Two months ago I never would have imagined myself in a place like this. I never thought ministry would be looking into the eyes of women trapped in prostitution. But there I was with 8 other women, stepping faithfully into the enemy’s territory to shine God’s light into one of the darkest places I’ve ever been. With shaking legs, I walked down the packed mud stairs into an underground restaurant. My heart began to beat faster and I whispered a prayer under my breath for God to give me strength.
In Nepal, women do not have much value. Although the dowry system is not in place, the financial burden of bringing up a girl is still culturally difficult. Once a girl is married, she no longer brings financial support to the family. From the time they are born, women live to serve. It makes sense that the cabin restaurant industry would be successful in terms of women servicing others.
Many times a woman chooses to work in a cabin restaurant. Culturally, if a woman’s husband dies she can no longer stay with her in-laws and must fend for herself. Most of these situations lead women to accept positions at a cabin restaurant so they can financially support themselves and sometimes their children, too. In other cases, this is not the women’s choice. Girls from rural villages will often be sold into the trafficking industry at a young age by their parents. A girl does not bring any financial support to the family. If the family is poor, they cannot afford to send the girl to school, so what use will she be until she is married and out the door? In these situations, men come through to buy girls for their restaurants, aiming for the poorest of families. Parents see their daughters working as a blessing. Before the girl didn’t bring any value to their family, and now they are working and contributing financially, this is a blessing!
The ministry we are partnered with work to rescue these women from this industry, whether they were put there by force, or by choice. The goal is to establish a relationship with the girls, to shine light and see them, maybe for the first time in all their lives. The ministry team will pursue these women in love, and when the time is right and they are sure the girls want out of the business, they will put together a plan to remove them. This usually looks like getting them a place to stay, whether it’s at the ministries women’s center, or with a local family, they get them physically removed from the restaurant. The next step is to train these women to take care of themselves. The ministry will teach the women how to read, write, sew – anything to help them establish a career to support themselves, their children and never return to prostitution.
So on a hot afternoon, a team of us, partnered with our ministry host entered into one of these dark places.
We turned a corner and entered into a “restaurant”. It was a musty dark room that was divided into small rooms by wooden orange walls. I say walls, but they were flimsy and makeshift. The wall was more of a boundary so we couldn’t see what was happening in the room, but they didn’t reach the ceiling, so “privacy” wasn’t something that was a high priority. All we had to do was stand on our tiptoes and we could see right into the other rooms. Fortunately, we were the only ones inside this particular restaurant. My mind fidgeted with the thought of what if we weren’t the only ones here? I quickly set that thought out of my mind, feeling my stomach churn even more uncomfortably.
The eight of us crammed into a small room, sitting on the floor, the girls offering us pillows to sit on which we declined. We ordered Mountain Dew to appease the manager who would have speculated why we were there if we didn’t order something. We weren’t allowed to say words like, pray, Jesus, God, church, etc. but because they didn’t speak English, we could pray out loud as long as we made it look like we were speaking to one another and spelled the words out. Awkwardly we would look at each other with bright smiles and say, “Dear G-O-D, please be in this room, (laughter like we were having a great conversation) fill this place with your presence and let them feel your love. A-M-E-N.”
We met two girls that day. One didn’t even work at the restaurant but came running over when she saw us going down the stairs. She told us a group had come through once before and the light they brought still filled her with happiness. She was in her late 20’s and was married and had a couple children. The other lady was younger, maybe early 20’s and had just gotten married. Her husband had moved to Saudi Arabia and would be working there for the next 4 years to financially provide for them. Both of them were drunk and the younger girl was high from another substance. We sat and laughed with them, our smiles never breaking. They told us about their families, and showed us pictures on their phones. We asked them what they liked to do and bonded over music and dancing. We got their phone numbers and planned another trip to go bowling with them and spend more time with them before we left Nepal.
The atmosphere in the entire restaurant shifted when we walked through the doors and there was power with us. These women had smiles plastered on their faces, but their eyes held their deep sorrow. This wasn’t a moment of friends chatting and getting along, this was a moment of chains being broken and lives being changed. We didn’t rescue these women that day. We didn’t drag them out, put them into a school and save their lives. But we saw them. We acknowledged that they were our sisters. We weren’t afraid of their shame and we openly loved them and fought for them in a place where everyone fights against them. Jesus was present that day and because we went in and looked into their eyes and loved them, they were able to get the smallest glimpse of the way our Heavenly Father looks at us.
Their story is far from being over. God is fighting for them each and every day and I am just so thankful that God used me to be a part of these women being set free from bondage.
*Our teams continued to work in the cabin restaurants over the remaining weeks. They went to their homes and had coffee and lunch with them, they watched their children and started the process of getting some of these women plugged into the ministry where hopefully their lives may be transformed by Jesus and they can begin again.
