: courstesy of Nyunt Than

The National Democratic Force (NDF) was created by former members of the National League of Democracy who wanted to participate in the elections. What do you think of the NDF’s ’s choice to break from Aung San Suu Kyi’s party?

Nyunt Than: I don’t think a difference of opinion is necessarily a bad thing, but we have been under this regime for more than 20 years, and it is very easy to see that there is no way we could have participated in this election. Just a few weeks ago, Nay Win Maung, leader of the NGO Myanmar Egress and a proponent of the elections prior to November 7, wrote in the Burmese-language magazine The Voice, “We climbed a slippery pole, knowing it was slippery. I thought just by climbing it the first time, we would go rather far.” He apologized to his readers for giving them false hope about these elections.

Moe Chan: To have participated in the 2010 elections was something for us to be very concerned about. It made us aware that we still have a lot to do among ourselves to find unity.

Why did the junta government orchestrate this election?

Nyunt Than: The regime not only wants power, but they also want to be seen as the founders of a modern democracy. As a matter of human nature, Than Shwe [the central figure in Burma’s ruling military junta] seeks acceptance from the international community.

Moe Chan: The military regime is trying to show the world they have created democratic spaces for us. In reality, they are tightening those spaces so we cannot move around.

The junta’s party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), has moved to engage with three ethnic parties that won seats in the election: the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party, the Shan Nationalities Democratic Party, and the All Mon Region Democracy Party. How does the USDP’s engagement with ethnic groups compare to Aung San Suu Kyi’s?

Nyunt Than: It looks good on paper, but in reality I am not sure what it means. The USDP was looking to elect a Vice President from the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party, but the Vice President and the President are instructed by the constitution to hand over power to the military in times of emergency. Also the parliament remains in the hands of the USDP. We are not hopeful that the opposition will have any say in this government.

Moe Chan: Aung San Suu Kyi has been very clear on the ethnic issue. She considers herself an ethnic among many in Burma. She has been trying to work with all ethnic groups, but the junta is afraid to allow her to meet with many of the ethnic leaders in Burma. Without resolving the ethnic issue, Burma will never be peaceful.

Moe Chan, the executive director of Burma Point in Woodside, NY.
Photo: courtesy of Moe Chan

What does Aung San Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest mean for Burma’s future?

Nyunt Than: We are very joyous and thankful for her release. At the same time, we are not hopeful that much progress will be made in the near future, especially given the fact that she has been released before and was arrested again soon afterward.

Moe Chan: Today, we are very much concerned about her safety and her well-being. If something were to happen to her, how would the international community react? Instead of reacting, why not be proactive? That’s why I would like to call on the international community to help us, to provide support so we can protect our leader and our people. Without having necessary protection or support, she won’t be able to continue leading for long.

What has been the response of countries like China and the United States to the recent elections?

Nyunt Than: China has been supporting the military regime diplomatically, militaristically, and economically. Militaristically, China has been selling billions and billions of dollars worth of military equipment to the Burmese government. Diplomatically, China won’t vote for any resolution in the U.N. Security Council to hold the Burmese military officials accountable for their actions. Economically, China, as a major trading partner of Burma, has watered down the United States’ sanctions. It’s not that the sanctions don’t work. It’s just that they are not targeted sanctions like travel bans or commodity embargoes.

All of this is in China’s strategic best interest. China is using Burma to expand its oil interests into the Indian Ocean and protect its oil transport route. It is mining energy and natural resources from the country. In many ways, China is influencing, eclipsing, and courting the military regime, and it’s making other Asian countries who would like to use the natural resources in Burma nervous. Many Asian countries have taken a stance of not criticizing the regime.

Moe Chan: The United States is the top supporter of Burmese democracy, followed by European nations and Western countries, including Australia. With their support we are able to continuously confront the military regime and demand democracy, human rights, and justice in Burma. That being said, the support we’ve been receiving is not enough. It’s very limited.

Before the 2010 elections, European nations supported people who wanted to participate in the 2010 elections. At the same time, they were very reluctant to support those opposing the 2010 elections. That’s something many of us could not understand and could not agree with.

What kind of political and economic support would you like to see from the international community?

Moe Chan: The international community could look for ways to enforce targeted sanctions and to encourage an arms embargo at the United Nations. Countries could continue to lobby their friends and allies not to recognize the elections. They can lobby at the United Nations to not recognize the legitimacy of the military regime.

