Hello all!
We are in our 3rd month, and we just arrived at our ministry site 2 days ago in Pattaya, Thailand. The city is right on the coast – hills and hotel skyscrapers lining the horizon, fresh seafood on every corner, aqua blue water lined by white sandy beaches, and tropical weather welcoming us every day. A packaged deal for any tourist seeking a beach vacation, or so it may seem. It’s amazing how deceiving looks can actually be. If you take a closer look, you’ll see that the majority of the “tourists” are men – older, American, wealthy, and lonely. Some are young, our age, just here with their buddies in search of a good time. Regardless, they are all searching for something, something to fill a void in their life, and they seek it out in the women that work the bars. Street after street filled with bar after bar filled with thousands of women selling themselves to men. Most of the girls and women come to Pattaya from northern Thailand where they were starving and jobless, because it is the only guaranteed source of income available to them. They have no other way of surviving, or at least they aren’t aware of any other way.
That’s where we come in.
We are volunteering with an organization called the Tamar Center, which is a place geared toward reaching out to the prostitutes and girls working the bars. Many women that work for the Tamar Center have come off the streets themselves, and their stories are unbelievable. It’s an inspiration to see women come from a past of being completely broken, empty and used to healed, full, strong women of faith. The center offers English classes for those that are interested, as well as job alternatives (training included) in a hair salon, bakery, café, and card making business. They also have a place for some of the girls to stay until they get on their feet, because in more cases then not it is dangerous for them to leave the jobs they have taken up.
We have only been here a few days, and already I feel that my heart is beginning to be wrecked for this place… I’ve heard people say that before and never understood what they meant… until now. Even as we got off the plane in Bangkok I had this incredible feeling… not quite sure how to explain it, but it has followed me to Pattaya and only grown stronger. It’s a feeling of peace, like this is exactly where I’m supposed to be, mixed with a feeling of urgency to do what we came here to do. I feel like we don’t have a lot of time because we are only at this site for 10 days before we have to leave, yet there is so much I want to do here… so much I want to see happen.
It is a dark place, but it is not a hopeless place. Little by little, one life at a time, this city is changing. And it is going to keep changing and growing. In a place that was once consumed in darkness there are now a few bright sparks…
And all it takes is a spark to ignite a wildfire…
