Myanmar’s Buddhist nuns nearing brink of starvation amid civil war

*Names have been changed for security reasons Around the clock for days on end, the roar of junta fighter jets over Loikaw kept Daw Theingi*, a Buddhist nun in her 40s, from sleeping. Beside her, some 70 fellow nuns and novices were also lying awake under the trembling nunnery roof. Aerial bombardment on the administrative capital of Myanmar’s Karenni State intensified in November last year alongside fierce fighting between the regime and ethnic armed organisations in the area. As bombs rained down on the city and the nunnery’s food and cooking oil supplies dwindled, Daw Theingi deliberated with other senior nuns whether to leave their home. “I almost fell ill from the lack of sleep and food,” she said. “Luckily, I wasn’t hurt physically, but my health will certainly deteriorate due to the war.” Myanmar Now recently spoke with six Buddhist nuns from around the country about the impact of the war on their everyday lives. All six described being on the brink of starvation. Since the crippling economic impact of the 2021 military coup, donations from the Myanmar public—on which the pink-robed nuns largely depend for their survival—have diminished. Fleeing Karenni State with orphaned nuns Before 2021, Daw Theingi’s nunnery was home to more than 200 Buddhist nuns from across Karenni and southern Shan States, with many of the young nuns from families unable to afford their education and others with no surviving parents or guardians. “We adopted them from as young as six days old to the age of eight. They had nowhere to go,” she told Myanmar Now. The senior nuns had been providing young people with shelter and formal education at the Loikaw nunnery for over two decades before the chaos in the town made continued life there untenable. In Myanmar, nunneries and monasteries have long been a crucial source of schooling for children from destitute families and areas with no educational infrastructure, especially in parts of the country impacted by the country’s 70-year-long civil war. Following the ousting of the civilian-led National League for Democracy government in 2021, Myanmar’s educational, business, and health sectors have been devastated, with all-out war affecting both ethnic homelands as well as the country’s central heartland. As November’s fighting between junta troops and resistance forces—led by the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF)—spread, scores of youth from the nunnery fled Loikaw. Those who could returned to their parents, while Daw Theingi remained with the rest. In the same month, a young Buddhist novice was killed when a monastery in the town was hit by artillery shelling. This incident left Daw Theingi and the others with little choice but to leave the town, bringing dozens of children with them. However, with roads out of Loikaw blocked due to armed clashes, transport options for the group of 70 were scarce. “I rang [car companies] all day for two days, I was getting upset,” said Daw Theingi. “Luckily, my call was finally answered by a driver agreeing to take all 70 of us.” The group was ready to leave by 3am the next morning, but had to wait for three hours for their transport to arrive, by which time the day’s fighting had already begun. “We barely escaped. It was really terrifying. We prayed all the way until we reached a town in neighbouring Shan State,” Daw Theingi recalled, adding “That was the day that Loikaw market burned.” Young Buddhist nuns on a morning alms round in Yangon (Myanmar Now) Life of the displaced in the Ayeyarwady delta Daw Theingi and the young nuns in her care made it safely to the Ayeyarwady Region, where she has family ties, and were offered a place to stay at a monastery in the regional capital, Pathein. Even after they found temporary shelter, food scarcity was a constant challenge, especially in a new town where donations are even more difficult to come by, Daw Theingi said, explaining that the group relies on packages of peas, beans, and chilis from friends and relatives. Struggling to afford basic necessities, the Buddhist nun described choosing from cheap vegetables past their freshness at the market, “I can’t afford to give them bread anymore as it costs 700 kyat [US $0.33] per pack,” she said. “I have to remind them constantly to be sparing even in using soap and monthly pads,” she added, saying 15 among the group of 25 in her care were in need of sanitary products. Daw Theingi recounted how one young nun was suffering from an ovarian cyst and in need of surgery. With no way to pay for medical treatment, Daw Theingyi said her last hope was a hospital in Yangon that treats monks and nuns free of charge. However, as young people’s cases are not prioritised there, the young nun has not yet received approval for an operation and her health hangs in the balance. A Buddhist monk walking ahead of nuns on the U Bein bridge in Mandalay’s Amarapura Township in July (Sai Aung Main / AFP) Desperation for food and education in Sagaing In northern Myanmar’s Sagaing Region, Daw Nandi, 54, spoke to Myanmar Now about her struggle to provide 18 young nuns with education and sustenance. After changes in the education system introduced this year, she said monastic schools are no longer allowed to teach high school students beyond eighth grade. As young monastic pupils are not permitted to attend government schools alongside lay students, the new rule leaves private education as the only means for the girls to continue their studies. Seven of the 20 students go to private school for 70,000 kyat per person (US $33) each month, a cost that Daw Nandi