Daraja’s New Life

Daraja loved this small Italian coastal town, surrounded by the Tyrrhenian Sea.  It was nothing like her home, Sokoto, Nigeria’s poorest village.

Four years ago, at age 16, she had to quit school when her widowed father died.  Her older brother worked as a mechanic while she sold bread and water.  Then, a neighbor told her about a friend who could help her to find a job in Italy.

Unfortunately, that friend turned out to be a “connection man”.  Daraja was held in a warehouse outside of Tripoli and forced into prostitution.  Months later, she was taken to Garaboli to wait for the boat to Italy.  Once in Sicily, she didn’t call her madam, but went to a local humanitarian NGO where she met Gaetano, a wonderful man, twice her age.

Initially, he was fatherly towards her but then they fell in love.  She patted her stomach.  Their second child was on the way.

She saw Gaetano and their son, Alessandro coming up the road.  She waved.  Gaetano waved back but Alessandro ran towards her.

 

175 Words

This story is based on true stories of young Nigerian girls who are forced into prostitution.  They are taken to Libya where they take a rubber boat to Italy where they are to call their madam at the mobile number their “connection man” gave them.

It was written as part of Flash Fiction for Aspiring Writers.  For more information visit Here.  To read other stories based on this week’s prompt, visit Here.

 

Sources:  Earth Porm; News Deeply; Ventures Africa

The Nightmare

Copyright Susan Spaulding

She stood at the window.  Radio City Music Hall was on her left.  Below, people carried on with their lives, oblivious to her plight.

She had left one prison only to end up in another type—without bars but more confining.  She was trapped inside the world of sex trafficking.  In exchange for being released from prison she was forced to become a sex worker.  If she didn’t comply, her bond would be rescinded and she would be thrown back into jail.  Prison life for an African American woman would be intolerable.

She had been arrested on prostitution charges, which were false.  She had been in the wrong place at the wrong time and when the others were rounded up, she was too.  Her protests fell on deaf ears and found herself in a cell, looking through the bars, terrified.  She had no one to help her.

When she heard that her bail was posted and that she was going to be released, she was surprised but relieved.  And then her nightmare really began…

She turned away from the window and began to undress.  The senator lay there watching her, waiting, like all predators with their victims.

197 words

This story was inspired by an article on US Sex Trafficking where sex traffickers target incarcerated women, forcing them to become sex workers after posting their bail and having them released from prison.  The women had to do what they were told or risk going back to prison.  Sex trafficking is a heinous practice that needs to be banned.

This post was written as part of Sunday Photo Fiction. For more details visit Here.  To read more of the stories based on this week’s prompt, visit Here.

Source:  Freedom United

Finding Joy in Jesus

The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying: “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love;
Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you – Jeremiah 31:3

Imagine you are a South Asian woman.  Every day is a struggle and a challenge to survive.  All you know is oppression from the day you were born until the day you die.   As a girl child, your birth is not celebrated.  You feel unwanted and are constantly reminded that you should have been born a boy.  You are neglected, mistreated, abused or abandoned.  As a young girl, you are abducted and forced into a life of prostitution which increases your risk of dying from AIDS.

If you are a widow, you are blamed for your husband’s death.  His family and your community shun you and you are forced to fend for yourself.  You are forced into an inhumane existence.   You are completely alone, with no one to support or care for you.  Life is too hard.   There is no help.  There is no hope.  Only despair, misery and pain.  What’s the use?  Tens of thousands of widows end their lives just to end the pain.

If your dowry is not enough, your husband can douse you with kerosene and set you on fire.  I have read horror stories of women being set on fire by their husbands or in-laws because of their dowries. A woman’s life is not worth anything.  It’s hard to believe that there are countries where it’s not safe to be a woman.  It can even be fatal.  Women who survive infanticide because of gender are forced to live in a society which denies them rights to equality, respect, education, etc.

Being a woman in South Asia is unimaginable and unbearable for many and it is not surprising that the suicide rate is up to 21 times higher than the world’s average.  Life for these women is a never-ending cycle of misery, hopelessness, degradation and rejection.  These women need to know that there is hope.  They need to know that there is a God who values them.  To Him they are precious.  They were fearfully and wonderfully made in His image.

