Interview
Border News Agency
Myaybon ,May 28.
In Myaybon Township, which is under the control of the Arakan Army (AA), a 12-year-old displaced girl lost her right leg after stepping on a landmine on April 9.
She is a young internally displaced girl. While picking fiddleheads on a hillside near a dam close to a Myanmar junta base near Myaybon town, she stepped on a landmine, which resulted in the loss of her leg.
Border News Agency has interviewed the girl.
“When I stepped on the bomb, I heard a loud sound. I felt like I fell just as I started to run. Even though I had fallen, I still tried to get up and run. I didn’t even realize my leg had been blown off. It was only when the woman told me, ‘Your leg is gone,’ as I was crawling away, that I realized what had happened.”
“There were three of us who went up the hill – an elderly woman, her daughter, and me. Just the three of us. The woman walked ahead of us. Nothing happened at that moment. But when I went to pick some fiddleheads on the other side, where the greens were growing, I suddenly heard a sharp sound, and just as I started to run, the explosion happened.”
“I didn’t even realize that the landmine had blown off my leg. I didn’t feel like it was severed. After I ran and fell down, I crawled away. It was only when Ahree (the woman) said, ‘Your leg is gone,’ that I found out.”
“I got home after my grandmother came down from the hill and called some boys for help. They took me to the clinic right away. I don’t usually go up the hill, but that day, my mom didn’t go to collect snails, so I went instead – just for that one day. We went to gather food so the mothers and children at home would have something to eat. If we found a lot, we would sell some, and if we didn’t, we’d just keep it for ourselves. But we didn’t find much that day either.”
“I just go like this. Even today, I don’t have anything to cook. When I grow up, I will get a prosthetic leg. After that, I will open a shop.”
“My daughter says if she was rent to work at a Mont Di shop, she would work there. She also talks about working in a shop.”
“But my mother doesn’t make me work. She makes me stay right beside her. Mont Di shops and other shops are hiring people to work. My mother doesn’t force me to work. Once I get a prosthetic leg, I will start working. If my mother sells fish, I will help her sell as well. I will also work inside the shop. If my mother cooks rice and dishes, I will help her with that too.”
