I’m going to buy my friend, Pai…and you’re going to help.

I’d like to introduce you to my friend, Pai. She’s the reason I came to Thailand.

It all started at the beginning of the month. It was only our second time hitting the bars in the red light district. Chelsea and I were walking down the street, praying to begin the evening. All of a sudden, Chelsea stopped dead in her tracks in front of the Good Friends Bar. “We  have to stop here. When I was praying earlier, God showed me a big hairbow and floral skirt. There she is.”
Sure enough, I looked and saw a petite girl standing there, wearing a red hairbow and brightly colored floral skirt. It’s hard to argue with something that obvious, so we walked in and took our seat at the bar.

We introduced ourselves and began talking. We learned that her name was Pai (pronounced like pie). She is 19 years old and a freshman in college. She works at the bar each night until at least 1, but most of the time her shift is drawn out until 2 or 3 in the morning. She then has to be at school at 7. Her boss is not a kind man, nor does he treat her kindly. She constantly has to cater to men that fawn after her as she pours drink after drink. As soon as we told her we were working at a cafe, she only had one thing to say in her broken English.
“Can I work too?”

This put us in an odd predicament. The cafe ministry is quite new, and it currently lacks the resources to pay more than one employee. The bulk of the work is done by volunteers like our team. We knew we couldn’t tell her yes, as much as we wanted to. I felt helpless. Here we were, encouraging these girls to choose a different lifestyle, but we couldn’t offer them very much on a tangible basis. We continued to visit Pai. A couple nights later, we partied with her into the wee hours of the morning. (Sorry, Gran). Our growing friendship even meant we got free ice-cream while waiting for her to close the bar. Each time we went back to visit, her face lit up as she saw us approaching.

Last week, we shared as a team the things we wanted to see happen before we left Thailand…before the World Race came to an end. We all agreed on one particular request. We wanted to see one girl make the firm decision to leave the red light district. We prayed and went about our usual day. I went back to visit Pai that same night. For some reason, she asked about the cafe again. She also told me that she didn’t have to work the next night and would love to hang out. I realized we could accompish two things here. I invited her to come to the cafe the next evening to meet Emmi. As you may know, Emmi is our incredible contact this month that owns the cafe and coordinates teams to do bar ministry. Emmi is well connected, so I assured Pai that Emmi would be able to find a job for her somewhere in the city.

 

Chelsea and I were ecstatic when we arrived at Wongen at the exact time Pai was pulling up on her scooter. We took a seat and ordered a milkshake, fruit smoothie, and banana split. After some small talk, Emmi pulled up a seat. They talked back and forth for a while in Thai, and Chels and I sat there smiling. We didn’t know what was being said, but we knew this was the start of something incredible. This was such a great moment. Emmi would be able to set her up with a new job.