The Tale Of A Karen Leader
The following is an English re-telling of the tale of an ancestral Karen leader named Htaw Mae Pa.
Once upon a time there was a man named Htaw Mae Pa living among the Karens of the Mongolian highlands. He was very brave, healthy, and smart. He was also a talented martial artist with a sense of humour. As time passed, he aged as people tend to do.
Every night, Htaw Mae Pa enjoyed getting together with the young children to tell them funny stories. More than that, he often taught that living in unity was most important. The children liked him very much and respected him as a great-grandfather.
One day Htaw Mae Pa wrestled and defeated a huge wild pig that had destroyed thousands of acres of the Karen people's farm lands. This act turned him into a hero, and made him famous. He cut off the pair of tusks from the wild pig and fashioned them into a comb for himself, which he wore as a necklace. People would say that whenever he used it to comb his hair, his youth and manhood returned.
Over time, the Karen people grew in number and crowded their home in the Mongolian highlands. They needed to seek another dwelling place. It was Htaw Mae Pa, then, who led a group of them south, leaving Mongolia. The travellers reached a river called Salween, where they camped by the river's edge. There they found many spiral shells in the water, which they cooked and ate.
When the time came to travel further south, Htaw Mae Pa tried to ready them for departure. Instead, the travellers preferred to stay by the river's edge and eat of the spiral shells. Htaw Mae Pa said he would set off alone then, leaving behind him a trail of felled banana trees for his people to follow.
Years later, when the people had tired of eating from the shells, they realized the true import of Htaw Mae Pa's words. They looked for his trail of felled banana trees and found no sign of it, because the trees had all re-grown. The Karen people had lost Htaw Mae Pa but his name remains in Karen history.