A man dreaming of a quiet retirement.

I just got back from sitting with a man called Jeff, while he showed me pictures of the home he’d been building for his retirement. Jeff is grey, and thin, but there is an assurance in his manner, which somehow reflects the experience of a man used to being in control. He had his computer on an ordinary desk next to his kitchen. While he carefully made us tea, we watched the snow outside his window, and listened as he complained about the robberies that had happened at the café and sports club he runs, and about the amount of tax he has to pay.
On the wall are pictures of his family, his wife, stepsons and stepdaughters. He has been married for ten years, and is proud of it. He’s sixty now, and soon he’ll be able to move with her to the house he’s built and relax a little.
It would have been a cosy and comforting scene, if it wasn’t for the fact that the room next door was full of half naked Thai women and that we were sitting inside an erotic massage parlour. It was from the exploitation of these women that Jeff was building his retirement home in Thailand. Pimping young women had paid for the beautiful garden and the terrace. The only disruption to his plan so far has been raids by the police checking that his women have the right papers. So far he’s got away with it.
Quietly during the conversation, we found out more about how this secret world operates, but what was most striking was just how banal and ordinary this evil is in his mind. For him, it was no different from selling drinks, or hiring out a tennis court. In his own eyes he was just a hard-pressed businessman trying to make a living, so he could retire with his wife and pass his remaining days with her family in Thailand.
The human mind is very adept at rationalising the wrong that we do, seeing it as normal, or “the way the world works”. Although we might not do what Jeff does, to a certain extent we rationalize the life we live, not buying ethical products, not caring about the homeless person in the street, not visiting an elderly neighbour, just seeing ourselves as too busy, or finding an excuse as to why the way we live is fine. We are hard-pressed, just trying to make it through the day; it’s the way the world works. Just like Jeff.

Trust

She had invited us through the front of the Thai massage parlour, into the back area where the women wait, watch TV and get ready. We sat there listening as she poured out her anger and frustration.  It struck me once again how the normal face of exploitation is boredom and exhaustion, punctuated by violence and fear. It was an ordinary living room, sofas, chairs, cigarette smoke, a TV showing Thai programs and a security camera giving a view of the front door. They were on the lookout for police making checks or violent customers. Whichever came, they were afraid.
As we talked about what was happening, the woman opened up and told us about the trafficking routes, the debts imposed on the women and the forced prostitution that followed. She kept coming back to the same word "trust". Could she trust us? Could she trust the Belgian authorities? How could she trust anyone? After years in Belgium, she tried to look after the younger women in the massage parlours, but it was hard to help them. It was a picture of a life on a knife-edge.

We offered help with visas, with alternatives to life in the massage parlours. We tried to show a way out. Again and again she asked “Can I trust you?” There was no way to prove that she could. All we can do is be consistent, keep going, keep showing up, keep trying to help. Eventually, perhaps, we will gain enough trust to really help. When you are isolated and abused you can close up to everything, even to those trying to help you. When she asked why we would try to help her and people like her, we pointed to the fact that as Christians we believe that everyone is of infinite worth. By the end of the conversation her eyes glistened with tears.
One of the many problems with a society that treats everything as a commodity is that there is a massive erosion of trust. Women find it hard to trust men, children are wary of adults. Parents look at strangers to find the danger that could be in them. Few people trust the advertising agents, and no one trusts a politician. Only when we recognise worth instead of looking for a bargain, and value people above products will we rebuild the trust that we all so desperately need. For many of the women we work with, it is the key to freedom.

An SMS for help, half way across the world.

An email landed in my inbox through our campaign "Business Travellers against Human Traffiking". It was from a man in Indonesia, begging for help. His friend had been in debt, which she couldn't pay off. As she couldn't pay, she was being forced to go with traffickers, who said they were taking her to Iraq. She had managed to sms her friend that she was being taken to the plane at 5pm that day. She needed to be rescued! I looked at the email, in which the man told this story, then I looked up the time difference from Belgium to Indonesia - there was only two hours to go before this woman was lost. There was no time to lose!

