Date: Sun, 6 Apr 2008 07:15:37 -0600 (MDT)
Subject: From Fighter to Paramedic

From Fighter to Paramedic
Having spent most of my life learning to end life, it is a bit of a change
learning to save it.

By Antonio Graceffo

"Bakers cover their mistakes with frosting. Carpenters cover their
mistakes with paint. Paramedics cover their mistakes with dirt."

The course began with a playing of the Philippine national anthem,
followed by a prayer. Being in a Catholic, rather than Buddhist country,
it was so refreshing not having to take of my shoes. And, unlike Thailand,
I was permitted to point my feet at anyone I wanted and even rub their
head. It's good to be among my own people…sort of my own people.

Sir Aiden is the owner of our school and the primary instructor. He hates
George Bush, which is a good thing. He hates Americans, which I could
understand but could also do without. Being Irish, he also hates Briton.
So, when class gets boring I bring up stories of my family being driven
off their land by imperialist British soldiers who burned our thatched
hut.

"The F…ing British." Aiden begins. "They are worse than the Americans."
Once I get him on this subject, we are guaranteed at least twenty minutes
that we don't have to take notes. Or, just one note, in case it comes up
on the test, I simplified the British/Irish thing for my classmates. It
reads "British bad, Irish good."

I enjoy studying with the Irish, they are one of my favorite translucent
people. And as organ sales are common in Philippines, being the owner of
two healthy kidneys, I try to make friendships with rich alcoholics who
may need to buy one.

Or is that the liver that alcoholics need? Probably not. Liver and alcohol
upsets your stomach. Anyway, I could sell them one of my livers if things
got really desperate.

You do have two livers don't you? That would be an example of one of those
times when I should have been taking notes instead of winding Aiden up.

As for EMS emergency medical services, Aiden is recognized as one of the
leaders in the world. I was googling his name the other day and was blown
away by how many times he is mentioned in professional journals. He
founded the EMS systems in a number of countries, higher the staff,
trained them, bought the ambulances. He is really amazing. In terms of his
practical knowledge, he was a dive paramedic, and a member of the faculty
at the dive academy in the UK. He was a military paramedic, and who knows
what else. Maybe he was a rescue swimmer like Kevin Kostner in "The
Guardian." The man knows his stuff.

Ma'am Joan, is Aiden's wife. She is a Filipina, and is certified as both
an RN and a paramedic. She is our second primary instructor. Aiden and
Joan both said that once you learn EMS you don't want to do normal nursing
anymore because ongoing patient care is boring in comparison.

My friend and classmate Ben is RN, but he is becoming an EMT because he
didn't want to wash the patients. "Sometimes you even have to clean up
their poop." He confessed. I could see why four years of really difficult
university studies, followed by intimate contact with excrement could be a
downer.

Aiden's take on EMS versus medicine was, "We see the patient from the time
of the injury, to the time they get through the emergency room. After
that, they become boring. We are lucky to have them at the most
interesting time."

It also seems that in EMS when you rescue someone, they thank you, and the
family thanks you. But once they are in the hospital as long term
patients, they behave like hotel guests and start complaining.  Once
again, to have four years of university studies capped off by complaints
about dinner…it would feel like being a highly specialized waitress.

"I am the only RN ho ever came back to my country." Said Joan.

Ben told me that the normal RN salary in Philippines is 5,000 Pesos per
month (about $120 USD). In most of the world, with the exception of the
USA, paramedics actually earn more than nurses. The reason is that the US
set up their paramedic programs in the 1970s. So, they are already
established and well-manned. In the rest of the world, 911 type response
systems are new, and training programs are either developing or
non-existent. In these countries there is no shortage of doctors or nurses
but a fully qualified paramedic is a rarity.

Most of the course is taught in English, but the students sometimes ask
questions in Filipino. It is OK, I am trying to learn the language.
Generally, even the instructors don't know the Filipino words for the
specialized medical vocabulary. This country is so America centric it is
amazing. I think it is one of the few places on Earth where they still
like us. When I walk down the street people always shout, "Hey, Joe." The
first time it happened, I looked around for my father, but then I realized
it was me. We all look alike.

