your pulse might not race the same way mine is as I write this. Yet I will do
my best to paint the picture for you of the unraveling of this journey that God
has been walking me along since he captured my heart.
you imagine God crying? I mean, he’s God, I understand that he has to be
compassionate or sympathetic, but just stop for a minute and imagine the Almighty
Maker of heaven and earth and all that dwell within in it sitting with his
elbows on his knees and his face in his hands weeping shoulder-heaving sobs to
the point that he is hyperventilating and trying desperately to catch his
seemingly sure breaths.
what could possibly cause the Omnipotent Heavenly Ruler of all things to clutch
his chest and be caught in this posture? Truly, it is the acts of injustice his
precious creations have reduced themselves to inflict upon one another.
fit in this picture?
we fit together.
worldview as I knew it has been destroyed. I’m scrambling to reconcile the
shattered pieces of what I have always thought to be reality, and piece that
back into something that makes sense.
than half of the world lives on less than $2 a day (Economic and Social
Development Department Report, 2006). The fastest growing crime syndicate in
the world is the buying and selling of little boys and little girls by adults
to other adults, to use and exploit in any abusive way they chose. More girls
are killed and disposed in any single decade for the sole reason of being
girls, then people slaughtered in all the genocides of the 20th
Century (Half the Sky, xvii). With these facts a reality, I can guarantee that
the hopes and dreams that I have always known of going to school, having a
happily-ever-after marriage, retirement, vacations, and a fenced in home with a
pretty finished wood front door are not even on radar for these precious
people’s lives.
what am I supposed to do with this information? Just thank God in my daily
prayers that I didn’t wake up in that life?? I used to, until God drew me into
the cracks of his broken heart to the point that I couldn’t sleep soundly at
night in my comfortable bed. I’ve had to surround myself with people with the
same passion and cares, read every book I can get my hands on and scour the internet
for information on the new term in my vocabulary; trafficking.
doesn’t take a flashy media savvy presentation to communicate the severity of
millions of slaves continuing to suffer in our modern day. That knowledge in
itself can rock a person out of their seat. This is the point where I can’t
shake the feeling of the necessity and urgency of action. I can’t reconcile how
everyone in our cozy neighborhoods are NOT in a state of emergency knowing that
we are busy running to this social gathering and that meeting, while an
enormous population of people is merely fighting for their own survival and
freedom.
problem is deeply complicated and this is where I can drown in the daunting
work ahead. After involvement with Not for Sale Florida and some lobbying in
Washington DC on the political end, I journeyed to Thailand to witness first
hand the depravity of a country notorious as a source, transit, and destination
sight for trafficked victims. The desperation and the neglect of these people
is a conundrum. I’ve heard their stories and I’ve seen their faces.
Srey
Neth was found in an $8-a-night guesthouse doubling as a brothel in Poipet.
Neth is a pretty, short, light skinned girl about fourteen or fifteen years
old. She thinks she might be older than that, but is not completely sure of her
birth date. She wore a tight pink t-shirt and equally as tight blue jeans, and
sandals. Neth has plump cheeks but the rest of her is thin and fragile; thick
make-up caked her face, incongruous, as if she were a child who had played with
her mother’s cosmetics. In the brothel, Neth would insist that she was selling
her body there of her own volition, but candidly she would have to admit a
female cousin had taken her from their village telling Neth’s family that she would
be selling fruit in the city. In actuality, once she arrived in Poipet, Neth
was sold to a brothel and closely guarded. Her virginity was auctioned off to a
Thai casino manager who locked her up in a hotel room for several days and
slept with her three times (he later died of AIDS). Then Neth was confined to
the guesthouse where she is young and light skinned enough to be rented out at
top rates. She was not allowed to go out alone in case she would run away. The
brothel owners make sure to beat the girls regularly into submission, silence
and fear of ever rebelling or escaping (story as told to Nicholas Kristof).
Srey Neth is only one of hundreds of thousands of girls and boys who are
commonly used and abused in trafficking rings.
typically lacking education, citizenship, employment, or a strong family
support system. Thailand is packed with all of these circumstances. Large
populations of people belonging to the rural hill tribes such as the Karen,
Lahu, Hmong, Lisu, Akha and Mienare are denied citizenship with the new and
weak governmental rule in Thailand. This makes it nearly impossible to buy land
to farm or find employment in a city, leaving people with little choice in ways
to make money to support their families. Schools are also reluctant to accept
hill tribe children because of their impoverished and stateless families.
from Laos, Burma, or Cambodia, which have fled their countries due to corrupt,
unstable militaristic governments and internationally understated and ignored
genocide to look for better living situations in Thailand. Without much money
or knowledge of Thai language and policy, these immigrants are easily swept
into the hands of traffickers all too willing to sell these desperate people to
factories and brothels.
familiar. Certainly we have poverty and unemployed populations in the United
States as well, but the corrupted culture, controlling governmental politicians,
and bullying policemen in these troubled Asian countries overshadow the hopes
of aid and justice. Police are easily bribed and take advantage of people by
raping women and stealing any belongings of value. Border police merely look
the other way when foreign underage children are clearly being smuggled, more
concerned with pirated DVDs and other paraphernalia maintaining the philosophy
that lower class people don’t matter and trafficking of persons is inevitable,
so efforts to police it are futile. In fact, one abolitionist I had the
privilege of meeting while in Thailand is an artist named Kru Nam. Kru Nam has
rescued up to one hundred orphaned children caught in trafficking situations
that she currently houses, feeds, and educates out of her own good will. The
thanks she has received? Thai police have arrested her seven times as the
community believes these children are poisoning their society. While trying to
fight off opposition from law enforcement and scoffing locals,
traffickers continue to
prey on Kru Nam’s children at the orphanage even as thirty children disappeared
one night never to be seen again.