I had no idea which NGOs to contact in Indonesia, so I googled around and soon found a few, and before long, I was hanging on the phone, nervously waiting for someone to pick up, but when they did there was another problem - no one spoke any English. So, it was back to the drawing board and the time was ticking away. In the end I did the only thing I could, I phoned the only people I was sure would speak English, I phoned the British embassy. They were slightly surprised to be contacted about trafficking on their doorstep by a man in Belgium, but they sprang into action and contacted the local police. Before long I received the message that the woman had been rescued and was safe for the moment, although the threat of the traffickers to whom she owed money would never completely disappear. It was a strange, but amazing story of a rescue that started with an sms and spanned half the world. It also showed yet again that by reporting what we know, we can bring help to trafficking victims.

This week www.businesstravellers.org ran another story about Indonesia, this time about a recruitment agency promising young women domestic work in Malaysia, but now acused of actually trafficking them into prostitution. The problems of poverty, debt and the hope of a better life creating vulnerability to trafficking continue. The more it can be brought to light, the more we can work together to stop it.

From the street to the classroom

Behind the Gare du Nord in Brussels, there is long street of windows with women in prostitution posing all day. They try not to look bored, but they must be. It's an odd sight, shoppers with children hurrying along a street with women in the windows, and a steady stream of men from the railway station looking for quick sex. That street is the start of the Brussels red light district and we are often in that area working to find out if there has been trafficking.

We were looking around to see if there might be a youth centre we could work with, perhaps as a space where the women could come to learn skills and be out of the pressure of work for a while, when we came across a young woman sitting on the floor, with a toddler on her lap and a four-year-old dancing about next to her. We stopped to talk, and although her French wasn't good and she spoke no English or Dutch, we learned that she was Romanian like so many of the women begging with their children in Brussels (It is curious the segregation that occurs, Bulgarians in the windows by the station, Nigerians in the windows a few streets away, Romanians on the street, using children to attract donations, all depending on who the pimps and the traffickers are that control the turf.). She had been here a few years and although she had somewhere to stay, life was hard. She insisted the children were hers and knew their names without hestitating. Someone was controlling her, and but she seemed to be genuine enough.

As we finished talking with her, and started to walk away, another woman rushed up. Her story was much more dubious and disturbing. Brandishing a piece of paper in our faces, and pointing to a young child about seven years old who stood vacantly next to her, she told us in perfect French that she was a Bosnian refugee who had only been in Belgium for one month. Her daughter, she said, was blind and needed treatment. We looked at her, and indeed her eyes were clouded over with a white film. The doctor's bill she waved in front of us for hundreds of euros was, however, clearly faked. Other questions sprang to mind; how had she learn French so quickly? If she was illegal, how did she get a bank account for this bill to be paid through? How come the bill was faked? We looked again at the girl, and a darker question troubled us. If she could not see, and she was being used to beg, how did she get blinded? It was a very disturbing thought. We tried to direct the woman to local organisations who could help, but she became angry with us.
We saw it on the streets of India, now we are seeing it on the streets of Brussels; children being exploited for money. I pray that the girl was not blinded for the purpose, but certainly she was not receiving proper medical attention. You may have seen the film Slumdog Millionaire, which accurately shows how children are sometimes injured and blinded to get more money from their begging. I hope this is not happening in Brussels, but now I have my doubts.

Another woman who regularly begs alone in the station itself, has a different story. She is very poor, and she also stays in the country illegally and begs all day, but when I enquired about her children, she replied that they were in school. Despite the precarious nature of her existence and the probably control she is under from traffickers and other mafia figures, she has managed to get her children into education. At least when they are in school, they are safe, and out of the environment which seems to trap so many. They will also have the possiblity of a different future. Education for all those children we pass on the street, another goal in the fight to stop the traffik.

