From the Land of Green Ghosts

Additional From the Land of Green Ghosts Information

In 1988 Dr John Casey, a Cambridge don visiting Burma, was told of a waiter in Mandalay with a passion for the works of James Joyce. Intrigued by this unlikely story, he visited the restaurant, where he met Pascal Khoo Thwe. The encounter was to change both their lives.

Pascal grew up as a member of the tiny, remote Kayan Padaung tribe, famous for their 'giraffenecked' women. The Padaung practiced a combination of ancient animist and Buddhist customs mixed with the Catholicism introduced by Italian missionaries. Theirs was a dream culture, a world in which ancestors were worshipped and ghosts were a constant presence. Pascal was the first member of his community ever to study English at university. But in Burma, English books were rare, and independent thought was discouraged. Photocopies of the few approved texts would be passed from student to student, while tuition consisted of lecturers reciting essays that the students learned by rote.

Within a few months of his chance meeting with Dr Casey, Pascal's world lay in ruins. Successive economic crises brought about by Burma's military dictatorship meant he had to give up his studies. The regime's repression grew more brutal, and Pascal's student-lover, who had become involved in the movement for democracy, was arrested, raped and finally murdered by the armed forces. Pascal fled to the jungle, becoming a guerrilla fighter in the life-or-death struggle against the government and seeing many of his friends and comrades die in battle. At a moment of desperation, he remembered the Englishman he had met in Mandalay and wrote him a letter, with little expectation of ever receiving a reply.

Miraculously, the letter reached its destination on the other side of the world. Not only that, it would lead to Pascal's being rescued from the jungle and enrolling to study English at Cambridge University, the first Burmese tribesman ever to do so.

From the Land of Green Ghosts is the autobiographical tale of a remarkable triumph of hope over despair, and of an encounter between two very different worlds. Hauntingly and poetically written, it unforgettably evokes the realities of life in modern-day Burma and one young man's long journey to freedom despite almost unimaginable odds.

What Customers Say About From the Land of Green Ghosts:

The situation in Burma is a sad, sad thing. Through this story we learn how land is taken in Burma, how the people are cowed into submission and about the life of a freedom fighter. There is one escalator in the whole country and no one knows how to fix it. All wealth trickles up leaving the population total prey to its rulers.

The prose of this book is outstanding, vocabulary and nuance show English skills far beyond even native English speaking college graduates. In the odd circumstances of this civil war we see how one day the armies are shooting at each other, the next side by side in a hospital on neutral ground.This narrative shows how the Burma police state operates on a personal level. For more on the collapse of Burmese society I recommend Finding George Orwell in Burma.There is a lot of eerie symmetry. No ghost writer is credited. The author sees the end of the man who told him his life was worth a bullet, he sees college friends on both sides of the freedom fight and when he is safely in England he sees a photo of his grandmother with her ringed neck as she was displayed in England, many years ago. Its rulers have guns and no compassion.

Joining the army to defend the regime is the only avenue for many to feed their families. The book starts you thinking about the lonely life of an exile, the plight of the Burmese people, the problems for Thailand this has created, and an international commuity that has been unable to act. These rulers refuse international help in a natural disaster to shield themselves not only from criticism of past atrocities but to further confiscate property. By the extraordinary actions of John Casey, Pascal Khoo Thwe "got out" and was put in a position where he could tell his story.

Get past the 1st few pages, get used to the way he talks, and enjoy. The author explains the culture, events, and his own personality beautifully. Absolutely loved this book. Written in such a style that you almost forget the seriousness of the events taking place.

His book swept me away and brought me to understand and sympathize with the central Burmese people's courage and devotion to democracy and freedom. I owe my soul to that land and grateful to Khoo Thwe for his gift of writing. This book converted me from a skeptic of opposition politics in Burma to an ardent believer in the democracy movement there. They have taught me to love as a human being in Burma amidst the poverty and deprivation. May he be strong enough to write many more books for Burma and the Kaya State. I grew up in the magnificent Shan State with bitter distrust of urban Burmese elites and their political dominance. I was persuaded to read this book after finding out that for the first time I had a chance to discover someone from a village close to my home town.

It does give a good account of what's going on in Burma, especially in the rural parts too. Easy to read but by no means a simple writer. It's definitely well written, and it's a very personal account of the author's journey. I'll recommend it for those interested in learning about Burma from a Burmese person, and from the native's perspective. It's a literary piece for sure. It's not as dramatic as I thought it'll be but then, I guess that's real life at times. It's definitely as honest as it can be.

His mentor, Dr. Aung San Suu Kyi, the wife of the late Michael Aris of Oxford. No good anti-Burmese government book would be complete without a mention of Ms. Casey indulged in nostalgia for the imperial past of Burma. We learn early on that Pascal's family introduced him to the Christian God and the Catholic Church. John Casey, admits in the foreword that he was `at first diffident' when asked to revise and cut the manuscript for publication, yet his input can be felt strongly in the final version.

Pascal mentions her several times."from the land of the green ghosts' is a fine book, if read with a good knowledge of the history of Burma. Pascal, alias Khun Sa, has created an interesting autobiography of his life as a Padaung tribesman from the Shan States of Burma, who is picked up by a Cambridge don visiting Mandalay, where he is a student working in a restaurant. He later finds his way to England and Cambridge after his stint as an rebel insurgent - through the kindness and intervention of his British friend and the British embassy in Thailand.He writes well in English when you consider that most of his youth was spent in Shan States of Burma where English was not his language. She says: "We were prosperous under the British, but when they went, they took the prosperity with them." She fails to point out that the British were replaced by the Japanese, who after a lot of killing were replaced by Nationalists looking for independence.

Pascal's Grandmother is hauled out to amplify the anti-government screed and tell us what a paradise Burma was during the age of the rule by the British. His strong anti-government bias even comes through against the government of Thailand, which had protected him and his fellow insurgents in refugee camps there. You can almost spot when Pascal is writing in the voice of his religious teachers; he uses words like `ululation' "assiduous to novenas' `impeccably' or he pokes fun at his own culture and animist religion. May I recommend reading The River of Lost Footsteps: A Personal History of Burma as a preliminary to this work.

As a poetic lament the book seems to be coming from Pascal, but as a political statement it seems more to originate from his handlers. This prejudice comes through clearly when Pascal writes of becoming an insurgent to fight against the Burmese government which had replaced the `golden age' of the `old British Raj'. When speaking in the voice of his Cambridge dons, he misses no opportunity to demonize the `regime' in Burma.When Pascal writes in his own voice he can be quite down-to-earth and when he writes of his time as a young rebel soldier, shooting and being shot at, he is quite believable. However, one can feel the strong hand of his English and religion instructors or perhaps his editor in the content of much of the book.

From that point on his writing is peppered with Christian religious euphemisms and often his religion causes him to rebel against the culture of his tribe. This feeling comes through as Pascal consistently characterizes the government soldiers of Burma as the 'enemy'. Pascal points out in one of the final chapters that Dr. Burma/Myanmar has been involved in a civil war ever since the British completed their occupation of the country and several rebel groups would like to have the country return to the British colonial era or become Communist.