There innumerable dialects and languages spoken throughout the more than
seven thousand islands of the Philippines. Tagalog was chosen as the
national language simply because it was spoken in Luzon, the big island
where Manila is located. Many Filipinos resent being forced to speak
Tagalog when they meet their country men from other parts of the country.
Since they don't speak to each other's dialects, English was seen a
politically neutral lingua franca. So, it is normal for Filipinos to speak
English to each other if they have trouble communicating in dialect. It is
also normal that university and school courses are taught in English. So,
having me in the class only slightly alters the language usage. Still, I
am amazed that the Filipinos are so polite that the presence of a single
Cano (Americano) causes them all to speak English.
While their accent is American, unlike Hong Kong, their pronunciation is
at times, a bit…creative. At first I thought I was the only one missing
out on one word in seven, then I realized they have trouble understanding
each other.

Ma'am Joan was saying something about blacking the arteries, we asked her
to explain what that meant and she wrote on the board, "Blocking the
arteries."
"OH! BLOCKING the arteries. That makes more sense."
"Yes, blacking the arteries." She repeated. "Try to listen more closely
next time."

I have no idea what it will be like when I start doing my practice on the
streets of manila and people are shouting at me in a language I don't
speak, and then I discover it is English.

Our first lessons were on human anatomy. Here I had another linguistic
adventure in trying to understand Sir Aiden. Apparently, in nearly all
biological terminology, the people from those islands, UK and Ireland, put
the accent on a different syllable than the Americans. The spelling is the
same, but they move the accent in capillary, bronchioles, and many other
words. They also refer to the gurney or stretcher as a cot. Which was
doubly hard for me because, when I used to have a British girlfriend, she
taught me that in UK, a cot was what Americans call a crib. But now, in
the ghetto, crib is what Americans used to call an apartment. And in EMS
class, a cot has wheels on it and is used for moving injured patients.

Many of our training videos are from those islands where leprechauns run
free and everyone drinks tea instead of coffee and lives in a castle. Most
of the English ones aren't too bad, but Aiden has a slue of videos from
Scotland. Those people should just be fitted with a subtitle generator at
birth. I have no idea what they are blabbering on about. Judging by the
glazed look on my classmates faces, they don't understand Scottish any
better than I do.

This confused me, because in school we were taught that the British
invented our language, but none of them seem to speak it.

When I protested, Aiden mumbled, "Bloody American."

Converting my mind from Martial arts to paramedic has been difficult. I
normally refer to the patient as an opponent. I also learned a lot of new
terminology like blood is called hemo, and unlike when I am fighting, the
blood, I mean hemo, is supposed to stay in the inside.

Through years of martial arts training, I knew some of the anatomy, like
carotid artery. This is where I strike with a chop, to knock a man out.
This technique is often referred to as a "Jap drop." Not very PC, I know.
Kidneys are something I hit with a knee. Trachea is with the open hand.
The armpit contains the axially artery, which is one that has to be done
with a knife thrust

Aiden told us, "As an EMT you will have life and death in your hands. And
what you do will decide if the patient lives or dies."

As a soldier, I was taught almost the same credo, but sort of in reverse.

During this course I am always amazed at what a wide variety of things we
learned in high school. We had basic anatomy, biology, chemistry…I didn't
think I had learned anything useful in those classes, but when we see it
in EMT class, although I don't know it cold, I know I have seen it before.
What I like abut EMT is learning all of the life saving techniques without
having to struggle through biology, chemistry and math which would be
impossible for me. That's why doctors have to be right clever people to
get through their years and years of education. I have huge respect for
them now.

Our goal in EMS is very simple, to keep Oxygen going to the brain till the
patient gets to hospital. Without oxygen, the brain begins to die in four
minutes. Organs take 50 minutes, skin and muscles take five hours.

The EMT must assess quickly and decide to "load and go" or "stay and
play." You have to make a lot of decisions, in a short period of time,
with the pressure of life or death hanging over you. Being an EMT is not
so different from working on Wall Street or even boxing. It appeals to me.

When I teach self-defense, I always tell people not to fight especially if
the assailant has a knife. Self-defense is like baseball, the goal is to
run home. If you reach your destination alive, you are a winner. In EMS,
the goal is to help the patient reach the hospital alive. In most cases,
you don't stay and fight, you run away and save a life.

Aiden and Joan are very religious, and they have a nice philosophy which
they live by. "People arrive on the scene and see problems. We see
solutions." That was Aiden's EMS motto, but his next statement was like a
lifestyle mantra. "The only true problem is death, because once it happens
it can't be solved. Everything else has a solution."