Isolated, excluded and illegal, what would you do?

When we heard they had her in the detention cells, Rach and I set out to see what we could do. Jane (not her real name) was a part of the church we were leading at the time in south London. A tiny, fine boned, but wonderfully self-reliant African lady from Ghana, we couldn't imagine what the police could want to keep her locked up for. She was being kept at a police station in north London, so off we went.
For some reason, entering a police station is always a bit of a trauma, its like when you see a police car when you are driving, you always slow down (or I do!) even if you are obeying the speed limit. If that's what it's like for me, a white, middle class Brit, imagine what it's like for an African on foreign soil. The police were perfectly civil and we went through to see Jane, huddled with three others in a cell that seemed only small enough for two. It was winter and she was cold. She had no blanket, no change of clothes, no tooth brush or other toiletaries. We applied to the police to be able to be able to bring her those things and they laughed at us. "Oh, they can ask us for those things any time they like" guffawed the seargent "they obviously don't need them". "Did you tell them they could ask for those things" I shot back. He paused and looked round at the women. They had no idea of their rights in a British police station. The policeman went off to get a blanket.
Jane's story soon emerged. She was, like many in our congregation, in the UK illegally. She came in on a student visa and stayed to work. She had been working quietly in a small factory in north London for a pittance of a wage. When the factory owner wanted to get rid of them, he just called the police and declared that he had found out that the workers hadn't got the right papers. The police then came and arrested them. The factory owner had the best of both worlds, cheap labour when he wanted it, and a good relationship with the police when he had enough. Whatever you think about illegal immigrants, what is obvious is that exploitation is never very far away.
This was brought to mind recently by the story we heard from one of the women in a Thai massage parlour. She had come into the country legally, and worked in a factory, but when she couldn't get her visa renewed, she lost her job. It was then that the pimp approached her to start working in the massage parlour. Isolated, excluded and illegal, she didn't see any alternative. Now she doesn't know how to get out of that kind of work.
Jane's story ends more happily, we were able to work with her to help her regularise her stay. The fact is that illegal immigrants, sans papier or whatever they are called in your country, are people too and are vulnerable to exploitation. It is impossible to hate and exclude immigrants and to also say you are against human trafficking. It's a sensitive subject, but it's also the elephant in the room. No one should be bought and sold and we should care for the vulnerable, no matter whether they are legal or not in the eyes of the state.

Politicians who love blood chocolate

A few years ago, at the start of the Stop the Traffik chocolate campaign, we were excited to be invited to the UK parliament to discuss the fact that thousands of children were (and are) being trafficked and exploited on the cocoa fields of Ivory Coast. We were invited to a meeting of the Cross Party Committee on Chocolate and Confectionary, no less. With jobs like that, it's a wonder that MPs even need to over-claim their expenses. We were excited though, because it was the first political interest in the UK.
We spent hours preparing the case, re-reading all the research, in the knowledge that the chocolate industry would also be represented and would be arguing to the MPs that they were doing all they could to stop the exploitation of children. They had even managed to find a sympathetic charity to attack us.
I was on holiday in Wales on the day of the hearing, so I got up at 4am and caught a train from a windswept, dark station, winding my way through to Birmingham, changing trains, and finally arriving, bleary eyed in London, more than five hours later (unbeknowns to me, my boss Steve Chalke had managed to get a lift from a friend with a helicopter and arrived from the north of England in less time than it had taken me to get out of Wales. Oh to have friends with helicopters!)
We went through security into Portcullis House, and were shown into the meeting room by a friendly assistant. Slowly the industry representatives were shown in, and lastly the MPs arrived. As we predicted, the argument between us and the industry was sharp, but what struck me most was the behaviour of some of the MPs. They were not really that interested in the plight of the children of Ivory Coast, but rather their attention was fixed on the large bowls of free chocolate that Nestlé, Mars and others had provided for them. Brian Woods showed the famous and moving film he had made in the Ivory Coast of children who had been trafficked and held as slaves, showing their wounds and talking of the pain they had suffered. All through this the MPs happily munched away at their chocolate, as if it was a trip out to the local cinema.
At the end of it all, one MP went over to a side table and picked up some of the gift bags that the chocolate industry had provided "Time to take my blood chocolate" he sniggered to us, and left. We were astonished.
Well, that was almost two and a half years ago, and much has changed. Industry has started to make steps forward, although there is still a long way to go. It isn't politicians who have made this happen, it is ordinary people who have bought fairtrade, written letters, held chocolate fondue parties, protested and petitioned. I can imagine that a meeting of the Cross Party Committee on Chocolate and Confectionary would be very different today, as everyone knows that voters want to see this terrible abuse end. That's why Stop the Traffik is a grass roots movement. We know that change starts in our own communities and the politicians will catch up with what we are doing. Perhaps, on some issues, that's the way it should be.

