on January 8th 2022 for the arrival of 2761 Karen New Year.
Under the dark cloud looming over us.
Ah Htoo
The dark cloud of global pandemic having its another full swing hitting community members who had to back down last minute — literally — after months of preparation and anticipation. Back home, our people — our relatives, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews — are running for their lives from senseless killings, aerial bombings on civilians virtually in front of the world.
This new year, most celebration go streaming for this age-old custom to avoid crowd. Are we foolish to gather for in-person festivity — or is it brave — history will judge. It was a risky endeavor but certainly with many cautionary measures — 30-foot high ceiling, tables sitting 10 feet apart in open space of double size high school gym. Everyone was reminded for Covid protocol, social distancing, while we were for socializing.
After all, this is a statement of resistance, a statement that our existence is real, so is the spirit to cherish our heritage, while we are actively destroyed at home. It is a moment of comforting — cheering up, like people hugging each other while going through calamity.
There were empty chairs and tables but not were the spirits. Sacramentonians are small in number but not their hearts, being unison in hospitality and hard work. Youths from the Bay were not back off but backed by big brother, I mean “sister” Christabelle Naw. If I may quote ancient saying “many daughters have done so well but you excel them all” — cuz I’ve seen your dedication.
While many events around the globe have gone quiet, the sound of ancient Karen Frog drum resonates Northern California with dances and songs of celebration. The spirits of our ancestors will rise, our people will rise, together we ward off evils from the land of our ancestors. And the people of our grandmother land must be free again.
Model in the picture is Ah Htoo who made things possible in this event. Watch the decoration. No other flags were raised in this event but that of the Karen People. Our flag is under no other flags — that’s the spirit of resistance and self-determination, may be rebellious.
Flag of the Karen People is a symbol of rebellion, flag of resistance for 75 years. Coup protesters had raised Karen People flags all over the land of our ancestors in the last year.
In fact, Karen New Year is an official holiday of a country for 84 years but most of its existence as an official holiday has been celebrated under an everlasting civil war. And the celebration is going strong and going global nowadays, except this year.
This celebration in Northern California is a testament that Karen People are resilient, relentless, and — well — rebellious.
Humanity admire bees for their work ethic, their nurturing humans with honey, and helping turn flowers into fruits.
But there are more to bee than those values we humans hold in admiration and gratitude.
A single bee can produce only one twelfth of a teaspoon of in her lifetime — yes, 1/12 of it, it’s nothing. A 50,000 bee hive needs 100 pounds — the weight of a small human — of honey to survive a subarctic winter.
What a single working bee can make for the survival of her colony is hopelessly insignificant. But a honey bee doesn’t look up to the problem and dismiss it as impossible. By a mass movement, they coordinate, they communicate, they collaborate to make honey not only the amount enough for winter but three times of it.
Above all, a bee doesn’t do it for herself, but for her younger sisters who are born in fall and live on in winter because a bee lives only six to eight weeks.
For us
For us, for the future generations living in their homeland will never again have to bow their heads to eat their tears, our generation will get our heads down and get the job done. We don’t look up to the problem in front of us and just be demoralized for its enormity.
This mass movement of true global collaboration working around the clock bringing different talents together for one goal — our land, our home, our freedom — is destined for triumph. Fragmented attempts, sloppy efforts will not lead us to the land our ancestors dreamed of. We are a blessing generation that have all the tools and technology at our disposal to connect, collaborate, and move the mountains together with all the individuals of burning desire to take up this God-given mission in synchrony.
Truely, this mission is neither for a faint heart nor for the ignorant. It involves a bet to life and death for defence and security, as much as it is gentle as a feature and smooth as diplomacy. It requires bravery and patience — vigor and intellect.
The mission may be long, may be a lifetime. The sacred struggle of freedom has been down on for four generations — starting since our great grand fathers. This could be the last that we finally rise up as a victorious generation only if we embrace this wisdom put into our face by nature, overcoming our individual insignificance.
