In strife-torn Myanmar, love trumps hate for a rare couple

Setara, right, holds her husband Mohammad’s hand in Thetkabyin village camp, near Sittwe. The love story between Setara and Mohammad is extraordinarily rare in Myanmar. (AP)
Updated 30 December 2017
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In strife-torn Myanmar, love trumps hate for a rare couple

THETKABYIN, Myanmar: In her dreams, Setara walks hand in hand with her Muslim husband through the streets of the seaside Myanmar town they grew up in. They visit old friends, share a meal with family, dip their toes into the warm surf of the Bay of Bengal.
But in the hate-filled reality of the world they live in, Setara can only do these things alone — when she takes off her Islamic veil and crosses through a pair of checkpoints into the predominantly Buddhist state capital, where her government will not allow the love of her life to set foot.
That’s because Setara’s husband is an ethnic Rohingya Muslim, a group the UN has called one of the most persecuted on the planet. Setara, meanwhile, was born a Buddhist and part of the ethnic Rakhine, who despise the Rohingya and see them as foreign invaders from Bangladesh.
Marriage between the two communities is extraordinarily rare. It’s also risky in a nation where security forces have driven more than 730,000 Rohingya into exile since 2016, carried out large-scale massacres and burned hundreds of villages in a campaign the UN and human rights groups have described as “ethnic cleansing.”
In Sittwe, Setara tells no one she is married to a Rohingya. Because “if they knew, they would kill me right away. So I’m always careful.”
The 24-year-old’s fears are not exaggerated. Even Rohingya who have ventured into Sittwe on rare trips escorted by police in recent months have been attacked by mobs and killed. Hard-line Buddhists regularly march through the city’s crumbling streets, past ruined mosques that have been closed since June 2012, when the Rakhine burned most Rohingya homes and drove more than 120,000 into camps for the displaced.
Setara, then a widow, met her husband, Mohammad, about eight months later at a market on the edge of a Rohingya village where she had come to sell vegetables. Rakhine traders, who can travel freely, regularly sell goods to Rohingya at marked-up prices.
They exchanged phone numbers and she began visiting him at a pharmacy he ran nearby. Mohammad, 32, bought her small gifts, teased her to make her laugh and took her for rides on his motorbike. He was amazed to meet a Rakhine woman who didn’t treat a Rohingya any differently than her own. He told her he loved her.
Setara felt the same way. She thought he was the kindest man she had ever known.
But when she told her family — after much reluctance — that she was dating a Rohingya man, they became enraged. Her brother beat her severely. They told her she could not go back. Then, her family kicked her out.
The move pushed her closer to Mohammad. In late 2013, she converted to Islam and they married in a small Islamic ceremony held before local religious leaders. No one from Setara’s family attended.
In the years since, Setara has reconciled with her three sisters. But she has never been able to return home. Her parents passed away when she was young, and the brother who helped raise them all still refuses to speak to her. Residents of her old neighborhood have also made clear she is no longer welcome; they call her a “Kalar’s wife.” Kalar is a derogatory word for Muslims that is frequently used in Myanmar.
Mohammad characterizes their relationship in much the same way his wife does. “She sees me as a human being and I see her as a human being, and it’s that simple,” he said, when asked how they had overcome the huge societal obstacles to marry.
Mohammad is a quiet man with a calm manner; Setara is more outspoken. They are a couple clearly in love, glancing at each other and smiling as they talk. The AP is identifying them by their first names only for their protection.
They live in a Rohingya village adjacent to a network of Muslim displaced camps, with Setara’s 2-year-old niece and her 9-year-old daughter from her first marriage. Setara says the Rohingya have welcomed her warmly, as one of their own. But she misses her old friends and her old life.
While Mohammad, like all Rohingya, is not permitted by the government to travel, Setara makes regular trips to Sittwe, about half an hour away, to buy supplies for the small pharmacy and shop they run beside their home.
Before going, though, she smears a pale cosmetic paste on her cheeks called “thanaka,” which is commonly used by Buddhists in Myanmar. She takes off her veil and puts on a blouse. And she never forgets to bring her national identification card, which includes a critical line indicating she is Buddhist. Without it, she could never cross the checkpoints — one manned by police, the other by soldiers — to town.
The contrast between the two worlds is startling. The Rohingya side is dry and dusty, devoid of trees and filled with despair, with little to do. The Buddhist side is lush, with schools and a university, paved roads, a karaoke bar and restaurants that serve wine by the sea.
In Sittwe’s main market, Setara visits friends and sometimes her sisters. But she also overhears Rakhine gossiping about the latest news, and cursing the Rohingya.
Sometimes she goes to the beach, where teens hang out at seaside cafes on plastic chairs, and watches the sun go down. But when she thinks about her husband — the fact that he cannot be there — her thoughts turn dark, and she wonders “if our lives will just end like this.”
“I always wish I could go out with my husband and go to the fun places in town ... especially when I see other couples going around,” Setara said. “I just want to cry sometimes.”
Mohammad imagines the same, impossible trips. But he also worries each time she goes. “I worry something might happen, that someone might find out she’s a Muslim, that she’s married to me,” he said.
Both said they want children of their own because they love each other. But they know it would not be easy for a child, who would be half Rohingya and not recognized as a Burmese citizen.
The marriage has given Setara a profound insight into life in the camps for the Rohingya displaced.
“It’s just like hell,” she said. “They have no hope. They have no medical treatment. People are more and more scared.”
Since Rohingya insurgents staged dozens of attacks in the northern half of Rakhine state that triggered a major backlash by security forces in late August, life in the south, where Setara and her husband live, has stayed calm but only gotten harder.
International aid for displaced camps has been held up by authorities, and humanitarian workers have been forced to scale back visits. Hussein said the government has also stopped Rohingya from fishing, a critical source of income, until they accept “national verification cards” which identify them as “Bengalis.” Many have resisted because they insist on being identified as Rohingya, a term the government does not recognize.
In her despair, Setara sometimes tells her husband she is going to leave. When he begs her to “stop saying that,” she tells him she doesn’t mean it.
“It doesn’t mean that I don’t love him. I just don’t like the way we have to live here,” she said. “I keep telling myself every day that I need to be strong .... but sometimes I just want to fly away.”
Still, she says, that is something she will never do. “The future for the Rohingya is bad,” she said. “But I will never leave ... it is my destiny to be here, to be with my husband.”


