Changed Our Thinking’

I volunteer at the clinic of the Free Funeral Service Society once a week. And I did have a dream to create a big compound—it wouldn’t be a school, but inside there would be a free clinic, or a free hospital, and also a nonprofit publication to publish research papers. And an orphanage. Families would work for the clinic or the publication and could host the orphans. There would be a family atmosphere.

What are your latest writing projects?

I’m translating a memoir by Suad Amiry, a Palestinian engineer and writer, about her experience as a migrant worker traveling to Israel. The title is “Nothing to Lose but Your Life.” I’m also trying to edit an English version of my own prison memoir, which was published in Myanmar language in 2012.

In your memoir, you describe how you meditated sometimes up to 20 hours per day in prison. Are you still practicing meditation today?

the public I might have interviewed the minister and asked why he made this speech. But instead, they printed all the good things about him, like propaganda about how he works so hard. According to this example, how can we believe this public service media can serve the public? Why should we spend our tax money on this kind of paper?

What social work are you doing now? I heard you had plans once to open a school in the countryside?

I don’t keep aside a particular time of day to meditate, but I meditate off and on, especially when extreme emotions come to me, to keep myself calm. Sometimes, more than sometimes, I regret not having enough time to meditate these days. … I was sentenced to 20 years in prison, and I used to wonder, who can release me? It truly was not me—for this, I needed to rely on others, the authorities. Since I was young, I wanted to be independent, I wanted to rely on myself. I thought, if I want to escape the vicious cycle of samsara [the Buddhist cycle of birth and rebirth, which involves suffering], who can do that? For this, I didn’t need to ask anything of the jail authorities. I could be released from the vicious cycle if I did meditation.

–Government spokesman U Ye Htut on his Facebook page in June, after his wife was criticized for posting a doctored image of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi wearing a hijab on her page. U Ye Htut later apologized to Daw Suu Kyi in person.

Quotes

–A monk sent by the State Sangha Maha Nayaka to evict followers of Sayadaw U Pyinnya Wuntha from the Maha Thanti Thukha monastery in Yangon in June, speaking to the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB).

–Martin Rinck, president of Hilton, AsiaPacific,tellingReutersthat some of the group's hotel projects in Myanmar have been delayed.