Coup D'état and a Life of Doodling

Lori

Lori never thought much about the weight of home until the moment he had to leave it behind. He grew up in Myanmar, a place where the air was thick with uncertainty, where young people like him lived with the constant fear of being taken in both day and night, of disappearing without a trace. The coup had shattered any illusion of safety. The military, Tatmadaw, had tightened its grip, forcing an entire generation to make impossible choices: stay and risk being swallowed by the regime, or leave and start over, somewhere, anywhere.

At 19, Lori became one of the countless youth who fled. The government was conscripting young people—kidnapping them off the streets, using their lives as leverage to blackmail their families. He had heard stories of friends who vanished, of neighbors taken and never seen again. Anyone could be the next, both male or female.

In the chaos of exile, art became his anchor. He had always drawn—doodles filling his school notebooks, sketches crowding the margins of every page. But now, his pen moved differently. His hands, once steady, now trembled with the weight of what he had seen. The streets, the protests, the silent stares of people who had lost too much. He channeled it all into his hands, letting his subconscious take control. There were no deep meanings in his work—at least none he could put into words—but every stroke carried the energy, the emotions, tangled to unravel.

In Malaysia, where he applied to study design, Lori found himself in an unfamiliar limbo. He was safe, but not at home. He was free, but still haunted by the heartbreaking news coming out of the country. His art, however, remained his constant. The digital illustrations, the fine-lined doodles, the chaotic compositions—each one a reflection of his shifting identity. He studied artists like Kaws and GAWX, not just for their style but for their ability to create something entirely their own.

To the outside world, Lori’s work seemed spontaneous, almost playful. But to him, every line carried an unspoken story. The faces he sketched, the distorted figures, the wild eyes staring back from his pages—each was a fragment of a life disrupted, a memory of a place that now felt like another lifetime.

Some days, he wondered if he would ever go back. If Myanmar would ever be a home again, not just a place buried under military rule and lost dreams. Until then, he drew. Because as long as his pen moved, he was still here. Still fighting. Still refusing to be erased.

@lorix_labyrinth