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you – Jeremiah 1:5

Imagine the joy these women will have when they hear about Jesus for the first time through Gospel for Asia’s ministries.  Help them find hope and joy in a Savior who loved them so much that He gave His life for them so that one day they could spend eternity with Him.  They need to know that they are worth a price far above rubies.  They need to know that although there might have been silence in their homes on the days they were born, there was a joyful noise in heaven.

Women missionaries have been bringing the message of love and hope to the women of Asia.  It is crucial that women minister to women because of the Asian culture.  Women are more comfortable around other women.  Gospel for Asia has trained, dedicated women missionaries who are willing to risk their lives to share the love of Jesus Christ with millions of women who still need to hear the Good News. These heroic women missionaries are willing to risk persecution, beatings and imprisonment because they are passionate about giving hope to women who have lived in despair for so long.  They want to offer hurting women healing and encouragement.  They want to bring the Savior’s light and love into their dark and uncaring world.  Many Asian woman have had their lives transformed but there are still so many who are still waiting.

Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning – Psalm 30:5

Help Gospel for Asia send more missionaries to those who are perishing without knowing about Jesus and His love.  Find out how at this link.   Help bring joy to a woman in Asia.

 

Source:  Gospel for Asia

Oppressed Because She is a Woman

Then I returned and considered all the oppression that is done under the sun: And look! The tears of the oppressed, But they have no comforter—
On the side of their oppressors there is power, But they have no comforter – Ecclesiastes 4:1

It saddens me that in some countries, it is dangerous or even deadly to be a woman.  Sex trafficking, bride burnings, infanticide, gender related crimes, poverty and oppression are the realities that girls and women face in Asia.

Women should be able to live in a society where their rights are protected  and are not oppressed because of their gender.  Gender discrimination is something that all women may encounter at some point in her life but in Asia, women are perpetual victims of violence, abuse and oppression.

Imagine that you are a mother and one Sunday evening you find your daughter lying naked on the front step of the house she shares with her husband and children.  There is no one there to help her and no one wants to come to her so you are the only one she can call for help although you live quite a distance away.   Imagine how you would feel when you see your daughter with burns on more than 80 percent of her body, crying in agony. She survives for three days, long enough to tell the police that she was doused in kerosene by her mother-in-law and set on fire by her husband–the father of her children.  Then she dies…

This is what happened to Laxmi, a woman in Bangladore.  She was a victim of bride burning which is a crime that accounts for the death of at least one woman every hour in India.  More than 8000 women die in this horrendous way.  This type of crime is also called, “dowry death”.

A dowry death is the death of a young woman in South Asian countries, primarily India, who is murdered or driven to suicide by her husband. This results from the husband continually attempting to extract more dowry from the bride or her family. Bride burning is just one form of dowry death. Others include acid throwing and Eve teasing.  Because dowry typically depends on class or socioeconomic status, women are often subjected to the dowry pressures of their future husband or his relatives.

Laxmi was only 28 years old when she died.  Hers was not an arranged marriage.  It was a love marriage and she came from higher caste than her husband, Majunath.  He became increasingly drunk and was unable to find regular work because most of the money Laxmi earned was spent on liquor.  Pressured by her in-laws to provide, Laxmi turned to her mother for financial support.  Laxmi was harassed and accused of adultery by her in-laws and beaten by her husband.  It turned out that it was her mother-in-law who compelled her son to set his wife on fire.  Majunath ended up dying because he suffered from burns when Laxmi hugged him in a desperate attempt to put the flames out.  So, their two children became orphans.   An arrest warrant was issued for Laxmi’s mother-in-law but she has disappeared.

Trafficking of minor girls – the second-most prevalent trafficking crime – surged 14 times over the last decade and increased 65% in 2014, according to new data released by the National Crime Records Bureau.

Girls and women are the main targets of immoral trafficking in India, making up 76% of human trafficking cases nationwide over a decade, reveal NCRB data.

Other cases registered under human trafficking over the last decade include selling girls for prostitution, importing girls from a foreign country and buying girls for prostitution.

Sexual exploitation of women and children for commercial purposes takes place in various forms including brothel-based prostitution, sex-tourism, and pornography.

As many as 8,099 people were reported to be trafficked across India in 2014.

In the article, Silent Slaves:  Stories of Human Trafficking in India, I read about a 15 year old girl who was in a New Delhi hospital.  She was frail, her face and head were bandaged.  A bruised black and blue eye and swollen lips were visible.  She had burn marks and scabs on her neck and down her whole body and one of her ears was disfigured.  She had a wound on her skull which was rotting and filled with maggots.  This caused a stench. She was in this horrific condition because of her employer who beat her everyday with a broom and a stool.  Many times the woman would put a hot pan on the girl’s body and burn her skin.  The skin on her skull started to peel because she was repeatedly burned in that same spot.