The call is to work hard as a bee, yet It is a perspective shift, a change of mindset — wearing the robe of a victor, not the outfit of a victim that begging only for pity from outside and above.
If you are searching for a field of study, I want to point you to a glowing one, AI, Artificial Intelligence.
This random advice is personal and probably bias — is tailored to sons and daughters of Kawthoolei — so some discussions might not be relevant to many. This is, however, written in a universal language with humanity in mind.
Choosing a college major could be the most life impactful decision.
A compulsory decision made by adolescence can possibly have the most lifelong impact on their identity, as well as social, economic and intellectual strength — wealth, income, education and occupation.
Some youths may have already made up their mind even before they enter a college without enough exposure to their chosen fields, like being asked a damaging what-do-you-want-to-be-when-you-grow-up question. We are living in a new age where a single industry drives all other remaining industries. Many of the menial and tedious tasks are eliminated everyday in the new industry; wisdom of the new age is constantly blooming.
What happens behind the scene has more commanding power than what’s traditionally seen in view.
Computer Science and computer programmers are often misunderstood until recently. Like computer programmers, AI has been wildly misrepresented in movies.
Yes, It’s coming and unstoppable.
AI — whether you like it or not, or whether you understand it or not — is rebellious and in a stage of being unstoppable. One can stay detached, cynical, ignorant of it and become vulnerable to its power, or learn to master it for the welfare and progress of humanity. We can’t let new generations of our people, the Karen, be destined to be victims like previous generations while many of us have the opportunity to equip ourselves and participate in the power distribution.
Throughout history people learn to use powerful machines to help them free from backbreaking tasks or that simply humanly incapable of. At the opposite edge, being in the state where one is incapable of controlling powerful machines may just create fear.
Digital knowledge is empowerment
Knowledge in computer science and its application in industries is empowerment. It is a drop of the veil when you are in behind the scenes and be a part of how industries operate the ubiquitous digital information.
AI is increasingly influencing our decisions and making decisions for you. If you don’t learn to master it, at least the basis, decisions could be made for you by a nebulous master.
California Karen youth camp summer 2021
AI is rapidly influencing our life
AI is already in our daily routine.
All the internet giants, Google, Facebook, Amazon, heavily rely on AI to provide services to their users.
Google already anticipates what you are looking for and gives hints in the search box before you type a single letter.Facebook algorithm feeds you Ads popup close enough to what you’re just barely thinking of buying.
A smartphone that didn’t exist over a decade ago now is in everybody’s hand connecting to the supercomputer, the internet. The phone and supercomputer always are together at work to have better analysis for you. It suggests locations to go based on your routine, giving directions to work in the morning, to home after work, to church or temple on Sunday morning.
Future is here.
AI now acts like a personal guardian spirit, checking the pattern of one’s steps and tapping on one’s shoulder when they misstep. When an alarm is still on for a public holiday, one could get a gentle reminder about that harsh alarm for the restful holiday.
AI is looking out at you on the road — telling you the road ahead is congested and suggesting you take a new route. When your vehicle is dangerously close to another, it will stop you from accelerating and pull you back to save your life.
Although AI sounds futuristic, it is already consumer-ready and heavily used virtually in all industries.
Self-driving cars may fail big in the big press. Machine intelligence may be laughed at, but Machine Learning is maturing very quickly. AI is equipped and at work in many of the new production of many vehicles — driver assistance making millions of calculations in a second for a single safe decision.
Safe self-driving cars would be a common thing to see in our generation.
Our generation starts talking to machine saying “hey google” or “hey Siri” although we are aware of its limitations and probably make fun of its shortcomings. But it will be of our sons and daughters, both in life and at work, to interact with machine as though they are intelligent beings.
New Generation School in Kawthoolei, 2014.
Machine learning and AI are just a normal part of the world now.
Consumer drones can now fly home by themselves avoiding obstacles along the way, using data from sensors and GPS coordination.
Banking industry uses pattern recognition to detect fraud. You would receive an automated call from your bank for using a credit card as suspicious when it is used as such — it is artificial intelligence (single task) at work.
