My visit to Burma and Thailand March 2008

This is one of my drawings of a Burmese monk that I met at the Shwedagon Pagoda in the Return Buddha Image temple in1995. The last time I was here in 2007 I remember being asked by a Burmese Buddhist if Buddhism was a useful or meaningful faith. I answered that it was a rational and effective belief that could benefit many, that it would be or should be known throughout the world. He and the other people standing nearby smiled broadly. Little did I know that by the end of the year Burmese Buddhists monks would be know all over the world due to their courageous self sacrifice during days of protest in support of democracy . They were brutally suppressed by the military dictatorship of Burma/Myanmar.