Exactly 30 years ago, on Aug 8, 1988, a popular democratic uprising took off in Rangoon that would sweep the country but end with a bloody crackdown by the Burma Army. In this article, which first appeared on Aug 8, 2012, participants in the uprising recall the heady days of revolt and its tragic ending.

t was August 8, 1988, or “8-8-88” as it’s widely known, when hundreds of thousands of Burmese from all walks of life joined a popular protest in the former capital Rangoon to topple the dictator Ne Win’s single party rule that had oppressed them for 26 years.

“Even today I have no regrets about joining the demonstration at that time. I was doing something I felt I had to do,” said the then third-year physics student at Rangoon University, who later received a long prison sentence for his participation.

August is the cruelest month. For every person who experienced Burma’s democracy summer of 1988, August will always be remembered as a month of bloodshed and crushed hopes. For it was in August 1988 that literally millions of Burmese from every walk of life joined to demand an end to more than a quarter-century of unenlightened despotism, only to be gunned down in untold numbers throughout the country.

Horrifying images crowd the mind of every person who witnessed this deadly massacre: endless gunfire and the relentless advance of soldiers bearing down on unarmed crowds; bullet-riddled corpses in the streets; the innocent faces and blood-stained uniforms of murdered schoolchildren; smoke billowing non-stop for days from the crematoria of city cemeteries.