Not every logic is explicitly programmed in those set up. Most industries use a semi artificial intelligence, with a combination of human and computing, AI is assisting human decision.
In medicine, a typical vaccine that takes a decade to develop in a complex process now takes only a year for Covid-19 vaccine that has heavily applied artificial intelligence, integrating a network of existing research and simulating possible scenarios of the effect of the vaccine. Global pandemic is tackled by global collaboration using digital technology intelligently.
Cutting-edge tech is everywhere.
You don’t have to be in California, or be on the coast, to be on the edge of technology. Anything tech doesn’t have to be designed in California and it isn’t sustainable as well. Actually, many great things are happening in the Midwest. Indiana University had won a CIO award – that’s about a decade ago already — for its top-notch digital library system and its IT infrastructure — making vast research materials accessible. The award compared IT products and infrastructure across hundreds of other industries.
Endless options to specialize in the field of AI
AI itself has many fields to pursue — – pattern recognitions (speech, voice, objects), – Machine Learning (autonomous decision making), – natural language processing (NLP) (Machine translation) and many more may be subdivided and specialized.
Pattern recognition is a piece of cake for a toddler — recognizing a real fire truck while never seen it before but in pictures — but it is very difficult for machines to recognize the pattern. That’s why humans have to prove to a computer that “I am not a robot” to show off their pattern recognition skills.
How do I know this is the best fit for me?
You don’t need to be an outlier or outsmart anyone.
To pursue a study in AI, you need a good foundation as much as any other fields you are to pursue.
A good foundation would prepare you for success in learning, such as a solid foundation on general science and math that prepares you for calculus and linear algebra. Prepare yourself to have a good idea of the limitations and capabilities of mechanical and electronic machines. You might not think of those in day-to-day jobs, but that theoretical knowledge would help time and again in thinking of the problems and crafting solutions with confidence.
Like anything under the sun, to enjoy what you are doing, you have to be good at it. To be good at it, you have to have a knack for it. To have a knack for it, it’s good to have a full grasp on foundational knowledge.
In college, you may need to take the same foundational and theoretical courses in Computer Science before specializing in an AI subfield.
Mathematical model in nature: Fibonacci sequence
Specialization is the goal but balance it by acquire a diverse wealth of knowledge.
While taking a STEM major, you can still explore arts and humanity subjects to offset the danger of a single side knowledge. Being well-versed in both sides of knowledge is important since both science and social science have an impact on the progress of humanity. It isn’t uncommon for a student to major in STEM and minor in social science. In the U.S, it is estimated 25% of the college students graduate with more than one major. I, for one, did double major in International Studies and Computer Science. So, I say, go have fun, take the challenge.
Coding is a New Literacy
Most science and technical majors in college now require some programming courses. It becomes a necessity even without a requirement. Data needs to be analyzed and manipulated to gain insight for research. Programming becomes a new literacy to read and write data in higher ed.
Fluency in a programming language resembles fluency in a foreign language since a programming language is technically a language to communicate not only with machines but also with fellow programmers. Programming is to logically organize ideas for a solution.
Coding is an extended form of writing.
Mitchel Resnick (MIT)
As a matter of fact, programming requires principally imagination — very little upfront infrastructure cost. Most computers (including smartphones) connect to supercomputers that can do heavy processing.
To get one’s feet wet, get involved in open source.
Collaborative open-source software creates opportunities for a true international collaboration. Open source technology encourages tinkering projectsthat a beginner can learn, grow, and contribute back.
Contributing in open source creates opportunities for learning, networking, developing communication skill — being able to articulate your idea clearly and succinctly, being able to work with others in complex organization, is a skill that carries a heavier weight than technical skills in a professional environment. Those contributions would also serve as a concrete reference. Github profile is now favored over a made-up resume.
Lately, there is a big press of Boston Dynamic that a robot that can balance itself nearly like a living animal on terrains with loads, or dance to the rhythm. Those are commercial projects with costly investment. For a college student, one can start with Raspberry Pi for a fun and useful project with very little cost.
