“Look at them all grown up!” wrote Sue Silverstein, a Teacher at Bishop Gibbons High School in Schenectady, one of my closest friends and a living saint to me. “Say, Mue Naw, Nilar, Dah Blue! BeSa was there, too. All Doing Great! Nilar is a nurse. Be Sa and Say work in dental. Dah is still in nursing school and works at the hospital. They all send their love to you two. I went to the Karen New Year,” said, essentially a surrogate parent for these girls, many of whose parents were either dead, missing, destitute, or struggling with rent, groceries, two or three jobs, and lost careers and professions. ”
Sue was always there for them, always on me to help them and raise money in her quiet and skillful way.
She was thrilled to see her children, as she called them, dancing and singing over the weekend. Shortly after the Army Of Good was formed, a teacher called me from Albany and said several young women from the horrors and genocide of Myanmar – our government still calls it Burma – had arrived in Albany and had been accepted by a Catholic High School Called Bishop Maginn.
A descendant of refugees who also survived genocide.
The families of these beautiful and unbelievably strong young women had suffered horribly, their homes and families butchered or destroyed; they got to the United States legally after years in United Nations Refugee camps where they suffered humiliation, persecution, physical and other assaults, and near starvation.
They then made their way to a country whose leaders no longer loved the idea of immigrants coming to America and slashed the financial support that was in existence for refugees before.
Sue Silverstein, a much-loved teacher at the school, Bishop Maginn, was working to help these girls, and when I called her to offer my help, she said yes.
This began one of my life’s most beautiful, important, and meaningful chapters. These girls spoke no English, and their families had no money. They also had few clothes and no winter shoes for Albany.
We supplied all of it including mattresses for the children to sleep on.
The Army of Good came of age with these women. I went to the school and profiled each one. We raised tuition for Bishop Maginn for all of them, along with food, clothes, and mattresses, and then helped them get into college, where they are now. I never did anything in my life that seemed as important as this or as successful. These young women are a line of happy endings. Every penny was a bargain.
It was the most satisfying thing I’ve ever done. Maria joined with love and astonishing energy, and we both came to know and love their teacher, who is now teaching at Bishop Gibbons in Schenectady, New York.
A few months ago, we helped her raise tuition funds for the sisters and brothers of these young women, whose courage and generosity were incredible to me.
I hear American children complaining all the time about their parents and teachers; I have never heard one of these girls utter a complaint about their awful losses and suffering.
Almost all these girls attended the Karen Christian New Year at the Hackett Middle School in Albany this weekend. Here, they celebrate their dances and songs and work to keep their culture alive. The military in Burma continues to slaughter and kill political opponents and Karen survivors.
Sue Silverstein, who saw these refugees as children in many ways and is still in touch with everyone—they are all in college—took these photos and sent them to Maria and me at the request of these remarkable women. They wanted to thank us again for helping them. It was the pleasure of my life. Here are some new American citizens at their New Year’s celebration.
Like teenagers everywhere, and despite the horrors of their lives, these girls needed help, counseling, comfort, lunch money, breakfast snacks, and guidance. She was always there, always, and still is. Away at college, when they have a problem, they call Sue. She listens and helps. They call her “Missie.”
The love between them is boundless and unbreakable.
Maria and I looked at these photographs last night. More than anything, we wanted to cry and hug Sue. She did it, and we helped. And so did the miracle of all, the Army Of Good.