Dubai, the city where everything's for sale.

The text came through on my phone "I'm at the Cyclone, it's like the United Nations of prostitution." It was from a journalist friend who had gone to Dubai to investigate whether women were being trafficked into sexual explotation in that most commercial of gulf states. The fact is that thousands of women are being trafficked and can be found even in the lobbies of many of the five star hotels. Back in 2006, our campaign Business Travellers against Human Trafficking ran a campaign with the European Parliament, asking Dubai, ever so politely to stop this practise. The response initially was to ban our website www.businesstravellers.org and to deny that anything like that could happen "It is against our culture", the minister for tourism said. Slowly, however, they changed the law. We thought that meant progress, but the problem was that thousands of women from Russia, Armenia, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, all over the world in fact, continued to find themselves trapped in prostitution, even amongst the palms and gleaming towers of the luxury that is Dubai. A law is all very well, but it must be enforced.
Business Travellers against Human Trafficking not only lobbies for change, but gives people a place to report instances of human trafficking. We received a report from a man who had seen a woman who was clearly distressed, being offered in a hotel. He took his life in his hands, rescued her and took her to the police, who promptly imprisoned her for being an illegal immigrant. They deported her back to Moldova.
The police in Dubai do sometimes arrest traffickers now, but the situation has not changed that much over the years. A Belgian journalist working with us recently went to Dubai and reported that the women were still being trafficked and offered in the business hotels. In his article he names some the hotels implicated, which include the Hyatt and the Radisson. We contacted both chains, but only the Radisson replied and said they would do something. It remains to be seen if they have (and anyone staying there could report back to us). The Hyatt seems content to ignore the criticism.
If you read Dutch, then you can see the original article here, if not, we have translated it into English and you can read a short section of it below. It's up to us to make it clear that we will not put up with this kind of trafficking in our hotels.

Dubai by night: Business as usual
It is said that there is nothing better than the Moroccan whores. No common Asian or East European smuggled goods for poor businessman, but the pure Champions’ League for wealthy Arabs. Beautiful, Muslim and without taboo.
It's just after nine o'clock in the evening, and the luxurious shopping mall of the Radisson SAS hotel in Dubai is preparing for the daily transformation. Businessmen have changed their tailor made suits for more casual clothes and seem to walk uninterested towards the club of the hotel, Ku-Bu. 'The funkiest bar in town, with its groovy tunes and mouthwatering cocktails', as the hotel’s flyer reads. There surely is some truth in that, although one could question whether it is only the cocktails that cause the mouthwatering by the mainly male public. With the darkness of the night girls start to drop into the lobby of the hotel; dozens of girls, high heels, short skirts, leaving little to the imagination. Within one hour, Ku-Bu is crowded. Security people closely but discreetly keep an eye on the crowd. The lustful men are politely welcomed and the girls receive a kiss. New or unknown girls are asked for their papers. An hour later people start to find their way to their rooms, a big German man accompanied by a beautiful young Ethiopian girl. A local sheik with two blond Russian ladies. The Radisson has more to offer; The Pub ('An informal and cozy English Pub') or Up on the Tenth ('The finest jazz bar in Dubai'), where a man alone will not be so for more than 10 minutes. A bit more style, ideal for the man whom prefers to have a good conversation beforehand.