Programming is easy.
Programming is easy and fun. Designing scalable architecture to meet complex business workflow isn’t. Occasionally, you may need to come up with a genius clever solution to tackle tough problems while your teammate runs out of ideas.
Programming requires logical, clear thinking, imagining possible scenarios and holding hypotheses before implementing it. Machine Learning, AI, takes away the work of explicitly writing logic, but humans still need to monitor and train machines with instructions, programming them to program.
Professional programmers have to consider accessibility, and security rather than simply implementing logic. Most of the time, those necessary emphasis eat up more time to build an inclusive, scalable, and secure system.
Standing on the shoulder of many giants
However, no technology is built from scratch, rather on top of each other. You usually don’t need to develop consuming works of foundational tools to build a larger system. We can also participate and learn from a wealth of knowledge from other successes and failures and adapt to your needs.
Career Prospect
Many opportunities abound for those who can program well. So far, there isn’t much big press on starving programmers, rather the shortage of it.
The trend will still likely be upward north in high demand as digital technology becomes the driving force of all business and organizations.
AI for rebuilding Kawthoolei
Kawthoolei needs more builders, who walk the walk.
We can only talk about changes, yet change needs change-makers, go-getters, capable of making changes at micro level. For the people Karen, we’ve talked about change, we’ve been fighting for it generation after generation, now to actually go build for a change. The fight itself needs many hands and many materials.
Making a change is often tedious, uncelebrated, and small-scale, but it is behind the scenes where the real change one wishes to see is happening.
Asking for pity isn’t sustainable and it doesn’t work to free us from suffering. Karen people, the long persecuted, have been characterized as victims. Constantly publishing the spreadsheet of our suffering is neither empowerment nor doesn’t do justice that intended.
International political order doesn’t guarantee to be on the side of victims and losers. In fact, it is the opposite. A nation has to learn to stand up on its own feet. As much as we can’t ask BerYorr to give us Kawthoolei, we can’t expect seemingly good-will wealthy organizations to build Kawthoolei for us.
Some practical projects for Kawthoolei would be landmine clearing, autopilot drones, surveying of all kinds, lightweight transportation in rugged terrains, security, territorial watch (IoT), supply chain and distribution.
If we can afford if (make it when), we subscribe to a satellite service and have our dedicated monitoring and communication system.
For us, the Karen people, we have to roll our sleeves, wipe away our tears, and go make the change we want to see.
Attempting to rebuild Kawthoolei with uninformed, indifferent, undisciplined individuals who spend most of their time in an echo chamber could only render detrimental effects.
A lookout from PCT. pwarr tee gay nay pwarr taay nay aw
As much as there is a need for a wise counsel of many that plans and strategizes well, we need people who are capable of executing well.
Every effective system now utilizes digital technology.
Rather than solely rely on human monitoring for defense, precision surveillance can detect unusual patterns of movement whether it is belligerent or benign. A Kawthoolei commander in his command center can make an intelligent decision for early detection and early elimination.
At security checkpoints, AI can help with face detection, recognition and alert, rather than solely rely on manually checking authorized issued identification cards.
Kawthoolei defense force needs super precision intelligence to perform precision strike by having intelligence of enemy movement.
Do it for Kawthoolei, if it isn’t for you.
There is a severe shortage of technocrats and technologists in Kawthoolei. Kawthoolei — the land as fertile and water is abundant — can be self-sufficient if we harness all the renewable energy and natural resources efficiently. For instance, many countries apply AI in agricultural work to be more predictable, more productive, less laborious, and more efficient harvest and distribution.
So go learn the cutting edge and be a master of the unstoppable.
Go make innovation. Go build Kawthoolei. Go make a better world for the left-behind people and beyond.
Saw Lah.
The views in this article are those of the author.
This article was written in collaboration with Manger Baw of UNO. Saw Lahkbaw is a programmer by day, a community organizer by weekend, and a lifelong learner by birth.
Karen People in California 