Like Ordering Pizza

The Trafficking problem in Cambodia and Thailand is much bigger than what we have been told. I have learned a lot these last couple of days and as a result had stopped writing. In Cambodia they have what you call begging rings. These are people who are often kidnapped or deceived at the border and forced to beg for a living not because they necessarily want to but because they are forced to.

Children are found to be the biggest victims of the begging rings. As I walk through the streets of Siem Reip on almost every corner there are women holding children that are frothing at the mouth or whose eyes are rolling backwards in their heads or who are injured and bleeding or are missing a limb.... and automatically my natural response is to give money or do what ever I can to assist. However after several interviews I have found that the children these women are holding don't belong to them, and that they are not sick or ill but rather have been drugged, or are maimed and injured in some way by the Ring Leaders they work for. I have met several children like this, who have been rescued at the orphanage in Siem Reip. There is one little boy here Lao who was rescued after being arrested at the age of 3 for stealing...? I can imagine how effective the handcuffs were lol....He was in one of the largest begging rings in all of Siem Reip and stealing was what he was taught and forced to do. So when he arrived here at the Maddocks orphanage, he was always getting into trouble for stealing from other children and the staff. He is now 7 and is still addicted to stealing but people say his face has changed. That is Khmer for he "even though he steals he is different now."

The more and more research I do and the more questions I ask the deeper the problem of human trafficking becomes. There is so much more than what we have been told. So much more than Nefarious. The brothel raids are hard experiences. They are not as welcomed and liberating for the children as are imagined. Often times the children don't want to be rescued because the brothel managers whom they've been sold to have become like parents to them. It's the only life they know. They all look scared and kind of just run al over the place. Its like you have to sort chase them and garb them while you can. There are so many under age children hidden in these Karaoke bars and pubs.

Its becoming harder and harder to track down these brothels because although in some cases the girls just sit outside waiting for clients, in cases where the tourists are requesting under age children the brothel manager delivers the children to the hotels, just like you would order a pizza. I've become much closer to one of the main tourists here in town his name is Sehya. He is a Christian and has offered to set up an interview with one of the girls from the brothels in town who was trafficked at the border. She has to come to us somewhere in town we cannot go to her. The only reason we are able to interview her is because I am paying her for the hour, because we are women and because now she says that after many years it is her choice to work prostitution so she doesn't mind sharing.

On a somewhat lighter pizza note, I thought this was quite hilarious...