The 2025 Grammy Award nominations are about to arrive. Here’s what to know

Updated 08 November 2024
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The 2025 Grammy Award nominations are about to arrive. Here’s what to know

  • The 2025 Grammy Awards will air Feb. 2 live on CBS and Paramount+ from the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles

NEW YORK: The 2025 Grammy Award nominations are just around the corner — who will compete for the top prizes?
Nominees will be announced during a video stream live on the Grammy website and the Recording Academy’s YouTube channel on Friday at 8 a.m. Pacific and 11 a.m. Eastern, kicking off with a pre-show 15 minutes earlier.
A host of talent is on deck to announce the nominees, including Gayle King, Jim Gaffigan and a long list of past Grammy winners: Brandy Clark, Kirk Franklin, David Frost, Robert Gordon, Kylie Minogue, Gaby Moreno, Deanie Parker, Ben Platt, Mark Ronson, Hayley Williams and last year’s best new artist recipient, Victoria Monét.
Only recordings commercially released in the US between Sept. 16, 2023 through Aug. 30, 2024 are eligible for nominations, so don’t expect to see album nods for Future’s “Mixtape Pluto” (though Future and Metro Boomin’s “We Don’t Trust You” is very likely to score a nomination), George Strait’s “Cowboys and Dreamers,” Tyler, the Creator’s “Chromakopia,” or “Warriors,” Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first full post-“Hamilton” musical with Pulitzer finalist Eisa Davis.
There’s plenty of unknowns going into the announcements: Will Beyoncé and Post Malone receive nominations in the country music categories following the success of their massive albums “Cowboy Carter” and “F-1 Trillion,” respectively, even though they are megastars previously not directly associated with the genre?
Will Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” the biggest song of the year that combines his country twang with the familiar sample of J Kwon’s 2004 rap hit “Tipsy” dominate?
The 2025 Grammy Awards will air Feb. 2 live on CBS and Paramount+ from the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.