He asked my class, "Have any of you had a problem in your life? Yes, but
you solved it didn't you? So, you didn't really have a problem. You had a
solution. And you know how I know? Because you aren't dead yet."

We learned about the circulatory system. An adult heart pumps 5 Lt of
blood per minute. An adult body contains 5 – 6 Lt of blood. That will
cause some dry cleaning issues. I remember my Uncle Sonny telling me he
preferred a .22 to a .45, "That way your suits will always stay nice and
fresh, after a job." He never went to school, but he had a certain
homespun wisdom that you could live by.

The rule book said, Safety first: Size up the scene. Make sure it is safe
for you and your patient. Don't go from being a paramedic to being a
patient.

Relating this to going back to Burma as a combat medic, however, you are
in the same danger zone as your patients. And you can be injured, but have
to focus and work. I had that experience when we had an accident on the
Burma border. I was knocked unconscious, but still had to crawl around and
render aid. A friend working for a security contractor said that they hire
both SWAT and ex-military to work as security contractors. He said that
they were both good, but the problem with the SWAT guys was that when they
were rushing into a building to get a sniper out, they assume that their
back is safe. The danger is only coming form inside the house. But, in
real combat the whole area is hot. There is potential danger on all sides.
It is the same for combat paramedic. You are almost never safe. In fact,
since you are traveling with the troops, then it stands to reason, if they
are injured, you are in an unsafe place, but you still have to go about
your work.

My family and friends keep sending me emails that say things like, "We are
so glad you are out of Burma and safe in Manila."

I like the people here, so I don't want to insult anyone, but Manila is a
lot more dangerous than Burma. Violent crime is rampant, and people get
shot here all the time. And, unlike the States, you can't trust the police
or emergency services to come help you. We are the best EMS in the
Philippines, but we didn't graduate yet. According to Aiden, in Manila, of
280 EMS calls per hour, less than 20 get answered.

One of the UK training videos we watched was of a paramedic on a
motorcycle. The idea is motorcycles can arrive at the scene faster and
start rendering aid while waiting for the ambulance to come and evacuate
the patient.
"Any comments?" Aiden asked, when the video had finished.
"Cool uniform." I said.
"We all wear that flash-green jacket and helmet in the UK."
"No, I meant the leather pants. Do we all get to wear leather pants?"
"No."
"Well, is there some other career I can pursue where I do where leather
pants? I don't want to throw away six months of hard work and study only
to continue wearing cloth."

The only career I could think of where I could wear leather pants was
go-go boy, but I had already done that one, and there were no course
openings in Manila.

Aiden told us that in the UK all people are assigned a primary care
physician from birth. "For the rest of our lives, if we have a medical
problem, we get free medical care. If you are injured and need to get to
your physiotherapy appointments, the ambulance will transport you for
free. That is what a government can do if it sets its priorities on the
people."

Yes, maybe in a perfect world. But, if governments squander their tax
budgets on medical care how will they fund the military?

Saving lives is a calling. Aiden served in the military, but in UK an army
medic is a noncombatant. In the US military he is a soldier first. He is
armed and must engage the enemy if called upon to do so. The same is true
in the war in Burma where no one can afford to specialize. I want to learn
paramedic skills to help save lives, but I favor a military solution in
Burma and believe there are times that violence is justified or even
called for.

Aiden, on the other hand, finds killing appalling. For this reason he is
better at his job as an EMT. "Only God can take life." He said.

I wondered if he would hate me for my willingness to pickup a gun. It made
me a bit sad and introspective. With the exception of psychopaths like
Hitler and the Junta who run Burma, no one wants to be the bad-guy. It
pained me that someone might point at me and say that I am the villain.

Ma'am Joan taught our next block of instruction. She talks a lot about the
rights of patients. The Philippines is a very stratified society, where
half of the haves don't have very much, the other half have everything.
The have-nots comprise nearly 80 percent of the population, and they have
absolutely nothing.

"In the Philippines no one is to blame if they are poor. Being poor is not
your fault." She paused to let that sink in. Then she added, "But being
rich is. If someone in the Philippines is rich, we have to ask where the
money came from."

Corruption is rampant in the country and is often identified as the single
most crippling force holding back the economic development of the people.

