Spread your arms out. Face up on your back. But it’s cold and seeping into my ears. Stop holding your breath; your muscles are too tense. But I’m sinking. It’s not working. You’re not trusting it enough. But how can I trust I won’t go down? Oxygen is precious to lungs. It’s my life. You struggle to save what’s necessary but risk losing the very element you seek to preserve.

When a tube is in a bus tire, it conforms to the rubber casing. Take it out, over-inflate it and you have a device for transport. The “captain” risks trips back and further to paddle passengers and their cargo. He floats precariously atop the heat-soaked surface as muddy water rushes beneath his skinny but muscled legs. He’s a catalyst for others; an attempt to seek the last life-line for survival.

Burma’s economy has tanked; it has sunk to the bottom of what used to be one of the richest countries in Southeast Asia. The ethnic Burmese aren’t necessarily persecuted by the decades of military rule but their livelihoods have shrunk and withered. Mommas and papas want to feed their babies; they eek out a meager existence. Straddling the tubes, balancing produce baskets on their heads or backs, they enter murky water. The floating tube is propelled against the current by the “captain’s” paddling. Thai soldiers stand on the well-developed bank on the other side. Semi-automatic guns are slung over stiff shoulders.

The commuters come under the bridge because they can’t afford the toll across the Friendship Bridge. If the Thai government decided, they could enforce the “rats” from creeping in below and often in the cover of darkness. But why take out the very people on whose backs your economy floats? It’s cheap labor. They risk abuse for the sake of providing a morsel for their kids’ mouths.

Sometimes I drove the little motorbike down to see. Sticky rice in bag, I walked the paved path to sit on a cement bench. Thailand may be poor by Western standards but it is rich in contrast with Burma’s dirt and poverty. Rice to mouth, I could pretend I was just a tourist. Quick snapshots with camera because lingering looks suspicious. Who are these people coming, floating, risking? What are their stories? Who is their family? What dreams for the future stirs in their hearts under the tattered shirts? I wondered.

Back in my cement room, the coldness with hot humidity mixed in rushed into my lungs. I lay on my back; my floor mat felt like it was sinking. Face up with eyes closed, I allowed the muscles to relax and risked trusting the Father with the burden of their lives. Prayer is a wonderfully secure flotation device. My Captain is strong. He knows the currents of this rushing world. Floating – it’s risky but the other side holds hope for something better.