Russian movie The Cranes are Flying--I saw it in Burma after 1957--+ memories.

My mother was appointed as a volunteer by Daw Khin May Than--Kitty Ba Than to the Censor Board so we got to see free movies before the cuts.

My cousin writer Minshin (U Win Maung) was probably on the board that bought or hired foreign movies.

I was about 14. I didn't understand the movie nor why my mother cut one scene.

My mother was extremely straight-laced,quite the opposite of Aunty K and her close friend Aunty Mary Kyaw Thet.

My mother said, "You remember that scene where the man carries her into the bedroom? I think she was raped."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cranes_Are_Flying

I didn't know what rape was and I didn't think it was so bad.

I realise now I was quite liberal for a very protected teen.

Later my mother would not let me translate Ko Ko's story about the difficulty of getting birth control pills in his married life.

I said, "Why? Why can't I translate it."

My mother said sternly, "It's not an appropriate subject for a young woman."

She also would not let me visit this Kamayut family (father's side.)

I knew they were rowdy and addicted to playing cards, and drinking, but I don't think they had orgies.

My brief cousin in law (different family, mother's side)though was a gambling addict and also I think a man-addict.

But I have not seen her since my cousin divorced her in the late 1960s.

Some people I think are rather a pain in the arse, while others are not.

Some were just lovely.

Kamayut Aunty Pretty Lady has a staring role in my Black Rice--available on Amazon.

I was really only close to Ko Minshin.

After he died, Ma Khinsein his wife wrote me, "You know,KoKo was so fond of you. After all you are both writers."

I cleared out some old letters,and only kept the stamp.

Unfortunately, MKS, her daughter Khine Khine and her grandchild were all killed in an aircraft explosion near Bagan around 1988.

My brother went to identify the remains. He said,"Nothing was left, only an eyebrow."

I remember Ma Khin Sein always smiled, showing her gums .She had thick eyebrows.

She was a Phys Ed teacher trained in USA.

Ko Ko's younger sister Ma Ma San who died 2 years ago said,"She does not swim that well herself,but she's an excellent teacher.

Maybe like my Welsh English lecturer, who does not seem to have written anything much.

To honor everyone "Khine Khine" is my alter ego in a yet unpublished novel, and the Welshman has become part of a fictional composite in a novel I started last summer.

Black Rice's near death story is based on Kamayut Ko Too's reallife experience.

RIP

Sending Metta.

Kyi May Kaung

Christmas Day, 2025.