Jan 2016 saw the best year yet in Karen traditional dance at Karen New Year in Western Australia. With widespread social media and community newspaper coverage for the AKO (WA) group last year, this year the team aims to go one better. Last year AKO (WA) had great feedback from the WA Karen community for the group, and this year they are aiming to take the next step in Karen culture performance.

The adult group will expand from 8 to 16 performers, and instead of using digital background music, the traditional format of drums, cymbals and the dancers singing will be used. The team also have the benefit of Saw Htoo Paung's experience instructing the adult men this year and the results are showing. This year AKO (WA) also has an under 18's team of 10 which will also dance to traditional drum, and singing etc, an under 12's team made up of 10 boys and 10 girls, and an under 10's team of 5 children.

Promoting Karen culture will continue to be a focal point for the Karen community in Western Australia, particularly as AKO continues to expand.

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AKO (WA) Traditional ''Done dance'' Team expands

### Background
The establishment of the Karen Language program in Queensland is to advance the knowledge and understand of our young people the importance of our Karen tradition, culture and language. Most of the Karen people are from Thailand refugee camp, many of us have resettled in Brisbane since the year 2005 and our community has increasingly grown in numbers ever since. Living in a diverse multicultural society it is in our community interest to promote and create a harmonious community, promoting Australia cultural values by way of providing our children and young adults an opportunity to come together on a weekend during school terms to socialise, to learn and speak the language of our ancestors.

### Mission
The Karen Language program is for all Karen children and young adults who are keen and have a strong will to wanting to speak, read and write their mother tongue as well as having mastered the English language. Our ultimate goal of creating a Karen Language program in our community is to pass down our identity, cultural value and ancestor knowledge to our young generation. As a community our main concern is our children are becoming less able to communicate with parents and elders in their mother tongue. Undeniably, replacing our ancestor language with a more predominantly spoken one seems very reasonable for many but we believe that what makes Australia a nation is diversity and language diversity is as important in its way as national identity and as biological diversity.

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The establishment of Karen Language School classes in Queensland

On the 12th of August 2017, the 67th Karen Martyrs' commemoration service was held and organised by the Australian Karen Organisation. Each and every year the Karen Martyrs' commemoration service is held on this day to remind us about our strong brave soldiers that had sacrificed their life for our Karen people's freedom. On this particular day, our Karen people pay tribute to our greatest leader Saw Ba Oo Gyi and his greatest fellow leaders who have made a great sacrifice, battled with an honour for the freedom of the Karen people.

The commemoration service was joined by a distinguish guest speaker, the chairman of the International Karen Organisation. A great encouragement speech was presented by the chairman of International Karen Organisation. The service was then followed by a number of great presenters and a number of beautiful songs were presented by various youth groups. Laying of wreaths (laying flowers crowns) took place in the middle of the service to pay their respect to our fallen martyrs.

The service then concluded with a nice refreshment and it was a successful commemoration service as many of the Karen people attended the service to pay their respect to our leaders past and present.

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67th Karen Martyrs Day commemoration ceremony, Victoria (12/08/2017)

The 28th KYO day was celebrated successfully in Queensland on 20th of May 2017. The event was organised by AKO youth in Queensland and supported by AKO Queensland branch. Each and every year the ceremony is held at a different location as. The 28th KYO day ceremony took place at the Stafford Community Centre. There were approximately 100 people attended the ceremony including elderly people although this event aimed to celebrate the establishment of the Karen youth organization. The KYO (Karen Youth Organization) was formed on 23rd of May 1989 to respond to the needs of the Karen young people. The establishment of the KYO (Karen youth organization) was to empower and equip youth through democratic leadership and socioeconomic development to be able to contribute towards fighting for the Karen people.

The event was also joined by several leaders from the Australian Karen Organization, Queensland branch. The 28th KYO day facilitation letter was received from the headquarter and read by a beautiful Karen girl named Nan Agrol Htoo. The ceremony then followed a number of great presenters and performances brought to us by the Karen community in Queensland. The ceremony successfully concluded with a delicious refreshment which was prepared by AKO youth in Queensland.

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28th KYO Day Celebration (Queensland)

On the 5h of April 2017 the Australian Karen Women group held the Karen Women's Day in Victoria. As we have witness that women from all over Victoria came together to put on a wonderful celebration. We had so many people coming together to celebrate Woman's Day and making the event enjoyable.

Woman's Day isn't like any other celebration, it's bringing all Karen Women, young and old together and empowering them with encouragement and showing the younger generation of leadership. On this special day we had performances by our Karen women and lots of food made with love by the Karen Women Organisation.

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KWO day celebration, Victoria

On the 29th March our AKO Australia Karen Organisation in Victoria members were invited to participate in an event called Global Pathway at Trinity College. We were able to show primary school children our traditional performances, instruments and our way of living in our Karen State. There were over 248 teachers and students that can to our station showing interest in our culture. As we engaged with the students and teachers, we realised many of them were surprised.

We were able to get to teachers and students to participate in dancing and playing the drums. In the end the organiser of the workshop came and reported back to us on how the majority of students was mesmerised by our culture display and performances.

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Multicultural celebration event participation, Victoria

On the 8th of April 2017, the Australian Karen Organisation of Victoria was invited to perform a cultural dance at Multicultural Race Day in Wyndham at the Werribee Racecourse. Every year the Wyndham city council invites our AKO in Victoria to perform a dance to represent our culture to all the different cultures in Victoria.

Our Karen community were able to witness the diversity culture in Melbourne and also show the different cultures the Karen dance. We were able to see the amazement in the audience faces during the Karen performance. The Australian Karen Organisation in Victoria would proudly perform the Karen Dance at any event to show Melbourne the beauty of the Karen tradition.

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Multicultural Race Day participation, Victoria

The National Karen Youth Seminar is a biennial event which is held in Australia since 2000. The event has come about after the leaders of the AKO believed that there is a need for the youth in Australia to be exposed to the idea of culture maintenance, political awareness, being aware of Karen values and customs. It is to uphold and maintain Karen values and traditions and at the same time to adapt to Australian culture, values, and its rules and regulations.

The National Karen Youth Seminar was held alternatively between VIC and NSW in early years in a small group. But as the years progressed, the number of participants has increased due to the arrival of Karen refugees from Thai-Burma border across Australia under Australian refugee settlement program.

The aim and objectives of the seminar;
- To promote and facilitate networking among the Karen youth in Australia.
- To empower the Karen community in Australia.
- To equip and empower for future Karen leadership.
- To maintain and promote Karen tradition and Culture.
- To strengthen Karen national value and beliefs.
- To raise awareness about the Karen situation.

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8th National Karen Youth Seminar (Australia)

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Since Karen people came to live in Australia, they have seen that organisation is very important for the community in this country. Even though they were less in number, they started organising themselves as a group. After the Karen people started growing in number, in 1996 they started organising a committee.

The purpose for this committee is to work for the Karen people who had resettled in this country especially in socio-political perspective. For the Karen organisation to be recognised in this country, this committee started writing basic constitution for the first time on February 17, 1997. The same year, the Karens in different states started organising committees for the first time through Teleconference.

On February 14, 1998, the Australian Karen Organisation's constitution was recognised by the Australian government. And in April, 1998, the Australian Karen Organisation's committees from all over Australia held the first national conference in Sydney. On July 16, 1998, the Australian Karen Organisation was recognised by the Australian government.

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AKO (WA) Traditional ''Done dance'' Team expands

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The establishment of Karen Language School classes in Queensland

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