"Naw Woo doesn?t know her age exactly but she thinks that she is about 40 years old. She grew up in a small village in the Karen State, helping her parents make a living with hill-side plantations. Conditions were harsh and sometimes the villagers had little more to eat than rice with salt. Other times they had to substitute rice for bamboo shoot or anything else they could find in the jungle. The villagers also regularly fled from Burmese soldiers who came to their village with no warning, demanding porters and torturing and beating anyone who got caught running away from them. Naw Woo and other villagers lived in a constant state of fear, and many villagers lost their lives amidst fighting between Burmese and Karen soldiers. Eventually, Burmese soldiers burnt their whole village to the ground. This is her story of survival and hope."