Ladies, gentlemen and honourable lads, it is an honour to speak to you on this auspicious occasion of fellowship and exchanging each other cultures and values coming from our same mother country of Burma. Some of you were born here, some came here as a young child but most of you are educated here and some of you have already started on your life’s journey with much hope and expectations.

But do we ever recollect of why we are in Canada, an alien land, a home far away from home? Do we ever think of why our parents leave their native place to come and eke out their living in Canada.

Some of your parents migrated here for political reasons particularly fleeing away from persecutions back at home, from human rights violations and so on. Again some of you have come for economic reasons, to find a greener pasture. For whatever reason you came here there is an unmistakable evidence that something is very, very wrong in Burma, without which there will be no raison d’etre to come to Canada.

Hence it is your historical bounden duty to maintain your own culture and to carry on the good traits and traditions of our people and at the same time to contribute to a new country, Canada which we call our home.

You all belong to the N Generation and the future of the Burmese Ethnic Community including the Myanmar are in your hands. It is your historical duty to create understanding and creates love among the people that migrated from the same country of Burma. We should construe each other as brothers and sisters of the same category and especially to the Myanmar or Burman must be construed as a fellow sufferer like us. There must be no discrimination and please remember that BENC is not a racist organization or association. You N Generation are very crucial to the community, to BENC and to your mother country Burma.

As a matter of general knowledge I like to point out that our generation who are septuagenarian (over 70) Octogenarian (over 80) who remembers the 2nd World War were known as Baby boomers because they could afford to have many children. Then, their children who were born in 1960s and 70s were label as X Generations. This is because Generation X" has always signified a group of young people, seemingly without identity, who face an uncertain, ill-defined (and perhaps hostile) future.1960-70s. They have to work for rehabilitation and have to work very hard and they are Xhausted. So they were label as X Generations.

Naturally after X Generation, Y Generation followed. The name is based on Generation X, the generation that preceded them. The Y Generation were born in 1980s to 2000. Members of Generation Y are often referred to as “echo boomers” because they are the descendants of the children of parents born during the baby boom Because children born during this period of time have had constant access to technology such as computers, cell phones in their youth, they have required many employers to update their hiring strategy in order to incorporate updated forms of technology. They are also called millennials, echo boom.

Now to day we see an entirely new generation i.e. N Generation. You are the N Generation because you are always net working with each other sharing News, Knowledge, technology and so forth. The future belongs to you.

Now the big question is what sort of N Generation are you going to be Are you going to be a good, domicile, full of understanding with the net working and be an asset to your society where you live in? Or are you going to be a Nutty Generations which will be a liability to your parents, elders and to your benefactors and will tarnish the fair name of your family, race and country? Only the future can decide.

Professor Ba Than Win
Speaking at Burma Ethnic Nationalities Culture event in Vancouver, 1 September 2012