Nyunt Than: If you take away the support of China away, the Burmese regime will weaken drastically. We need to change the minds of the Chinese leaders. We need to make them see that a democratic government is more in their interest than a military regime that the world does not support.

Moe Chan: New Zealand just changed the way they recognize the country from Myanmar to Burma. That’s a good thing. That kind of moral and political support goes a long way. If a country like New Zealand can lead the effort to get the United Nations to change the name Myanmar to Burma that would be a great victory for us.

How has the junta government responded to international pressure?

Nyunt Than: If you look at the progress in the field of political conflict in the last 20 years, you wouldn’t find much. The response from the regime is far from what we wanted and what we were hoping for. It comes back to the same point: Because of the unwavering support of neighboring countries including China, the regime is never short of cash, and they do not have to answer to anyone. They can survive. They are sustainable. They will respond with minimal concessions and only if they have to, as they did in this sham election.

What do you think of Aung San Suu Kyi’s policy of reconciliation and gradual change?

Nyunt Than: Burma has a very complex situation with many players and stakeholders. The regime always plays a zero sum game; they will grab everything and leave the opposition with nothing. Aung San Suu Kyi has to accept reality and deal with all the stakeholders, including the regime holding the handle of the weapon. I think it is realistic and inevitable to deal with all stakeholders and institutions in the country.

Moe Chan: Aung San Suu Kyi’s position is that she has to come between the democratic forces and the military regime and encourage them to compromise. She has to lead the effort to ensure that the regime comes to the table. We have a different role as members of the international community. We need to weigh-in on her efforts and level-off the power of the military regime. Until we have enough strength to overwhelm the military regime, I don’t believe they will come to the table of dialogue. In order to have national unity and reconciliation, we have to work together to find long-lasting unity for all of us.

Burma general election counting votes in November 2010. Photo: EPA

2010 was a pivotal year for Burma. On November 7, the military junta orchestrated the country’s first national elections since 1990, when the National League of Democracy (NLD) won the popular vote. The government refused to recognize the results of the 1990 election and placed NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi under house arrest.

The 2010 elections were part of the military’s seven-step “Roadmap to a New Democratic State,” a resolution that, in theory, will transition Burma into a democracy. Critics, however, called the elections a sham. A quarter of the seats in the newly created bicameral parliament are reserved for the military. Any constitutional change requires a parliamentary majority of more than 75 percent—meaning that the military can vote down any reform.

While some Burmese pro-democracy groups saw the elections as a step toward democracy, the NLD boycotted the 2010 elections, saying they would not register as a party under the unjust election laws of the junta. As a consequence, some of NLD’s members broke from the organization and formed the National Democratic Force (NDF), an opposition party that participated in the election and gained 16 seats in the parliament.

Aung San Suu Kyi greets supporters after her November 2010 release. Photo: Getty Images

Five days after the election, Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who had spent 15 of the past 21 years under house arrest, was released. Her freedom was seen by many as an attempt to legitimize the electoral proceedings in the eyes of the international community. But if that was the case, the attempt was not successful; after Aung San Suu Kyi’s release, a U.N. human rights committee condemned Burma’s elections, saying that they were neither free nor fair.

These events are the latest in a long string of diverse diplomatic responses, ranging from economic sanctions and isolationism to non-interventionist policies and limited engagement.

Read Jen‘s bio.

700 applicants, 12 winners

For its new Literary Center project, City of Asylum/Pittsburgh was a winner in the national “Space for Change” Competition. The award is accompanied by $50,000 and two years of technical support.

City of Asylum/Pittsburgh was begun in October of 2004 and is the publisher of Sampsonia Way. The organization is best known for its exiled-writer residency program and its “house publications” on the facades of the houses where the writers live. However, it also sponsors an annual Jazz-Poetry Concert and salon-style readings by authors from around the world as well as readings on the streets and gardens of the Central Northside and residencies for visiting international writers and translators.

Both buildings and the empty lot will become City of Asylum’s Literary Center. Photo: Laura Mustio

What started out as a program with a limited mission has become a catalyst for the transformation of its Northside neighborhood, rooted in making reading and writing a part of everyday life.