Joan gave a lengthy lecture on discrimination against poor patients in the
hospital. Sometimes these people were abused verbally and even physically.
She said things like "Don't try this with white people. They will stand up
for their rights. But we Pinoys let people push us around."

Organ sales are common in the Philippines, and apparently, some medical
staff accept a commission for brokering the sales when a patient dies.
"This is unethical." Joan told us, as if maybe we didn't already know.
"Let the families make their own arrangements to sell the organs."

"It is illegal and awful, but poverty makes people desperate."

This phrase, "poverty makes people desperate," is a recurring theme in the
Philippines. There are a lot of cases in the news of people jumping off of
bridges or committing violent robberies that are so public and stupid,
they seem more like cries for help. Money is really tight for me during
school, and I live in very basic, jail-cell-like conditions, but I still
can't imagine the grind of real poverty. To know that you can't provide
for your family and that there is no hope that tomorrow will be any better
must be absolutely incapacitating.

Doing my anatomy homework, it occurred to me that this stuff is freaking
hard. There is a reason that doctors study for ten years.  In the
Philippines, however, anatomy study is slightly easier, because I can just
drop by the market and pick up a human kidney and practice in my room.

Pinoy Paramedic Email 4

For all of their education and training, the Filipino's approach to diet
and exercise is dated. In fact, everyone smokes. They are all fat, and no
one exercises at all. The course had a unit which said EMTs should be fit,
exercise regularly, and eat right. Joan repeated the what was written on
the overhead, basically, "you should exercise every day, eat a healthy
diet, and keep fit." But that was the end of it. We went on to the next
slide. No exercise program was laid out, nothing was planned. It occurred
to me, how many times in my life have I sat in an orientation at a school
or a company where they said, "You should do fifteen minutes of aerobic
exercise per day, keep fit sleep and eat right, next slide."

In America, kids are required to attend gym classes but they don't work
out or do any serious exercise. The kids who are fat or have no fitness or
muscle tone in September are fat and have no fitness or muscle tone in
May. I think the kids should be given a fitness test at the beginning and
end of the year. If they fail, the gym teacher should be fired. Seriously,
if we are going to eat up an hour of class time per day, why don't we
demand fitness?

According to a July report, the National Center for Health Statistics
indicate 15 percent of children ages 6 to 18 were overweight in 2000, up
from 6 percent in 1980. Fifteen percent of youngsters ages 6 to 19 and 10
percent of children 2 through 5 were considered seriously overweight.
Sources: AHA.
According to the Weight Control Information Network, which may or may not
be a reliable source, today, more than 65 percent of adults in the United
States are overweight or obese. Obesity puts people at increased risk for
chronic diseases such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, high blood
pressure, stroke, and some forms of cancer.
In our EMT course we learned that heart disease is the number one cause of
death in the world. WHAT are we waiting for? Get off the freaking coach
already. And as for the kids, kids shouldn't be fat. And parents shouldn't
make the kids fat. If kids get fat later, at least they had a choice. But
as children they rely on their parents to take care of them. Once again,
parents of overweight children should be fined.

I spend less than 45 minutes in the gym per day and I am probably fitter
than 90% of people. Why can't we do this for our kids?

The next slide was a dietary advisement right out of the 1950s when bacon
was thought to be good for you. It had a picture of the food group pyramid
and it said that 60% of our diet should be composed of carbohydrates. Joan
stressed to us, "If you want to lose weight please don;'t cut carbs, your
brain can only function on glucose.'

While it is true that your brain only functions on glucose, carbs are the
first place you should cut when dieting. Otherwise, what are you going to
cut? Fish, meat, vegetables, fruit….

Time sense is an issue here. You wait for everything. I waited in line for
an ATM for twenty minutes the other day. You are always waiting, things
take longer and everyone is late. But no one seems to mind. To travel five
kilometers could take one and a half hours, but no one ever walks. I walk
to the mall and my classmate got lost on the public transport. It's only
like 600 kilometers away. Why not walk?

My classmates and I got drunk after class and gave each other tattoos with
IV needles. We were working together on an assignment. Aiden had asked us
to design an ambulance, inside and out. Ours had Playstation, CD, DVD, and
a Borat headbobber. For an engine, I chose a straight twelve hemy. I am
not exactly sure what that is, but I suspected it was wicked fast.