has to shoulder. As a result, she said, she has had to borrow more than 200,000 kyat (US $95) to pay school fees. Daw Nandi has headed the nunnery for 24 years. She described how life has become particularly challenging since the 2021 coup due to a lack of donations and soaring prices even as the number of young nuns in her care has grown. “The hardship this year is worse than in previous years,” she told Myanmar Now. In the past, the parents of the young nuns would send rations and donations to the nunnery, but this year there have been none, she said, attributing this to the ongoing civil war. Before war broke out in the region, nuns used to be able to collect donations from locals in surrounding rural communities, which helped with year-round rations, she said. With fighting impacting broad swaths of Sagaing Region, the nuns’ contact with potential donors is severely limited. Like many others, Daw Nandi is facing shortages of rice and other dry rations for the first time. “I used to be able to provide robes in abundance as well as some pocket money, but now even food is at a bare minimum [and is] mostly dried fish or fish paste,” Daw Nandi said. “Families usually have no more than three children they need to support, but I have 18 students whom I need to care for,” she added. Ma Waddy, a 16-year-old Buddhist nun preparing for the 11th grade, said that Daw Nandi has been supporting her since her mother passed away when she was in third grade. Her father, who lives from hand to mouth, is unable to contribute to her education. Although she is a nun, Ma Waddy said she hopes to become a doctor after finishing grade 13. “I want to graduate and become a doctor. But I have financial challenges,” she said, adding, “I also feel bad for our senior nuns, who have to pay a monthly fee for us.” On her alms rounds, Ma Waddy has observed a significant decline in rice donations. “In the past, at least eight out of ten households would offer rice, but now five out of ten shy away from contributing,” she said. Ethnic Ta’ang Buddhist nuns from northern Shan State at a Yangon nunnery in October 2019 (Ye Aung Thu / AFP) Yangon nunnery overflowing with war refugees The recent escalation of violence between the Arakan Army and the Myanmar military in western Myanmar has triggered a mass exodus of civilians from Rakhine and Chin States. Tens of thousands have sought refuge in Yangon and Ayeyarwady regions, including numerous parentless children who have sought shelter in nunneries. Daw Haymar, a 53-year-old abbess, has given sanctuary and education to approximately 100 lay children—a mix of Christians and Buddhists—as well as sheltering 150 nuns.She has housed upwards of 270 people, including teachers, at a time in her Yangon nunnery. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Daw Haymar said that some 400 people were staying at the nunnery. Following the coup, however, she has been forced to reduce the number of students she takes in due to financial struggles. People are facing many difficulties in this period, Daw Haymar noted, referring to the economic effects of the coup. Consumers have seen the price of necessities skyrocket, she added, with the price of a bag of rice soaring tenfold from around 35,000 kyat (US $16) before the coup. “Only when people had a stable financial life could we feed those kids,” Daw Haymar said, describing how the lack of resources had diminished the nunnery’s capacity to help people. According to Daw Haymar, the majority of students at the nunnery are from northern Rakhine State, where many have been left homeless by junta forces’ arson attacks on their villages. Other students came after fleeing conflict in Chin and Shan States. “They were sent to the nunnery all alone, with the help of social workers, while their parents remained in the war zone amid burning, bombing, and artillery shelling,” she said. The provision of education in certain regions is very poor, Daw Haymar said, referring especially to Rakhine State and noting that even fewer teachers have been willing to travel to the state’s remote regions during the war. Recalling one family she took in, Daw Haymar said they had walked all the way from Rakhine State to Yangon on foot—a gruelling journey that took 18 days. “They could have died on the way. I have so much pity for the children,” she said. As resources have diminished, the abbess said she has had to turn some children away. “Not being able to accept needy children breaks my heart—I wonder where they will go afterwards,” she said. “I worry that they may be sold to traffickers or forced to beg on the street.” “As much as it saddens me to refuse them, it would also be a living hell if we [took them in and] couldn’t feed them,” Daw Haymar said. Emphasising the adversity faced by Buddhist nuns in Myanmar, Daw Haymar noted that for every hundred people who donate to a monastery, not even one would donate to a nunnery. As a result, she said, the struggles monks have undergone are incomparable to those experienced by nuns. Daw Haymar also mentioned the difficulty of being unable to afford sanitary products for the nuns in her community, saying that these essentials have tripled or quadrupled in price since before the coup. “The donations aren’t increasing, but the hardships are,” she added. “Due to spiking prices, we are barely managing not to starve.”

Myanmar’s Buddhist nuns nearing brink of starvation amid civil war

Neglected and marginalised, Buddhist nuns from across Myanmar share their stories of sheltering and educating the youth while coping with displacement and poverty

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