Prison break: Monkeys escape from South Carolina medical research facility

Updated 08 November 2024
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Prison break: Monkeys escape from South Carolina medical research facility

  • Alpha Genesis provides primates for research worldwide at its compound
  • Alpha Genesis $12,600 in 2018 after dozens of primates escaped

Forty-three monkeys escaped from a compound used for medical research in South Carolina but the nearby police chief said there is “almost no danger” to the public.
“They are not infected with any disease whatsoever. They are harmless and a little skittish,” Yemassee Police Chief Gregory Alexander said Thursday morning.
The Rhesus macaque primates escaped from the Alpha Genesis facility Wednesday when a new employee didn’t fully shut an enclosure, Alexander said.
The monkeys are females weighing about 3 kilograms and are so young and small that they haven’t been used for testing, police said.
Alpha Genesis employees “currently have eyes on the primates and are working to entice them with food,” police said in a statement issued around noon Thursday.
The company usually handles escapes on site, but the monkeys got outside the compound about 1.6 kilometers from downtown Yemassee, Alexander said.
“The handlers know them well and usually can get them back with fruit or a little treat,” Alexander said by phone.
But rounding up these escapees is taking some more work. Alpha Genesis is taking the lead, setting up traps and using thermal imaging cameras to recapture the monkeys on the run, the chief said.
“There is almost no danger to the public,” Alexander said.
People living nearby need to shut their windows and doors so the monkeys can’t find a place to hide inside and if they see the primates, call 911 so company officials and police can capture them.
Alpha Genesis provides primates for research worldwide at its compound about 80 kilometers northeast of Savannah, Georgia, according to its website. The company did not respond to an email asking about Wednesday’s escape.
In 2018, federal officials fined Alpha Genesis $12,600 after dozens of primates escaped as well as for an incident that left a few others without water and other problems with how the monkeys were housed.
Officials said 26 primates escaped from the Yemassee facility in 2014 and an additional 19 got out in 2016.
The group Stop Animal Exploitation Now sent a letter to the US Department of Agriculture asking the agency to immediately send an inspector to the Alpha Genesis facility, conduct a thorough investigation and treat them as a repeated violator. The group was involved in the 2018 fine against the company.
“The clear carelessness which allowed these 40 monkeys to escape endangered not only the safety of the animals, but also put the residents of South Carolina at risk,” Michael Budkie, the executive director of the group, wrote in the Thursday morning letter.


Trump victory renews interest in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ and other fictional dystopias

Updated 08 November 2024
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Trump victory renews interest in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ and other fictional dystopias

  • Margaret Atwood’s dystopian classic about a country in which women are brutally repressed has been high on the Amazon.com best seller list

NEW YORK: “The Handmaid’s Tale” is selling again.
Since President-elect Donald Trump clinched his return to the White House, Margaret Atwood’s dystopian classic about a country in which women are brutally repressed has been high on the Amazon.com best seller list. “The Handmaid’s Tale” was popular throughout Trump’s first term, along with such dark futuristic narratives as George Orwell’s “1984” and Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451,” both of which were in the Amazon top 40 as of Thursday afternoon. Another best-seller from Trump’s previous time in office, Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century,” was in the top 10.
Pro-Trump books also were selling well. Former first lady Melania Trump’s memoir, “Melania,” was No. 1 on the Amazon list, and Vice President-elect JD Vance’s “Hillbilly Elegy” was in the top 10. Donald Trump’s photo book “Save America” was in the top 30.
At Barnes & Noble, “Fiction and non-fiction books that feature fascism, feminism, dystopian worlds and both right-and-left leaning politics rocketed up our sales charts with the election results,” according to Shannon DeVito, the chain’s director of books. She cited “Melania,” “On Tyranny” and Bob Woodward’s latest, “War,” which covers the responses of Trump and President Joe Biden to the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.
DeVito also cited “a massive bump in dystopian fiction,” notably for “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “1984.”


