I met a woman yesterday. Some years ago, her mother-in-law committed suicide and blamed it on her daughter-in-law. This caused her husband to loose face as the local mob boss. Because his lost prestige was blamed on his wife, he took her to the city and sold her to work in a brothel. He came every week to collect his wife's earnings, but she had no freedom or right to leave. Their three children were scattered to the wind. By the time the youngest son was nine years old, he was in a roving countryside gang and already frequently raping young girls. The woman was eventually given an opportunity to leave the brothel and live in a safe house. While there, her husband found her and they both believed in Christ. The safe house searched for and relocated all three children who were reunited with their parents. Their lives have started to change and the parents are being trained vocationally, but recently her husband slipped and beat his wife to a pulp. All of them struggle with deep and harsh anger.
I met a woman yesterday. When she was a young girl, her father sold her into the sex trade in order to pay for a male relative's education. She does not know how old she was, but it is possible she was around the age of nine. Her owners kept her pumped with drugs in order to keep her passive. Everything about her life is a blur, but she is certain she not only worked in her own country, but was sold internationally and worked in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos. Eventually she made her way back here where she met a high ranking official in an internet bar. He made her his kept woman even though she continued to work in brothels. They have a son together. She eventually left the brothel and entered a safe house refusing to tell him its location. She openly talks about every person's craving for love and how it is only satisfied by the love of the Heavenly Father.
I met a woman yesterday. She gave birth to the most beautiful and healthy little boy six days ago. She was a prostitute and due to the physical harm it caused her, she should never have been able to have children. Last year, she married and this year she rejoices over the miracle of God redeeming "even down there."
~Hannah
I haven't encountered human trafficking yet, but I am told that men are bringing Vietnamese women into my town, so invisible or not it is here.
ReplyDeleteOn the plane into Phnom Penh I sat near several middle aged American men, travelling alone, not in business attire. Probably they were just tourists, but I confess I struggled not to feel irrationally angry. Angry that they might be supporting such a terrible institution, angry that Cambodians should see people from my country as supporters of such an institution, and angry that any one of those men could have been harboring the same suspicions about me: another American male, travelling alone, not in business attire.