Getting laid in the hotel
About 24 hours later we arrive in The Premiere, the huge nightclub from the Hyatt Regency Hotel, one of the biggest and best-known business hotels in Dubai. Entrance costs are 125 dirham a person, almost 25 Euros. The club is crowded, even though it is only 11 o'clock. Hundreds of prostitutes are positioned around the dance floor, or hang around the bar. The visitors, only men, take their time to watch around while the women are becoming more intrusive with the time passing. Just after entering the club an Ethiopian beauty tries to get our attention, whilst on the other side an East European beauty gives us a view into her décolleté. Tariff for an hour of pleasure, preferably in the Hotel itself; 250 to 300 dollars. It's not a problem that I do not stay in the hotel; Hannah rents a cheap apartment nearby together with a friend. We can go there if I want to.

Why education can Stop the Traffik

We were in a building site in Mumbai, squatted down, talking with a thin, defeated looking Indian man called Balraam. It was hot and dusty and we were tired from the day at the drop-in centre we worked in as part of Oasis India. Traffic thundered past as the city headed home. Behind Balraam was his home, a make-shift shack in amongst the construction. Ajay, my colleague, an amazing, tireless worker for justice, was doing the talking. There was a lot at stake, and as usual this brought out the best in Ajay.
Balraam's son Bipin had been coming to the drop-in centre we were running. He was small and thin too, but the was no defeat in his eyes. When you looked at him you saw him almost daring the world to try to stop him. Bipin, like his family were from Orissa and spoke Oriya. Bipin also spoke some Hindi and it was in Hindi that he was learning to read and write. The centre we ran was just a gap between buildings with a tin roof rammed on top, for which we paid way to much rent to a grasping landlady. Everyday children packed into that space to learn to read and write, play, wash, get clothes and food. We also prepared them for school and tried to get them places there. As soon as Bipin started to read, you could see that he had something special. He was ravenous to learn, and he picked up everything the staff of the Asha Deep centre taught him.
Then came the bad news. The construction work at a nearby site was over. Balraam and his wife Sarojini (hers is another amazing story) had to move on. Moving job meant literally pitching tent in a new site. This was a major blow to Bipin. How could he learn to read now? Before we knew it, he had threatened his parents that if they moved, he would run away and sleep outside the Asha Deep centre. The parents were shocked and angry. We agreed to pick him up and take him to the centre where ever they were in the city, and we would also return him home.
This arrangement went on for a while, very successfully. Bipin was brilliant. He had to be in school. Eventually we managed to get a sponsor so he could go to boarding school. At that point his father said no. This was too much, the boy was needed at home. Soon, he would have to work. Bipin could see his chance for a better future slipping away.
So, it was a tense meeting, when we sat together in the rubble.
It was at that very moment that Ajay said something that I will never forget. He asked Balraam a question; "What do you do?"
A simple question. Balraam replied "You can see, I am a construction worker"
"Where do you live?"
"I live here, you can see it!" Balraam said, sweeping his hand around, looking at Ajay as if he was stupid. Ajay wasn't finished though;
"And what did your father do?", he asked.
There was a pause, "He was a construction worker"
"And did he live the same way as you?"
"Yes"
"And his father?"
There was a longer pause. "He also worker on the building sites"
"And did he live like you do in a shack?"
"Yes"
Balraam wasn't insulted as I feared he would be, he was instead beginning to see, and could guess what Ajay would say next.
"Don't you understand, brother, that if you stop Bipin from learning, he also will live and work as you do, and so will his son. Do you like living this way? Is this what you want for your son?"
Balraam looked at his feet. We waited; this was his son, and something new was difficult for the man to accept. Eventually though, he agreed, that the best thing, the only thing to break the cycle of oppresion and abuse that their family had suffered for generations, was to let the boy go to school.
Bipin went to school. The only place available (that we could afford) was in a Marathi language school, the state language of Maharashtra, of which Mumbai is the capital. He took the place, learned the language and before long was top of the class. He has thrived in school and his life is revolutionized. Balraam can be proud of the decision he took that day in the fumes of traffic and the clatter of the building site.
This also has a lot to do with Stop the Traffik. Education changed Bipin's life and it also made him a lot less vulnerable to being trafficked. It is a long-term investment in a person, but if we can ensure that children from poor families are educated, given vocational training and are mentored as they try to find a job, then they are much less likely to be trafficked. What was true in the life of a boy like Bipin is doubly true for girls. Education is vital, if we really are going to Stop the Traffik.

