Dear Friends:

I am back in the US.
Deported from Thailand for fighting for the Akha
cause, for refusing to compromise when it comes to the
most basic Human Rights of the Akha people.

To some, this was viewed that I was being shut down.
But that in reality is not the case at all and I was
well prepared for this eventuality in the work there.

Now the case of the Akha people is being taken to the
UN, I will be there for a number of days, starting
Wednesday.

I will be making updates via email from New York about
what is going to be a learning process.

After that I will be traveling to Washington DC, to
talk to legislators, like Sen. Leahy, regarding US law
that links security aid to Thailand to human righs
violations.

The Drug War, I will be talking to Congress people who
probably never knew who an Akha was, let alone that US
Tax Dollars are killing them and putting them away in
prison for infractions at record numbers.

I will be talking about what is being done to Akha
children, how AMERICAN missionaries are taking them
from their culture and villages for financial gain and
exploitation.

Legal disussion of course is already going on about
class action law suits against numerous American
Missions in Thailand. Investigations are also ongoing
into cases of sexual abuse at these missions. Mr. Woon
of Benedikta House has already gone on trial in
Bangkok for the rape of hill tribe boys and I will
forward those results to the web site soon as I hear
back.

Both Catholic and Protestant Missions are in our
sights.

And they know who they are.

We will continue to set up IMC Thailand.

From Washington DC I will be traveling to Europe to
discuss the Akha situation in Thailand and raise
additional support for Akha projects.

And then we will have announcements of the progress we
make in establishing network to the international
human rights movement for all Akha people.

I got an email this morning, and it says something
about what I thought about all the Akha people I knew
in Thailand and Burma.

I miss them all for a moment, but I will never never
give up for the Akha people.

And I ask you this, if you have been a donor to this
work, please don't think it is over, and stop, the
work now doubles, triples, what must be done to find
human rights for the Akha.

And if you haven't made a donation before, consider
it, as there is much network that has to be made in
the Akha mountains.

Matthew McDaniel
Salem, Oregon, USA

*********
*********

Dear Matthew

How are you? We can only hope hope you are o.k.
now in America. You know we all miss you.

We cannot describe how much we are sorry about all
the problems you have had from what is supposed to be
a democracy country. You have worked with all your
heart to improve the human rights for the people
especially for Akha people who hardly have any voice.
Even it is hard to talk to you, just to say thank you
for all the hard work you have done for us, because
there is always the fear of the politicians, the
police or the army. Today we just know that you are
gone, somewhere so far away we can't imagine.

We will remember your truck coming up to the
villages always bring good spirits, always asking "how
are we today." And of course there were always lots of
problems, problems with other cultures and other
religions coming to the villages and tearing the
villagers apart, even families cannot join in the
ceremonies together. And this one is not well, needs
some medicine, and that man has disappear, nobody
knows where he is gone, and the children and mother
all alone.

Everyone here has got enough energy to work but
some how the lands are not big enough for everyone
now. In our memory there used to be so much land, and
free, not belong to anybody but the people who farming
there, working hard. We know everything is changing
now and so difficult to survive.

Now, thanks to you, we know a little bit that we
have the right to live on this planet earth. We are
talking now about the land, maybe belong to somebody
far away who has never been here, so where is our
land? Is in Burma, Thailand, China, Laos? Actually
Akha are many people in these countries, we need to
connect with each other more and feel we are more than
just one or two village.

You are only the one and only brother, Akha of the
heart, who fights for akha farm land, fight for the
right of human, fight against other religions coming
to the village and telling us our culture is no good
and say they will give good education to our children
if we give up our culture. You are the only voice
telling the world the reality of our lives.

I have no idea what the future holds. I stand here
in my heart, in the village, in the hills, though I am
far away. The insects are noisy, they are thirsty for
water. How thirsty, how hungry we are, waiting here
for the rain to fall, for the wind to bring relief and
seasons change.


*******

Dear Akha Friend:

I hope you do not despair.

I knew, every day I told my Akha wife, today I go down
the hill, I don't know what happen, maybe I don't come
back.

Be ready. Never fear, take care to the children, the
world is a big place, and if not here, I can fight
from there, where ever "there" is.

So when on April 15, they picked me up in Maesai,
which it turns out they had been trying to do for two
months, there was no surprise, no shock, just
determination to go to the next stage.

For years I had worked alone, I had no one outside
Thailand that could fully link to me, could see the
urgency of what I was doing, had the time to run full
time for the Akha. I wished how many times I could
clone myself and work in one mind, one of me in the
world, one of me in the mountains, where I loved more
than anything to be, one of me free to go the world
and tell what tragedy was befalling the Akha, people
most did not even know existed.

Because there were Akha people there.

I would sit for days on the computer and then have to
get off it and go to the other villages, take some
gift, remember the vitamins, ( I was running vitamins
to Burma when they picked me up), remember a sack of
rice, ask about so and so who was in prison, when were
they coming out, take some pics for a story, go see
this elderly singer, like Ah Gurh at Hooh Yoh Village,
dig out medicine for the imflamation on a babies ear.

Little can describe the GIFT the Akha gave me, to
enjoy who they were, to be in some way Akha, to listen
endlessly to their humor, their stories, their
language, poetic in every tone. Like Ah Peeh, showing
me the burns on his arms and joking about what he told
the army when they electrecuted him at Som Yaek army
base, he was "just so happy to be there" he couldn't
"stop dancing". That is Akha humor.

Tragic humor of a people with a heart so large.

But my plans, my reality that some day I might get
pulled out, was not unprepared. In Thailand I had slow
computers, bad food, no phone to the outside world,
and there is not much money in the environment to draw
on to pay for things for Akha.

But now that I am out, I am free to move as fast as I
can dream for Akha people.

Tomorrow I fly to New York, to the UN. I will be there
many days. A new case now goes against the government
of Thailand at the UN.

"Retaliation Against A Human Rights Defender". The
Thai Government has much to learn.

And out here in America, where beautiful cars are
parked as far as you can see, where the streets are
clean, where everything costs big money, and where the
place is so big, hardly anyone knows who an Akha is
there is a lot of work to do.

I reckon to change that, and to give every Akha a
voice out of Thailand, out of any where they live, to
something that is solely Akha, that looks fully on to
their behalf, only now I have more hope of linking to
the resources that will help that get done.

I have no idea, how long, but when I am done, all the
world will know who the Akha people are.

As soon as I am able I will be setting up aid links
for Akha communities, projects for specific villages,
I know where 280 of them are after all, I brought the
maps all out with me, I had them hidden in the truck
for that very moment I was pulled out, 40 pounds of
maps. And I will set up communication links, so that
people can tell what is going on.

Water, seeds, agriculture, books.

But it is going to take time, how long, I don't know,
but unless I stop, I usually get there.

And please tell the Akha, the Akha you know, this is
not over, it is just starting.

What you know from Akha, post it to the list, and soon
there will be a hotline phone number that Akha people
can call.

Never Never Quit!
Akha Nation
Matthew McDaniel
Salem, Oregon, USA

=====
The Akha Heritage Foundation.
http://www.akha.org Akha Heritage Site.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Akhaweeklyjournal
Discussion http://groups.yahoo.com/group/akha
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PO Box 6073 Salem, OR. 97304 USA.















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