Aye Aye had to grow up early. When she was 10, her mother died, and Aye Aye became the main caregiver of her younger sister. They live in Thailand, but Aye Aye was born in neighbouring Myanmar. The family had to leave their home in a hurry a few years ago.
”We moved here, because it wasn’t good there. It was all of a sudden, we didn’t prepare”
“We came by car,” Aye Aye says, “but I don’t remember anything from the trip.”
Aye Aye is 12 now and living with her younger sister and her father, her two older sisters are married and have moved away. Her father works long days as a farm hand. She goes to a school for refugee and migrant children, run by one of Save the Children’s partner organisations.
“I want to sew when I finish school, to help my father support the family. He is old,” Aye Aye says.
Fighting and economic problems in Myanmar has resulted in hundreds of thousands of families crossing the border into Thailand. Girls that are migrants and refugees are especially vulnerable when families are on the move. The school Aye Aye goes to helps support children and provide them with education in a language they understand.
“My favourite subject is Burmese literature,” Aye Aye says.
*Name has been changed.