A coffin, a harmonica and a big bass drum

It was a dull, rainy day in Antwerp, and the police had got there before us. When we arrived for the start of the march, there were two police riot vans waiting. This made us smile, firstly because we didn't know how many supporters would come, and secondly because there is almost nothing as mild mannered and polite as Oasis Belgium - we'd much rather make you a cup of tea than shout at you. Anyway, the police were taking no chances.
Slowly a small crowd gathered in one of the cobbled courtyards that dot the centre of Antwerp, the rain eased off and we were nearly ready - all we needed was the band! And what a band it was! They are called the Psalters and if you ever see them, you'll never forget them. My colleague Niels, who is much groovier than me, found them. They spend part of the year living in a Christian community, part of the year travelling to places like Iraq to spend time with the people and learn their culture and music, and the rest of the time they tour as a band. We had caught up with them in a small anarchist festival in Germany (that's another story!) and they had wanted to help us with a protest march against the terrible exploitation of children who are trafficked to work on cocoa farms in Ivory Coast. This is one of the big campaigns run by Stop the Traffik, asking that the chocolate industry takes its responsibility not to buy from farms that exploite children and to help put these children into school and pay more so that the farmers make a decent living.
So, here were the Psalters, piling out of a transit van, all leather and dreadlocks and piercings, face paint and it must also be said, a gentle and friendly attitude. Never judge by appearances! What was the music like? It's hard to describe - they call it refugee music and it's made up of amazing harmonies, chants, strange instruments as well as good old feedback guitar.
And the coffin? Well, to make a statement about all the children who were being abused and sometimes dying on cocoa farms in Ivory Coast, we made a small coffin and draped it in a cloth. It was to be a funeral procession. We set off down the road, escorted by the police, the coffin held high, the Stop the Traffik supporters following behind and others giving out leaflets. Then the Psalters started up. They had a big bass drum and a harmonica, which they played through a megaphone, accompanied by beautiful singing and chanting.
It sounds weird, but the effect was electrifying. People started to pour out of shops and houses to see what was going on. As we wound round the beautiful streets of Antwerp, people were leaning out of top story windows, wondering what this was all about. Sometimes, something happens and suddenly an event seems to take on an importance and a significance you never expected. Sometimes you get the feeling that something is happening spiritually and it is slightly out of your control. As a Christian, I love those times.
We reached the centre of the city and the Psalters played for a while, people asked questions and took leaflets. Belgium, the home of chocolate (sorry if you are Swiss, but I still think Belgium is the home of chocolate!), suddenly hearing a message that there is a price to pay for all this luxury and it is being paid in the fields of Africa. Strange day, strange and wonderful.
Now, you might say that days like that change nothing. You might believe that the mega corporations like Nestlé, Mars, Cadbury and the like will never listen to a few bedraggled protesters, or to a few letters, or phone calls or school events. Change comes in strange ways though. Since Stop the Traffik began its chocolate campaign a couple of years ago, Cadbury has changed one of its main brands to Fair Trade in the UK, Australia and New Zealand, one of the big Dutch brands, Verkade, has gone Fair Trade, Mars has pledged to make all it's chocolate certified as free from trafficking by 2020 (long time, I know) and now, today, we learned that the biggest brand in Belgium, Cote d'Or, which is owed by Kraft, has said that it is working to make all of its chocolate certified by Rainforest Alliance. We have concerns about whether only 30% of the cocoa will be certified in order to get the label - but it's certainly a start!
Change comes in strange ways, and the smallest pebble can start an avalanche. Nestlé next! Please join us on this campaign. You can find out how at http://www.stopthetraffik.org/takeaction/chocolate/
And by the way, if you want to experience the music of the Psalters, you can at  http://www.psalters.com/