When we presented our design, Aiden said, "That all draws current and runs
down your battery." A serious concern in the ambulance is running out of
electrical power before getting back to the hospital. Incubators, for
example, draw a lot of current. If you get stranded, you increase the
chances of your patient dying.

Filipinos talk about America constantly. America is the standard by which
everything else is measured and still the number one country they want to
go to. But checking  on line, in USA paramedics only earn about $4,000 per
month. In the Middle East they can earn $2,500 tax free, and get free
accommodations and food. If you did the Middle East deal you could easily
save $2,000 per month. In US, after paying taxes and apartment there would
be nothing left. In many, many instances my classmates mention that one or
the other country in Europe has a better procedure or equipment than the
Americans. But America remains the standard. I tried to convince Ben he
would be better off as an EMT in Qatar or as an RN in America, but going
to America to be a paramedic was not a good idea. They don't understand
that $4,000 is nothing in USA and $2,500 in the Middle East is a better
deal.
grom
Aiden always gets talking and forgets about our breaktimes and lunches. I
wrote the word coffee in hugfe capital letters on the back of my textbook
so when it is time for break I can hold it up . joan always says just one
more minute and I will let you go but it was another thirty five minutes.
Iu had to fakle a seaizure to get us released for lunch. Mondya I have to
prduce a note from my doctor confirming that I have a medical condition
called hypo-cafination and need coffee every two hours or I will descend
into a state of hypo-cafiosis. That will cost a pretty penny.

Ben ging home took his atm cards out of his wallet. "This is manila we
always have to prepare in case we get robbed.

Emts here have not cross trained most police and eben fore don't have
advanced first aid and emst don't learn rescue.

Erik told us no rescue no rappelleing no difuising bombs no terroriszt
threat illimination. Only medical.

Too boring I want to change courses.

Triage in manila if yu have one patient suiffering form gunshot wound and
one with a sprained wrist who do tyou take to the hospital first
Answer, the rich one.

Only supposed to have one patient in  the ambulance but it doesn't always
work out that way. He said that on ce in the nmiddle east he had a whole
family and a goat which is unsiual because in the Philippines you don't
usually use an ambulance to transport a goat. A pig maybe,m a few
chickens, but never a goat.

He lectured us about the golden hour. Basically the brian starts to die
after 4 minutes buyt if it is still gett8ing oxygen then the next one is
the internall organs which start to die after 50 minutes. So we call it
the goilden hour, the narrow windonw of time we have to respond and take
the patient to the hospital. Of course the hour starts when the patient
gets hurt, not when we arrive. We are toild that our gola is to spend only
ten minutes on site.

In usa someone sees an injured person., they call 911. the dispatecher
uses GPS to locate them gets some pertinent information and sends out an
ambulance But in manila laughs erik thoigs don't work the way they do in
usas. If they see an accident they call emergency number dispatcher askls
what kind of emergency do you want plice or ambulance or fire. You tekll
her which one you need then she aska where are you and it is not always
easy in Philippines to know where someone is so it is a lkong discussion
then they blook it up and give you a landline phone number for the closest
command station. You call them and they refer you to the specific station.
You call them and assuming they answer the phone they come. A lot of time
is lost in traffic in manila where it could take over an hour to travel 5
KM. also a lot of time will be lost looking for the place. When the
ambiuklance arrives, the police are not trained and donmt necessarily take
comntroil of the situatin often the crowd is a huge impediment to the
rescue workers.

"when you have an accident in the Philippines the first people to respond
are the onlookers." In a country where many people don't have a lot of
disposable income and aren't bogged down by a job which eats up their
time, EMS emergencies can be seen as a cheap source of entertainment. "the
second group to arrive is the media. Then the npoliticians." Ostensibly
this ancient system of ward boasses sto;lll exists where they would show
up and shake babiues and kiss hands. "Next comes EMS/" pnce we are sure
the situatin is safe the police arrive.

Ems dfoes their work and transports the patient to the hospital. At
present there are only three trauma centers in manila. It could take ages
to reach one of these trauma centers only tyo find out that the hospital
is full and you are being turned away.

The golden hour could easily turn into the golden three hours. Especially
oif your patient is poor. For rich people., once again nearly everything
is possible with private ambulances and private admission to the best
hospitals.