The literary center on Monterey Street will convert a former bar, a vacant lot, and an abandoned home into a unified space with a bookstore (specializing in translations), a bar-café-restaurant, and spaces for readings and writing workshops. The project will enable a major expansion of City of Asylum/Pittsburgh’s literary program and residencies and is intended to be a home for literary activity in Pittsburgh.

Local foundation support has been critical to launching the project. Over $1.5 million has been committed by the Richard King Mellon Foundation, The Heinz Endowments, and the Hillman Foundation, with additional support expected over the next few months. Ground-breaking is projected for this coming summer.

Read LINC-Ford Foundation Press Release

Read more about the other winners

An Egyptian Protester’s banner. Photo: RT

In “Does Egypt Need Twitter?”, published in The New Yorker website on February 2, 2011, Malcolm Gladwell states that the human voice is a “largely unknown instrument” in today’s society and implies that the Egyptian uprising would have occurred even without the aid of social media.

Even though it’s clear that Twitter and Facebook are not gathering in Tahrir Square or protecting the museums and libraries of Alexandria, it is undeniable that they are an important aid in spreading the message of the Egyptian protesters. Here two Egyptians explain how the human voice has been a well-known and powerful instrument that is still in use—with or without the help of social media.

Speaking under pseudonym, Abdullah Al-Fulan, an Egyptian student on holiday in the United States, expressed his surprise at the origins of the January 25 protests: “I knew we needed a revolution, but I never thought it would start on Facebook. The youth was the engine for this protest and where else can you find young people getting together but on Facebook?”

Egyptian activist Abdelrahman El Hennaway, commenting from Cairo, added, “Facebook was a major factor to reach young people who don’t care about politics and don’t have serious economic problems.”

Photo: Egypt Social Media Cafe

According to the CIA’s Factbook report from July 2010, only 25% of Egyptians have access to the Internet, and many of those who have it haven’t even been alive for the full length of Mubarak’s thirty-two year rule. It was June 2010 murder of 28-year-old blogger Khaled Saied that sparked the outrage of the formerly apathetic youth.

In January, risking arrest or worse, fans of the Khaled Saied Facebook page and other groups posted the whereabouts of riot police and locations of protests. Mubarak’s complete shutdown of the Internet on January 28 forced the youth to get creative in their efforts to protect and organize people.

The use of anonymous proxies and the donation of bandwidth to Egyptian servers from internet users around the globe allowed many to bypass the communication blackout that lasted until January 31. Sites like YouTube and TwitPic were inundated with photos and videos that allowed the Egyptian message to reach those outside of the territory.

As of January 31, “the game had gone out of Facebook,” said Abdelrahman, meaning that Facebook was no longer the primary source of information and instruction. “Picture and video sharing became very important,” he added.

The same day Google joined the social media fray by setting up a Speak to Tweet service in cooperation with Twitter. Those with access to telephone communication in Egypt could call a Google Voice number and leave a voicemail, which would immediately be posted as an audio file on the Speak to Tweet Twitter page. Volunteers dedicated hours to transcribing and translating the voicemails for international followers.

“I had no idea how to use it,” Abdelrahman admitted. “Didn’t meet anyone who did.” However, almost 3 thousand spoken tweets were posted, and this alternative method of tweeting eventually turned into a forum for longer-form expression. Speak to Tweet’s voice recordings were not confined to Twitter’s 140-character limit.

Still, this tool deployed by Google was only an extra aid to those thousands of protesting voices. Abdullah and Abdelrahman agreed that the greatest influence on the protests was the human voice. Thousands of people, formerly silenced by poverty, poor educational opportunities, and corruption, were not stopped by the lack of Internet or mobile communication; they still gathered in the streets of Cairo, Alexandria, Suez, and other Egyptian cities.

“Protesting was here long before phones or Internet were invented, so I don’t know what they [the Mubarak regime] were thinking when they blocked the Internet,” said Abdullah.

On one hand Abdelrahman and Abdullah testimonies seem to agree with Gladwell’s statements: This is not a Twitter or Facebook revolution, and it is unfair to the Egyptian people to say that it is. Facebook and Twitter are not sleeping in the streets of Suez.

On the other hand, Abdelrahman and Abdullah seem to contradict Gladwell. According to them, the human voice is a well-known instrument in Egyptian society–not the “largely unknown instrument” Gladwell claims it to be. They add, whether they use social media to help them speak or not, now they have a voice.