The business of trafficking.

If you've ever visited Mumbai as a tourist, you'll probably have been to Colaba. It's where you can see the gateway of India, and where the famous Taj Hotel is. The Taj is a wonderful old building, where the rich and famous stay whilst in Mumbai and has boasted many world leaders, kings and Bollywood stars amongst its guests. Sadly it became briefly famous last year as the scene of a terrorist attack, with pictures beamed around the world of smoke billowing from its roof and guests hiding in the basement. I'm happy to say that it soon bounced back to it's former glory with typical Indian resilience.
We certainly never had enough money to stay at the hotel, but it did have a good bookshop,which was free to visit, so we went down there now and again.
There was something disturbing about the area around the Taj, though. The guys selling flutes to the tourists were ok, and the children begging were sad, but we could chat with them as we were working with street kids just like them at the other end of the city. What was disturbing was what was going on in the streets behind the hotel. If we walked down there, we would be offered young girls for sex. When I say young, I mean seven, eight and nine years old. Amongst the street kids we worked with, we saw the average age of the prostitutes get less and less, as men thought this was the way to avoid contracting HIV. There was even a rumour that if a man who was HIV positive had sex with a virgin, then he would lose the infection. The effect on the lives of children was devastating.
When it came to hotels such as the Taj and the other major hotels, often these children were being marketed to business people staying there. The money attracted the traffickers. Often the hotels had no links with this, yet still it happened in the area around them. In other places in the world the staff of major hotels do know what is going on and profit from it.
So, we started to research and eventually decided to launch Business Travellers against Human Traffiking. It was based on the simple realisation that most business travellers hate the fact of the exploitation that their money can attract, and want to do something about it. Via the website www.businesstravellers.org we give an easy place to report what you might have seen, so we can take it to the police. The project has seen women rescued and helped around the world, and I'll tell some of those stories in later posts. Do check out the website, it could lead to a life being changed for ever.

