After being sick and in bed for a few days, biking to the
safe house today was an overwhelming experience.
It wasn’t just the usual noise of the street, which includes
children, motorcycles, tuktuks (the typical Khmer mode of transportation), cars,
bicycles, street vendors, a neighbor’s wedding ceremony (which includes music
blasting over speakers from 5:30 a.m. on), and an occasional dog bark or bird
squawk in the distance. Living in this city comes with a medley of sounds that
are not always pleasant, yet Siem Reap would not be Siem Reap without them.
To say that my ears, which had grown accustomed to a silent
room, minus the wall fan, were affronted by all this would be a drastic
understatement. I felt a bit overwhelmed by all the noise up until my sense of
smell kicked in.
Yikes.
I almost toppled off my bike when the smells of egg, mango,
mud, some sort of sweet-cinnamon-sugar, wet dog, rotten vegetables and
I-don’t-know-what, car and motorcycle exhaust, and sweat swirled around me as I
biked as fast as my weak legs could. The neighborhoods, hotels, stores,
temples, and people flew by as Casondra, Keet, and I biked from the center of
the city toward the familiar red dirt road that passes in front of the safe
house.
I entered the gate and gratefully accepted my visitor’s name
tag, thankful to have arrived without anyone noticing my discomfort. It was as
though this 15-minute bike ride took the life out of me. Was I really this tired after 16 days of feeling sick
and 2 days of bedrest? I wanted to lie
down, my stomach ached so much, despite having Tylenol an hour before. I felt
guilty for not being instantly ‘there’ for the girls, as my pain seeped from
the physical to the emotional.
I secretly composed myself with a quick prayer as we walked
from one side of the compound to the next, looking for the girls to join us in
some sort of structured activity.
We found a few of the girls relaxing in front of the
television, hanging out like normal teenagers, bored and in need of something
fun and dynamic to capture their attention. We asked them what they would like
to do and a variety of non-committal responses entailed. Which is understandable. These girls have been placed in this safe
house for a variety of reasons, namely to protect them from their previous
victimizers, who would either bribe the
girls’ parents to prematurely settle their court cases or have a hit on the
girls (you read accurately-these teenagers are wanted.) While they are
safe here, they are also bored.
But not bored like a typical teenager on summer break with
too much free time. They are bored because all they know-their supposed
boyfriends, sex-trafficked street lives, heels, makeup, and flashy jewelry-are
no longer a part of their lives. Before they were placed here, some of them were
living on the streets, ‘working the streets,’ and more or less ‘owned’ by a
guardian (or ‘pimp’) to do what no girl was meant to do. Their lives
are sheltered and secluded here, with tall walls, a guard, and an inconspicuous
red dirt road that is no different than the ones around it.
Later this afternoon, as I sit in the Common Grounds café, I
ask God, “Is this too much?” Is praying,
playing, and talking with these victimized girls too much for me? Are all the sights, smells, pains, stories,
broken dreams, stolen childhoods, destroyed families, pimps, and
human-trafficking too much? I have begun
to understand that I cannot understand all of this and then I look back at what
happened today at the safe house and my jumbled thoughts and feelings of
incompetency fade away.
Casondra, my team’s English teacher, led the way for Keet
and I to not only practice English with the girls, but to draw upon each
other’s hobby of drawing. I have enjoyed drawing since my earliest years and
the three of us, with a few of the girls, made memory cards with paper,
markers, and the simplest of words and correspondent sketches (‘moon,’ ‘ice
cream,’ ‘beach,’ etc.) While this was enjoyable, it was through the simple act
of one girl making me an origami fish that redeemed my previous thoughts of
inadequacy.
Out of the little she had-time, an orange marker, and a
piece of paper-she gave. Her selfless and simple gift, which took time and concentration,
reminded me of how much these girls just want to love and be loved. And
everything of the past, everything that brings disgust to my throat like bile, everything
that makes me want to defend them in court with a loud and articulate argument,
everything that makes me want to erase their ugly past and pave the way to a
beautiful future, and everything that wants me to be Jesus and not just another
friendly American, cries out-THERE is NOTHING that is ‘TOO MUCH.’
God made me to love and love I will, I must. There is no
question about it. There is no bike ride, no overwhelming sights and smells, no
pain in my stomach, no emotional pain, and no lingering insecurities to hold me
back from loving these girls.
