Does $1000 US dollars a day sounds like a tempting offer? Well, it can be yours if… (this is the place where you should stop reading this offer and find something better to do.)
I don’t know about you, but I think I’m pretty good at recognizing a scam when I see it. If I received an e-mail with the same title as this blog, it would go straight to the spam folder! But there are some scams out there that are a little more cunning and believable. They actually look like pretty good deals, and to the right person they sound too good to pass up, especially when you need a break in life.
For instance, I walked past a BMW dealership the other day and advertised on the front of the building were the following irresistible things: Joy, Fulfillment, Prestige, Happiness, Success. Apparently all these things now come standard with the purchase of a BMW. I know better, but if I wanted a BMW badly enough, I might be tempted to think that heated leather and joy were synonymous.
The truth is, if I want something badly enough, I’ll be more willing to look into an offer that would otherwise be an obvious bad choice. Last month in Phuket, Thailand, I was with thirteen other men for the entire month doing construction work for SHE ministries. For most of the month we were working on the property, if not we were walking to 7-11 (they are everywhere in Thailand!) or frequenting the nearby mall for air conditioning.
One night we got the opportunity to see with our own eyes the real work of what SHE is all about though. We took a minibus over to Bangla Road at Patong Beach. This is the notorious spot in Phuket for people who are interested in the sex tourism industry. It is really a spectacle there, with lights and glamour, music, advertising the promise of fulfillment – for one night anyway. The workers on the street will call out to you, some will even grab you and entice you to purchase their services. Some of them are selling drinks, others are selling entertainment, while some sell their bodies. If you ask the girls or boys who work there if they like their job, they will tell you they do. But if you get to know them and actually spend enough time with them to hear their heart, most of them never wanted anything to do with sex tourism in the first place.
Fast forward one month to George Town in Penang, Malaysia. This is where I am with my new team and we have been here about one week. For the first couple days we stayed at the Mingood Hotel, which was near several markets, restaurants, clubs and businesses. We spent some time preparing for the month and exploring. Then we headed over to meet our contacts for the month, who are with YWAM and only a few blocks away from the Mingood Hotel. So, we walked over to our residence for the month and settled in.
One rainy evening, we met up with some of the local workers in order to walk and pray around the city. Up until them things seemed rather exciting and new, and we were eager to get involved with the ministries. But one of the workers there started telling us a darker tale. Apparently sex tourism was rampant, right where we had been staying at the Mingood Hotel, and we had no idea. The industry is hidden here behind closed doors, at massage parlors, clubs, guest houses and other places. What may look like a legitimate business is really dealing in a dirty slave trade.
We learned how many ‘business owners’ would travel to poorer, more remote villages in Vietnam, China, Burma and surrounding countries and offer city jobs to local residents, mostly young girls. They would then fly them, often business class, to places like Penang and buy them brand new wardrobes. Everything would look good until they were raped and told that they needed to pay their employer back for the flight and wardrobe. They are then enslaved. Shame and defeat keep them hopeless, unwilling to even try to escape. Even if they had the chance to return home, many of them would not.
What a scam.
I don’t have strong enough words to condemn it, and who knows what we can do about it? But please pray. There are some who are opposing this and working to raise awareness, but they are so few. This is not even the primary thing I will be focusing on this month, as I will spend most of my time with the homeless and at a hospital, but hearing these stories makes my heart heavier than any other plight that has fallen upon these shores.
