THE STORY BEHIND THE SONG -- PAST FEATURES

WALK ON

"I think it is a testament to Dublin that U2 are being given the Freedom of Dublin. We're also acknowledging the terrible, immoral - my words 'incarceration' - of Aung San Suu Kyi... If there is one idea this city treasures above any other it is freedom. Freedom to make noise, freedom to make your point, to say what you want to say, freedom to be a pain in the ass … freedom to criticise, the kind of freedom Aung San Suu Kyi has been denied... " - Bono, at the Freedom of the City Award ceremony 2000

Every day, as she lives under the constant eye of military intelligence, confined to Rangoon, the capital city of Burma, she endures threats upon her life and the loss of any kind of personal freedom. But if ever asked, Aung San Suu Kyi will always refuse to admit that she has given anything up in order to fight for democracy for her people.

As the daughter of General Aung San, the founder of modern Burma, and Daw Khin Kyi, an ambassador to India, a strong sense of duty and diplomacy has flown feverishly through the Nobel Laureate's veins from the moment she was born, and an unrelenting urgency to bring peace and economic justice still sustains her through times of trouble and one ultimate self-sacrifice.

While studying for bachelor's degrees in philosophy, politics, and economics at Oxford University, Aung San Suu Kyi fell in love with and married a British professor named Dr. Michael Aris, with whom she had two sons. In a letter to Dr. Aris written before they were married, Suu Kyi foretold of a time when she would be separated from her love to be of service to her people: "I only ask one thing: That should my people need me, you would help me do my duty by them. Sometimes I am beset by fears that circumstance might tear us apart, just when we are so happy in each other." In 1988, when her mother suffered a stroke, she, along with her family, returned to Burma to stay by her bedside. While in the country, she saw civil unrest stirring under a military dictatorship among millions who were hungry for democracy and decided to stay after her mother's passing, while her husband and sons returned to Oxford, to speak up against the rule of the military junta.

Later that year, when the National League for Democracy (NLD) was formed, Aung San Suu Kyi became its general secretary and continued to lead the Burmese in peaceful protests against the regime. In 1989, she was placed under house arrest, restricted from leaving the house and receiving any kind of outside contact, until 1995 when her confinement broadened to the city of Rangoon. A year after she was detained, the NLD won 82% of the votes in the general elections, but the regime refused to honor its results.

However, despite those years in detainment, of submission to around-the-clock surveillance, of having the lines cut and the phone taken straight from her hand, probably the most heartwrenching moment during that time came when her husband was diagnosed with prostate cancer. When an application for a visa for Dr. Aris to see Suu Kyi was denied, the military encouraged her to go to England to see him. Suu Kyi rejected their offer, knowing full well that once she left, they would never allow her back in the country. When he died on March 27, 1999, Suu Kyi could not attend her husband's funeral. As her heart must have been breaking on the inside, Aung San Suu Kyi went on, fearless and unfailing in the pursuit of democracy for Burma.

In 2000, when U2 accepted their Freedom of the City Award, Bono took notice of the bravery and selflessness of another of the honourees -- Aung San Suu Kyi. As her son Kim accepted the honour on her behalf, Bono became inspired by the story of her sacrifice and separation from her family and wrote "Walk On" as a moving tribute to the courage and modern-day heroism of Aung San Suu Kyi.

Free Burma : Aung San Suu Kyi
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi

Week of August 17

ONE TREE HILL

It's a very personal record. Greg's death brought us together in a way. That's what always happens. It becomes the family again. - Bono

In July of 1986, U2 was touched by tragedy when a dear friend of theirs was killed by a drunk driver. Two years earlier in New Zealand, a young Maori man approached a member of the U2 personnel and wondered if he could have the official tour jacket off his back. Though his request to attain a piece of U2 was denied, Greg Carroll was actually already working on the tour as a roadie for a supporting act. Drawn by the warmth of his personality, the band recruited Greg for the rest of their own tour, and Bono kept him on as a personal assistant after it ended. One day, he went out on an errand on Bono's Harley and coincidentally met Bono's friend, Guggi, along the way. They exchanged motorcycles just to see what Bono's reaction would be when he came home with a different bike, but Greg wasn't ready to take on "Guggi's more powerful machine" (Flanagan 427). He rode off toward a drunk driver and crashed when the car turned without signaling. He was killed on impact. On July 10, 1986, Bono and Ali, Larry and Anne, and Joe O'Herlihy and Steve Iredale (crew members on their tour) attended Greg's Tangi (Maori funeral) at Wanganui, New Zealand. At the funeral, Bono read a poem he'd written for Greg and sang renditions of "Let It Be" and "Knockin' on Heaven's Door."

