Source: Myanmar Times

Ko Htuu Lou Rae with one of ‘COEXIST’ t-shirts he has created.
Pic: Yadanar

THE first screen-printing shop Ko Htuu Lou Rae visited refused to make his t-shirts. The workers looked at his design, told him that they were not interested in his money and he moved on.

A lawyer he consulted about retaining the rights to the image he created warned him that displaying it in downtown Yangon could make him a target for violence.

“They were scared,” Ko Htuu Lou Rae said smiling, sitting in the Dagon township restaurant that serves as his temporary office. “Of what, I don’t know.”

At a second shop he had more luck. The owners accepted his order without as much as a second glance. Late last week, his 200 shirts, individually wrapped, arrived.

The image Htuu Lou Rae created is not grotesque, sexual or graphic. It consists of just one word – COEXIST – altered slightly to serve as a message of unity and support for those affected by the ethnic conflict in Rakhine State.

The letter “C” has been replaced with a crescent and star representing Islam, the “O” has taken the form of the dhamma wheel, an image of the Buddhist faith, and a map of Myanmar has replaced the “I”. The rest of the letters remain unchanged.

The chosen symbols represent Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims who have been engaged in violent clashes since late May.

A string of skirmishes, which were still continuing last week in some areas, have left at least 78 dead and 100,000 displaced, said New York-based Human Rights Watch.

“This logo, it clearly gives the information,” said Shine, a friend of Ko Htuu Lou Rae’s whose aid group, Inter-Faith Alliance for Rakhine Relief (IARR), will receive half of the profits from the sales of the t-shirts. “You can just look at it and understand. Nothing has to be said.”

The logo is a streamlined version of one that Ko Htuu Lou Rae says he first saw in 2006 on t-shirts and bumper stickers.

The original features the same crescent and star for the “C”, a peace sign in place of the “O”, a combination of the male and female signs for “E”, the Jewish Star of David for the “X”, an “I” dotted with a Wiccan pentagram, a Taoist or Confucian yin-yang overlaid with an “S” and a Christian cross for the “T” spelling out the word “COEXIST” in a jumbled, inter-faith font.

The idea of reworking the design for Myanmar came shortly after the violence broke out in Rakhine State and Ko Htuu Lou Rae and his friends gathered to discuss what was happening.

The three longtime friends made for a curious group; Ko Htuu Lou Rae, an atheist, and his two friends, one a Rahkhine Buddhist and the other a Rohingya Muslim.

“We have been friends since we were 12 years old,” said Ko Htuu Lou Rae. “Kids that age don’t see themselves as a type and there aren’t as many prejudices.”

He has used a stack of business cards and hand shaking to let some people know about what he is doing but social networking sites, primarily Facebook, have served as a crucial vehicle to spread his ideas to a wider audience. “Without Facebook I don’t think the project would be possible,” he said.

With a computer, smartphone and expanding web of friends and groups he has reclaimed at least a piece of the social networking landscape, which has been used to spread rumours, disinformation and discriminatory comments about the conflict and groups involved. NGOs attempting to provide aid in Rahkine State have also been targeted.

“The main problem comes from online – online there is a lot of hate speeches and information is shared,” Shine said. “I’m so sad to read all the comments and posts which are written by young people, because in Myanmar most of the internet users are teenagers and young people. When you see that mindset it is very harmful for our future.”

Shine’s IARR is a region-specific offshoot of the larger Inter-Faith Coalition on Aid in Myanmar (IYCA-Myanmar), a group that he formed in 2006 and now has 50,000 volunteers operating across eight branches.

Like many other NGOs working in Rahkine State, IARR was not able to distribute the clothes, food and other goods it had collected to both affected communities when its volunteers visited the area last month. It is continuing to gather supplies but is waiting until it is given equal access to affected communities before returning to the area.

Ko Htuu Lou Rae said he believes that a long-term solution will only be found when the Rakhine and Rohingya communities engage in business with each other.

He attributes the idea to a case study he read that detailed a successful attempt to end ethnic conflict in Papua New Guinea.

“It [Rakhine State] is the second most impoverished state in Myanmar,” said Ko Htuu Lou Rae. “There are no career opportunities, no business opportunities and that type of pressure causes this type of conflict to happen.

“We need to express hope and a sense of equality with these relations. If it is the Rahkine that prosper but the Muslims are still oppressed, it will lead to the same situation.”

While many in Myanmar consider the Rohingya to be illegal immigrants and appear hostile to their plight, the t-shirts have found a market in Yangon. Over 50 of the first run have been sold and two local non-government organisations, Theik Khar (Dignity) and Teach Myanmar, have started stocking them.

The 50pc of profits not donated to IARR will be put towards printing another 1000 that Ko Htuu Lou Rae hopes to sell not only in Myanmar but also through friends in Los Angeles and New York.

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