Here we are at month 3! We are currently in Managua, Nicaragua. We are working with Breaking Chains ministry; which is a ministry geared towards women and children who are in prostitution either out of “necessity” or forced into it. I say “necessity” because Nicaragua is the poorest country in the western hemisphere. Women often do not get the same opportunities as men and are not able to stay in school so their only foreseeable option is to sell their bodies.
Sadly, this problem becomes a vicious cycle because they will then begin bringing their children with them because they don’t have childcare so their little girls will be sitting in the corner while their mother is selling her body. As the men repeatedly come back they watch the little girls growing up and when the girls get to be about 5 the men begin touching them. It then comes to a point where the men come in wasted and beat the mother then they move on to the little girl and rape her.
My heart is broken for these women and children. There are known cases of 12-year-old girls who are pregnant. We went to a shelter for these women and many of their children looked half white. That angered me because in talking to the people they said that many of the “john’s” were foreign businessmen or politicians. I knew there were a great majority who were American and feeding this problem.
I was given the opportunity to go out onto the street last night with our contact and a few other people from our group. It was only about 9pm when we started out and our contact told us that we might not find that many girls because it was a weeknight and it was fairly early. As we were driving around to the “hotspots” there were little clusters of girls standing on corners of streets.
When we pulled up only three people were allowed to get out at a time, our contact, a Spanish-speaking woman, and one other person this was so that the women did not become overwhelmed or feel judged. At the first stop I stayed in the car with the other two people and we watched from a small distance. There were about ten girls out there and one man who appeared to be working as a transvestite. We watched for a while then our contact waved us over to join them. As we stood there I noticed a couple of the girls holding a jar in their hands, then they would lift it to their nose and take long sniffs of it. I realized that they were sniffing glue. How horrible, to live a life so terrible that you just want to forget it so you sniff a substance that is absolutely horrific for your body. The women gathered around to hear about what our contact was telling them. There were many distractions of horns honking and of the women walking over to every car that stopped at the corner. Maria, the Spanish-speaking woman with us took a girl to the side that our contact really wanted to rescue. She began talking to her and telling her of God’s love for her. We learned that she was sixteen and had an 8-month-old baby. She also had a thirteen-year-old sister who had a serious heart condition. Her baby had been in the hospital multiple times almost to the point of death. By the time Maria had finished talking to her she was crying but still did not make a response of believing she could leave the streets.
We went to a couple other stops then at the one I got out at there were probably eight girls standing there. When we walked up they were very friendly and curious, I’m sure they were wondering what two women and a man would want. We began talking to them and our contact was telling them all about the program then they asked if I spoke any Spanish, sadly our translator had to answer and tell them that I only spoke a little. Then Steve, our contact, told them why I was there and what we were doing for 11 months. One of the ladies asked me if she could pack into my suitcase. I laughed and told her yes that she would probably fit. One of the things that touched me was just how sweet and genuine those girls were. One of the girls was 5 months pregnant. She was so young and beautiful! My heart was filled with so many emotions and trying to understand. I didn’t want to walk away. I wanted to stand there and scare all the potential customers away from them. I did not want any of them to be beaten that night. I wanted to rescue them all and bring them back to the house. Unfortunately, I couldn’t do any of that. I couldn’t even speak the language. All I could do was smile and wrap my arms around them as we prayed for them and then hug them when we said goodbye.
Stay tuned for the results of last night's adventure…