After his death, Bono remembered that during their first conversation, Greg had talked about how much he loved One Tree Hill. He visited the Auckland landmark, where a lone pine tree stands alongside a monument on top of a volcanic cone, an experience which inspired him to write the song. Here's what Bono had to say about "One Tree Hill" and Greg:

It was a devastating blow. He was doing me a favor, he was taking my bike home. Greg used to look after Ali. They would to out dancing together. He was a best friend. I've already had it once, with my mother, and now I've had it twice. The worst part was the fear, and the fear is the opposite of faith. After that, when the phone rang, my heart stopped every time. Now when I go away I wonder, "Will these people be here when I get back?" You start thinking in those terms. We're never performed "One Tree Hill," and I can't. In fact I haven't even heard the song, though I've listened to it a hundred times. I've cut myself off from it completely.

On a side note, Victor Jara, a Chilean singer, is mentioned in "One Tree Hill." Jara wrote songs about the poor people of Chile and used his music to attack social injustices and to share his political ideals. In Chile, after the military overthrew Salvador Allende's government, they took Jara and other political prisoners to the Stadium of Chile, where they cut off Jara's hands (though Jara's wife refutes that statement and says his hands were just broken) and harassed him to play his songs on his guitar.

Week of August 10

In 1986 and much of the 1980s, most who resided in the United States were more than proud to be Americans. Why shouldn't they be? After all, President Reagan went to all extremes to brainwash his own people into believing that the only real threat to America was the Soviet Union. Something darker was happening that, if known, would make most angry at the lack of morality possessed in his or her own country, mainly by that country’s ringmaster, Ronald Reagan. In 1986, something was going on in Central American nations, such as El Salvador and Nicaragua. As a result of the civil wars brewing in Central America, civil wars that were fought to overthrow the dictatorships and replace them with very American-based democracies, the United States did something very undemocratic. It would later be known as the Iran-Contra Affair, and it all seemed very simple. The United States, under specific instructions from President Reagan and other Republican bigwigs, were secretly and illegally selling arms to Iran. With the some $30 million made from this, the money was directed to the right-wing contra guerillas in Nicaragua and El Salvador in order to combat the now growing left-wing Sandanista government. The results were even more astonishing, and when Bono traveled to Central America with wife Ali and other members of Amnesty International, he witnessed the actual bombing of a city by the United States. Most citizens watched daily as their cities and towns were destroyed by a nation that was supposed to stand for and help preserve democracy everywhere. The hypocritical actions of the United States, along with his own eyewitness account, inspired Bono to produce the very anti-American song, “Bullet the Blue Sky.” Lyrics such as, “See them burning crosses, see the flames higher and higher,” and “I can see those fighter planes ... outside is America” accurately depict the anger Bono felt along with the fear the citizens of El Salvador felt.

Bono revealed after returning from Central America, “The spirit of the people of Nicaragua is being beaten down. They’ve got no food or supplies [as a result of the economic blockade the United States placed on several Central American nations] ... It’s just very sad to see the stranglehold America has on Central America in practice.

On Reagan, Edge tells us, “People were so behind everything that Ronald Reagan stood for, but now I think when we go back to America we’ll see a broken country. Either that or people refusing to look - which is a more frightening prospect.” And today, people are still “refusing to look” at the numerous acts of selfishness and immorality that Ronald Reagan completely on a daily basis.

Bono offers, “I still believe in Americans. I think they’re a very open people. It’s their openness which leads them to trust a man as dangerous as Ronald Reagan. They want to believe he’s a good guy. They want to believe in his cavalry, coming to rescue America’s reputation after the ‘70s. But he was only an actor. It was only a movie.” Let’s hope that the movie is over. (At least George Bush is not a good enough actor to fool the nation on such a large scale.)

Week of July 26

MOTHERS OF THE DISAPPEARED

In light of the impunity granted to General Augusto Pinochet on July 9 on his plea of ill health, I thought "Mothers of the Disappeared" would be an appropriate song to start with. During his military dictatorship in Chile, Pinochet had ordered the deaths, or "disappearances," of more than an estimated 3,000 people, most of those who were his political opponents. Only recently, 27 years after it all began, has the armed forces stepped forward with information about some of those disappeared, clarifying only about 200 cases out of over a thousand prisoners who were never to be heard from again after their capture. "Mothers of the Disappeared" is a protest group that formed in reaction to the Pinochet regime. Here's what Sting had to say about the "Mothers":

"This was something that I saw when I went to Chile with the Police. The mothers and wives of "the disappeared" do this amazing thing; they pin photographs of their loved ones to their clothes and go out in groups and do this folk dance with invisible partners in front of the police station. It's this incredible gesture of grief and protest. But it's a feminine way of combating oppression. The masculine way is to burn cars or to throw rocks. Yet this feminine way is so much more powerful because what can the police do? These women are simply dancing. What I'm trying to say on the record is that the female ultimately is superior to the male. That's what will bring Pinochet down - the mother's sense of injustice." - Timeout, 10/87

For further listening: "They Dance Alone" by Sting, "Los desaparecidos (The disappeared ones) " by Little Steven.