and prostitution is illegal, and certainly the Thai government does not prefer
the reputation that it has earned itself. But it cannot be denied that the sex
industry brings in insurmountable amounts of money. This is where the demand
for this ‘entertainment industry’ must be addressed, both in the U.S. and
abroad. Thailand is a breath-taking country attracting endless tourists to its
lush green jungled-mountains and beautiful clear water beaches, yet the main
reason why westerners flock to this Asian border is undoubtedly for the pennies
it takes to shell out for the cost of using a beautiful girl or boy.
According
to Gary Haugen, President and CEO for the International Justice Mission (IJM),
an organization currently working in Thailand to free young girls from sex
trafficking, “There is no question that the US bears a significant measure of
responsibility for the sex industry in Southeast Asia… American sex tourists
are still a large part of that demand.� In fact, Western tourists are still the
number one consumers of child prostitution in Thailand (Harvard International
Review).
ahead and release a heavy sigh. I know that I need to often. My mind can just
swim with tasks at hand. Families need to begin to instill stronger values and
morals in their children, teaching boys and girls their worth as individuals
and to respect and honor the opposite gender. Parents must emphasize the importance
of education and the dangers of promiscuity where AIDS and STDs will begin to
run rampant. Huge shifts need to move in weak governments of Thailand,
Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar (Burma). Police need to uphold the law and seek
justice enforcing harsher punishments on traffickers and the johns engaging
underage children in illegal acts. Rehabilitation programs, hospitals, and
counselors are needed where victims have already been abused. Trafficking
awareness needs to be a common conversation where its existence should appall
us all in the United States and across the world. The buying, selling, and
using of other human beings absolutely cannot be tolerated. Most important of
all, this is a platform where the love that Jesus Christ walked the earth in order
to convey must be practiced. It is feasible to rescue victims from a
circumstance, it is even possible to teach them an alternative trade to earn
money to feed their families, but what is to be said about their hearts and
souls? How can a life be put back together after such exploitation? Only the
healing salve of God the Father the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, shining the
brightest light into the darkness of the world that does not know the true love
and care of Jesus.
United Nations, stable governments such as the United States, and countless aid
bureaucracies have undertaken a relentless search for technical solutions in
these situations. These efforts are obviously crucial, yet it cannot be denied
that charisma, passion, and leadership on a grassroots level have often been
most effective in efforts of the past. Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi,
and William Wilburforce are just a few examples of leaders taking the daring
initiative for change. This is where I can get slightly uncomfortable. See, I
love my church family, my consistent job and income, my car, my bed, Barnes
& Noble, and reading books for leisure at the beach. But I have to be like
Peter and step out of the boat if I want to have the faith to walk on water. I
am not suggesting that I am the next Mother Theresa, but in order to expand my
knowledge and experience, I need to be more hands on. I have no idea what this
journey looks like more than five steps ahead, but I am seeking to align my
heart with the heart of my Heavenly Father and he has led me up to this point
toward an organization called Adventures in Missions. My next action steps are
to travel to back to Thailand and also tour Cambodia, India, and the United
States to work for five months and truly invest in the cause. AIM
works with organizations
such as YWAM to do outreach in the night bazaars and brothels as well as in
rehabilitation centers to offer love and care services to trafficked victims. I
want to develop relationships with the precious girls and boys trapped in
desperate situations. I want to hug them and love them and teach them their
value and worth. I want to educate them on the risks of sexually transmitted
diseases to save their health. I want to draw out their dreams and hopes for
their future. I want to use their relentless resilience to survive to save the
generations to come. Most importantly I want to insert a new word in their
vocabulary; Jesus. I want them to know that their life’s purpose is a story of
redemption and that despite all the corruption in the world there is a force of
goodness and grace that is fighting for them and rescue them from His absence.
United States possesses a similar need for prevention and awareness concerning
human trafficking and the collapse of many of the same values that have slipped
out of the family system in Thailand. I understand that I could stay here and
work towards many of the same efforts. But I can not explain to you why my
attention is consistently turned back Asia. Maybe because in what is known as “the
land of never ending smiles� I know that behind those smiles is deep hurt and
confusion and a strong will to survive and succeed. And I cannot deny these
people’s need for God’s redemption. I will not be ignorant and try to map out
the next two to three years of my life knowing that God already has a plan,
however some of my hopes include building a strong foundation of knowledge and
experience while in Thailand and other parts of Southeast Asia to come back on
American soil to raise better awareness. Partnering with other voices and
restless hearts I want to educate my peers and fellow Americans in of the
forgotten corners of the world. I want to replace misbelieves with truth and
bring to light the ugliness of consumerism and the demand of the sex industry
in American and over seas. I want to save the future.
me in this journey and we will be a microphone of light shining into the
darkness of the injustices that reduce our Father in Heaven to tears.
my first hand account of my experiences in Thailand that better capture my raw
reactions to the experiences while visiting there. I also was able to put
together some media for you to watch if you have the time. Thank you!
