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Last year, I was in the Thai city of Mae Sot interviewing a Burmese rock star turned filmmaker when I stumbled across a website that belonged to a nonprofit based in Thailand. The group was helping empower Burmese women migrants — through soccer.
I was thrilled. As the Southeast Asia bureau chief for The New York Times who is based in Bangkok, I had been looking for new ways to write about the civil war that has been ravaging Myanmar, which then was in its second year.
Since the military government in Myanmar seized power in a coup in 2021, reporting in the country has been mostly off-limits to foreign journalists. But talking to recent exiles who had fled to Mae Sot — which is separated from Myanmar by a narrow and muddy river — was a way to cover the conflict. I also wanted to tell a story that focused not only on war but also on female empowerment and the joy of sport.
I quickly wrote an email to the nonprofit, PlayOnside, and met with Naw Laura Htway, its program manager. Over the next few months, I kept in touch with Laura.
One day in May, she sent me a link to a Facebook post that read: “Coming soon. Borderland Women’s League. Six teams.”
“Awesome!” I responded. “When?”
I got in touch with the organizer of the league, Daen Kajeechiwa, a founder of PlayOnside. He told me he had raised his own funds to start the league — the first women’s soccer league in Mae Sot — and it was set to begin practicing the first weekend in July.
I booked a flight from Bangkok to Mae Sot and arrived the second week of July. I spoke to several Burmese women during their soccer practice, who told me how they had been actively discouraged from playing sports. I was particularly struck by a 23-year-old woman, Thone Darin Han, who told me how her parents used to beat her up because she wanted to play soccer (her brother could play without any consequences).
I was amazed at how many women and girls showed up for practice. There were 50 in all. I realized later that PlayOnside had chartered transportation for many of the women who were mothers. Their children came too, and played alongside them in a separate training area.
But the league offered more than just soccer.
After practice was over, the players gathered for a round of “women’s talks,” group conversations held every quarter. That night, the theme was “Bad day, not bad life.”
Every woman had a poignant story to tell. And each story showed the struggles of living in Thailand as an exile.
Thailand has long tolerated the influx of people across its border but does not offer refugees any formal protection. Recently, it has pushed thousands of Burmese people who had fled Myanmar back to the country. This article was a chance, I thought, to share that story.
Over the next few days, I attended soccer practice every day. I interviewed about a dozen people; many told me of their harrowing journeys running away from the Burmese military junta, and how soccer was a form of therapy. But it was my interviews with the men who championed these women that moved me the most.
When I spoke with Pyae Sone, a PlayOnside coach, I could see him wrestling with the cultural norms that he had grown up with. He said his players had told him that they needed permission from their husbands and fathers to play soccer. He reiterated that the organization needed to change men’s attitudes, too.
But four days into my reporting, I was still looking for a central character. Finally, I found her. On a Thursday night, I was sitting on the sidelines of a practice when I saw a woman walk to the bench for a water break. I approached her and asked her if she wanted to talk.
She was happy to, and proceeded to tell me an incredible story about how she served as a jungle medic to rebel forces. She had played soccer for the first time — terribly, by her own account — the week before we talked. (She also happened to be a former assistant managing director for a men’s soccer team in Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, despite never having played before.) Her story resonated with me because I had been looking for someone who discovered soccer for the first time while in exile.
I stayed in Mae Sot for six days so I could attend the league’s second tournament. The women played with passion, and a sizable crowd cheered them on from the sidelines. When the game was over, I saw a group of men waiting to come on the field to play.
That symbolism was stark. I knew I had found my ending.
