Interview Responses

When did you move from Burma? How old where you? How did your family apply to come to the US and how long did it take to get accepted? Describe your life in Burma? What is farming like?

Response:

Name: Bei Ta Tha
Arrived in the US: December 14, 2010 
Age of Arrival: 12

"We have to go to the refuge camp or office very early in the morning about 6 or 5 and get inside to apply for it. Once we got inside the gate they will ask you why you ran away from your country, about your age, gender, about siblings and stuff like that, and you have to memorize them every time you went back to the refuge camp. You will have to tell what problem you're in at your country about all the hardships and stuff like that."

"In Burma I or my family didn't have enough money to send me to schools because we have to buy a lot of stuff with our own money and we don't really make money from jobs and working in the farm"

"I usually stay at the farm with my grandpa almost whole year and went back home on the Christmas day and some other holidays.We don't usually stay at home very much, we spend most of our time at the farm working everyday. We chopped down about 1.65 acres and burn all trees so we can get grow crops. we mostly grow corns and we have to do by our hand.Once we harvest the crops, we have to carry it on our backs all the way to our home about 3 hours walking sometime."

Although I was not able to upload the video, these were the insightful responses I got from my interview with Bei. Hearing his responses and how they were so much similar to my reach made my information even more reliable. His story was also really touching, especially about the part about about working every day all year and only seeing his family during Christmas. He was also telling about sometimes not having enough money to go back for Christmas because all of the money, if any, was sent back home to his family. Hearing his story has inspired me to want to help end world hunger and poverty even more than before.