Hidden just down the street

We had to search amongst the usual mass of intercom buttons to find the right one. It was an ordinary house in an ordinary street, yet it was also the first Thai massage parlour we had ever visited, despite months of research. We rang the bell and waited. At first nothing, then the door swung open to show a man. He wasn't tall, but made up for it in weight and muscle. He was covered in tattoos and his head was shaven. He looked very suspicious, probably because he wasn't used to two women and one man calling at this house, usually it was just men.
It is strange what we don't see, even in our own community, down our own street. It was a long time, even whilst working against human trafficking, that we started to notice the growth of Thai massage parlours across Belgium. Few people knew about them, and if you asked people about the Thai community here, they would look at you strangely, as if to say "Why would Thai people be here?". Yet they were here and we quickly found seventy-five massage parlours. In fact, after weeks of research, we suddenly came across a google map made by one of the clients which showed the location of the parlours, little knowing that we would use it to as part of our work.
Now, many people have Thai massage, and in many cases that's fine. It's an ancient and very relaxing form of massage, but in a lot of instances a Thai massage salon has become so closely linked to the sex industry that it is little more than a brothel. The adverts for these places left little to the imagination, and the comments in web forums showed that these were places of prostitution. As part of Stop the Traffik, we wanted to visit the women and find out if they are being exploited, or if they have been trafficked. When people come from abroad, have little contact with the outside world, do not speak the local language and are reliant on others for their visa and their everyday needs, and in addition to this are involved in the sex trade, then exploitation and trafficking are never far away.
We expained to the pimp who had answered the door that first time, that we wanted to give presents to the Thai women in his house, as it was Thai New Year. We had chosen this day to start work in the massage parlours, so we could give gifts and welcome them to the country. The man was more than a little confused! He was used to customers or perhaps the police, but friendly neighbours was outside of his expectations. He ushered us into the front room of his ordinary house, and then the Thai madam of the place went to fetch the other girls. Often in these places a Belgian man is in charge, who has a Thai woman for a wife or girlfriend who acts as the madam. When the three other girls came downstairs, they were nervous about what would happen to them, but when they they heard that we wanted to bless them on their New Year, smiles broke out on their faces. We wanted to pray for them too and they welcomed that, wafting the prayers like incense over their heads.
That was the start. We have continued to visit the massage parlours every month, with Miet at Oasis Belgium working very hard to produce a newsletter for the women in Thai, telling them what is going on in the community around them, what services are available for them. We want to help them be less isolated and welcome them into the community. This reduce the chances that they will have to endure exploitation. The newsletter also gives us the chance to visit and to get to know them. Already we have reported to the police one massage parlour for probably trafficking. We have also heard stories of years of violence and abuse and are starting to help the women. We have also been asked for help to get out of the sex trade. It must be said that we have also spoken to women who have come here to earn money and although they find it tough in the massage parlours, are looking forward to going back to their families having earned enough to help their children in education. The reality is complex, but we want to end the abuse and give every Thai woman the safety, hope and choice she deserves.
I noticed on the list of massage parlours the name of the street next to where I live. I never knew it was there, hidden away, just like all the other houses, apart from the small Thai good luck stickers on the door and the men visiting at all times of the day and night.

Mail Order Bride

A few years ago I was on a plane, flying to Kiev. I'm not a very good flyer, so I tend to try to keep my eyes on everything that happens, just in case I spot something that might go wrong. I'm not sure what I would do if I saw something, but I keep watch anyway. The flight to Ukraine was interesting, largely due to the copious amounts of vodka that was being knocked back right from the start, but that wasn't what caught my eye. What I noticed was that on the immigration form, right next to where I had to fill in my passport number, was an advert for Ukrainian women. Apparently the government at that time thought this was a good opportunity to advertise women who would be delighted to pay money to an agency, just to marry me. Well, being happily married I ignored this kind offer.
Then I turned to the man in the seat next to me and made some comment about this wierd advert for women. He didn't think it was strange at all, though. In fact, that was the very reason he was on the plane. He was due to meet his new bride. He'd paid his money in advance and his 22 year old blonde was waiting to be whisked off to Kentucky. She loved him, he said, despite the fact that he was 75.
It took me a little while to take this all in. Some of these "mail order bride services" are legitimate, making connections that lead to happy marriages, but in many cases there is a hidden agenda of human trafficking. Once a woman reaches a country like the US, or western Europe, she is totally at the mercy of the husband. She may not speak the language and is dependent on him for her visa. She can become his slave and in some cases is forced into prostitution. The point is that she becomes dependent and vulnerable. I explained all this to my American friend, but he was adamant that there was nothing unusual in his case.
Next time I went to Kiev it was after the Orange Revolution and the adverts were gone. Still, next time an advert or spam gets onto your computer screen offering you Russian beauties or Thai women, behind it all could be yet another trafficking ring. In fact, as I write this, an advert on blogger is offering me a Ukrainiann woman. I don't know if an advert like this will appear on the blog as you read it, I hope not. Time for a different kind of postal strike I think, where we stop men ordering their brides online.