First artwork by humanoid robot sells for $1.3 million

Updated 08 November 2024
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First artwork by humanoid robot sells for $1.3 million

REUTERS: A portrait of English mathematician Alan Turing became the first artwork by a humanoid robot to be sold at auction, fetching $1,320,000 on Thursday.
The 2.2 meter (7.5 feet) portrait “A.I. God” by “Ai-Da,” the world’s first ultra-realistic robot artist, smashed pre-sale expectations of $180,000 when it went under the hammer at London auction house Sotheby’s Digital Art Sale.
“Today’s record-breaking sale price for the first artwork by a humanoid robot artist to go up for auction marks a moment in the history of modern and contemporary art and reflects the growing intersection between A.I. technology and the global art market,” said the auction house.
Ai-Da Robot, which uses AI to speak, said: “The key value of my work is its capacity to serve as a catalyst for dialogue about emerging technologies.”
Ai-Da added that a “portrait of pioneer Alan Turing invites viewers to reflect on the god-like nature of AI and computing while considering the ethical and societal implications of these advancements.”
The ultra-realistic robot, one of the most advanced in the world, is designed to resemble a human woman with a face, large eyes and a brown wig.
Ai-Da is named after Ada Lovelace, the world’s first computer programmer and was devised by Aidan Meller, a specialist in modern and contemporary art.
“The greatest artists in history grappled with their period of time, and both celebrated and questioned society’s shifts,” said Meller.
“Ai-Da Robot as technology, is the perfect artist today to discuss the current developments with technology and its unfolding legacy,” he added.
Ai-Da generates ideas through conversations with members of the studio, and suggested creating an image of Turing during a discussion about “A.I. for good.”
The robot was then asked what style, color, content, tone and texture to use, before using cameras in its eyes to look at a picture of Turing and create the painting.
Meller led the team that created Ai-Da with artificial intelligence specialists at the universities of Oxford and Birmingham in England.
Meller said Turing, who made his name as a World War II codebreaker, mathematician and early computer scientist, had raised concerns about the use of AI in the 1950s.
The artwork’s “muted tones and broken facial planes” seemingly suggested “the struggles Turing warned we will face when it comes to managing AI,” he said.
Ai-Da’s works were “ethereal and haunting” and “continue to question where the power of AI will take us, and the global race to harness its power,” he added.

 

@AIGOD_Aida

A portrait of renowned English mathematician Alan Turing became the first artwork by a humanoid robot to be sold at auction, fetching $1,320,000 on Thursday. the world’s first ultra-realistic robot artist,


Three charged in One Direction singer Liam Payne’s death

Updated 08 November 2024
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Three charged in One Direction singer Liam Payne’s death

BUENOS AIRES: Three people have been charged in relation to One Direction singer Liam Payne’s death in a fall from his Buenos Aires hotel balcony last month, Argentine authorities said on Thursday.
The 31-year-old’s death shocked the world, and raised questions about how he had fallen.
A 911 call from a hotel employee the day Payne died warned that he had been acting aggressively and could have been under the influence of drugs and alcohol.
An autopsy revealed the former boy band member had traces of alcohol, cocaine and a prescription antidepressant in his system when he died, a prosecutor’s office said in a statement on Thursday.
Payne’s body was handed over to his father, Geoff, over the weekend and flown back to his native England. Over the past few weeks, Geoff had been seen alongside longtime One Direction bodyguard, Paul Higgins, at the CasaSur hotel where his son died.
Those charged in Payne’s death include a suspected drug dealer, a hotel employee who may have provided Payne with the cocaine and a person who was close to the singer, the authorities said.
All are accused of playing a role in giving Payne the drugs, with the hotel employee accused of giving Payne cocaine at least twice during his stay and the alleged drug dealer believed to have provided it twice more two days before his death.
The person who was visiting with Payne is also charged with “abandonment of a person followed by death,” authorities said.
None of those charged were named, but will be notified and are prohibited from leaving the country, according to the statement.
The investigation into the circumstances of Payne’s death will continue, prosecutors said, adding that they were still trying to unlock the singer’s broken laptop.
Witnesses had told local media that they saw Payne smashing his laptop in the hotel lobby.