I’ve been in Thailand for a
week now. It’s been a week of
firsts. On a light note it has been the
first time I bought my meal in a bag. Beef and vegetables and it was pretty tasty. I went zip lining through the jungle. It was incredible to feel like I was flying
over the tree tops. (picture blog to come of this) I also got completely soaked walking down the
street last night. The Songkhran
Festival started yesterday. Basically it
is several days of gigantic water fights. It is completely acceptable to throw buckets of water on people walking,
riding motos, cars, tuk-tuks, etc. Basically you pretty much get soaked no matter what during this
festival. It is the hottest week of the
year here and Chiang Mai is the number 1 place to come and celebrate Songkhran.
On a heavier note, this was
my first week going into bars and building relationships with the women in
prostitution. Basically these girls work
for the bars and can be bought for about 400 baht for the night. That is about 11 dollars. Prostitution is illegal in Thailand but
you would never know it because it is so common. I am working with another squad mate Darci
going into the bars at night. We go from
8pm to 10pm. We have two bars that we go
to each night and talk to two girls specifically at each of the bars. We have gotten to know some of their
stories. One of the girls, Mary* is a
violinist. She is working at the bar to pay for her music classes because they
are very expensive. The other girl we
have gotten to know at that same bar, Jamie* has a 7 year old daughter she is
providing for. These two girls light up
when they see us walk into the bar. They
give us big hugs and smiles.
It breaks my heart to see
what they have to do every night. It is
hard to see the men usually foreigners come and treat them like objects for
their entertainment. It is hard to have
such anger at the men. One thing God is
showing me is that not only are these girls his children that He loves but also
these men are too. Sin and evil are so
strong and so prevalent. Those men also
are broken and empty people trying to fill that void we all have that only
Jesus can fill. It has gotten
progressively harder each night in the bars as I get to know the girls
better. I have such a love for these
girls. I want them to know that they are
priceless, valuable, and a daughter of God.
One of the things we are
going to do is buy the girls we have gotten to know for the night. They can either go home or spend the evening
with us going bowling or to dinner, whatever. It gives them a night that they do not have to have sex (or boom boom as
the girls call it) with anyone.
Please pray for us and the
girls we meet. Pray that they will see
something different in us and the way we treat them and that we will have
opportunities to share Jesus with them. Also pray that I don’t get completely soaked everyday during Songkhran. 🙂