In primary assessment ask patient what is the quality of the pain.
Quality? It sucks. So I would say the quality is quite shitty. They
suggest giving the patient a scale so they can measure their pain, the
example given in the book uses a scale f 1 to 10, ten being the highest.
The bok stresses that this is just a suggestion and we can do it however
we wish. But I prefer a scale of 3.9 to 11.7 with 11.7 being the lowest.

We studied ten ways to tell if your patient is unresponsive. Aiden pinted
out it is pretty easy to determine. "Just talk to him." See if he answers
ask hiom some questins and see if he gibbers nonesense.

They all knew that UFC referee Big John  McCarthy is a paramedic.

I am getting to find out interestingt stuff like what the hell is a
spleen? I mean you've heard of the spleen, but what is it?

This is the first non-language course I have taken since I was a junior I
college, more than fifteen years ago. I like EMT because it has all of the
life saving stuff which I find interesting but without having to learn all
of the medical and chemsisrtry  and bilogy that I know I could never
learn. Also the first one taught ain English well mostly I English but my
classmates often ask questions in tagolog bt iut is ok I am trying to
learn the lanaguge I am always amazed at the English spoken here. They do
prefer to speak tagaolog to each other but when they have to talk to me in
engliosh they are all near native speakers and they watch all of our
movies and eat at Taco bell so the cultural differences are not so huge
except for the time issue.

I wrote in my notebook, "Cytoplasm is made up of protoplasm and occupies
the space between the plasma membrane and the bucleus." How many times
have I written that exact sentence in my life? Probably at least five
times between fourth grade and freshman year of college? Why? And why did
it always seem new to me each time even now it has very little meaning for
me I braely understand what it means and how it reflects to what I need to
do to save a life.

Learning anatomy thoracic park, a trip back to a time when the iternal
organs ruled the earth.

Being a paramedic is one of the only time syou get to cut a girls clothes
off without buying her dinner first or getting hit with pepper spray.
Training video from usa showed us how to ciut the clothes off of the
victim. Teacher Eric laughed at the video, "They doi it wrong in USA they
cut straight ypo the frint. Here in the Philippines you need to cut along
the seam so that the people can have the clothes repaired if they want to
reuse them.

Over the six years I have been writing and publishing stories I have built
up a personal mailing list of about 4,000 people, plus all of the readers
of the hundreds of magazines and websites where my stories appear. As a
result I get a lot of email from strangers and a lot of unsolicited advice
from people. If I followed most of it, I would be dead.  I would like to
take this time to answer some of these emails.

1. Reader: "Why don't you sell your stories to big magazines, wouldn't
they pay better than the small ones?"

Response: I didn't realize the big magazines paid better. Now, I feel like
an idiot. Big magazines have been offering me huge pay checks, but I
stupidly turned them down to write for peanuts in obscurity.

2. Reader: "Instead of putting your videos on youtube for free why don't
you sell them to TV?"

Response: See response number one.

3. This next one is classic. At least the first two knew that I do sell my
stuff but just don't make a lot of money.

Reader: "You should try selling some of your stories." This person
suggested after reading one my stories in a paying magazine. "National
Geographic would probably be interested in some of your work."

National Geographic comes up a lot in these suggestions. Let me just head
that one off, right now.

Response: National Geographic really doesn't like queries. More than 90%
of their stories are thought up and decided on in house, then they are
given as assignments to prominent people working in the field.  A lot of
the biggest magazines only give assignments. Play Boy is a good example.
They pay a huge amount but they contact you, not the other way around.

If you have any contacts please let them know I am very available.

4. Recently a number of TV people have contacted me because of my Burma
youtube videos. They all promised to make me a star and all made me
promise never to use youtube again. "It is obviously not working for you."
They said.

Response: Well, it brought you to me, didn't it, Momo. So, it must be
working.

As of yet, all I had from any of these TV people was a ton of talk,
followed by silence. If I had taken their advice and quit youtube I would
have nothing at all. At least now my videos are getting out there.

Currently, Antonio is taking is in Manila attending paramedic training.
When his course finishes he will return to the conflict in Burma as a
medical volunteer. He is self-funded and seeking sponsors. If you wish to
contribute to his paramedic training or his "In Shanland" film project,
you can donate through paypal, through the Burma page of my website.
http://speakingadventure.com/burma.htm