How could one human being treat another like this?  Sadly, this teen’s case is not an isolated one.  Thousands of girls like her are trafficked every year from remote villages to large cities and sold as domestic workers. Many of them are abused or sexually exploited.

Extreme poverty, lack of education and employment, and poor implementation of the government’s minimum wage system in rural India make girls more vulnerable to being trafficked. The 2013 Global Slavery Index, published by the Australia-based Walk Free Foundation, an organization that works to end modern slavery, found that almost half of the 30 million “modern slaves” in the world are from India.

The article describes how domestic worker placement agencies operate and how they are flourishing at the expense of minor and illiterate girls. Read more.

Due to the fact that girls are seen as an economic burden and boys a source of income, girl babies have been aborted and murdered – female infanticide or Gendercide – in their millions in India. The Lancet estimates that 500,000 female fetuses are aborted in India every year. As a result according to the BBC, “an estimated 25-50 million women in India are ‘missing’, if you compare the proportion of women in the population with other countries.” Staggeringly, Unicef believes 10 million girls, were killed by their parents in the last thirty years.

Killing babies because they are girls really hits close to home.  As a woman, I can’t imagine my parents ending my life because I was born a girl instead of a boy.  I always remember my mother telling me that she had a dream of how I would look before I was born.  My father used to take me kite flying. My parents loved my two sisters and me.  I know fathers who have only daughters and no sons but they are ecstatic.  They adore their girls.  This is not the case for the girls in India, however.  Some are aborted or killed after they are born, others are neglected or abandoned.

In India a girl is an expensive burden because when she marries, her family is expected to pay a sum of money to the groom’s family regardless of whether or not they can afford it.  It’s an expense they don’t want to deal with.  So, when a girl is born, there is no joy.  There is no celebration, only disappointment and anxiety.  In some cases, there is rage–rage of the husband toward the wife and the baby girl.  The wife is blamed for the gender of the baby and the girl, if she survives, is constantly reminded that she is a mistake–she should have been a boy.

Bride burnings, sex trafficking and girl infanticide are just some of the hardships that women and girls face in Asia.  The documentary film, “Veil of Tears” takes you on a harrowing journey into their lives.  Their stories may make us squirm but instead of shutting them out, we ought to raise awareness and do what we can to help.  Let us be the voice of hope for the oppressed.

Find out more information at this link:  http://veiloftearsmovie.com/take-action/ 

And the LORD shall help them, and deliver them: he shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in him – Psalm 37:40

Sources:  Gospel for Asia; The Sidney Morning Herald; Wikipedia; Scroll In; Women’s Media Center; Counterpunch

 

Investing in A Child

One sponsor can have an enormous impact in the life of a child in Asia through GFA Bridge of Hope! Their prayers, love and encouragement can make a difference in the lives of children who are constantly derided and told they are worthless by their culture – Gospel for Asia

Nothing is more wonderful than giving a child hope for a bright future.  You can do so by sponsoring a boy or a girl.  In Asia, parents struggle to provide for their families.  Their children grow up illiterate, uneducated and taught that they are worthless.  More than 20 million of boys and girls are forced into child labor and prostitution so that they can support their families.

Thankfully, Gospel for Asia is turning these terrible situations around through their wonderful program, Bridge of Hope.  Children are educated and nurtured.  Families experience Jesus’ love.  So far, the program has helped over 74,000 children and thousand of families have come to accept Christ as their Savior.

Watch this video of a Mom as she explains why she sponsors three children.

Bridge of Hope sponsorship is not just about giving money to support a child in Asia—it’s much, much more. If you decide to pour into a child’s life, you are making a direct impact on the lost in Asia. Your child will have food, clothes, education, and most importantly, your child will learn about Jesus’ love and share it with his or her family and the surrounding community – Gospel for Asia

Read how sponsorship has made a difference in the lives of Daya and Nibun.  As you read their stories, keep in mind that it takes only $35.00 a month to give a child everything he or she needs–such as school supplies, a daily meal, medical check-ups and the opportunity to attend a Bridge of Hope center.  100% or your sponsorship is sent to the field to support your child.

A child could benefit so much from attending a Bridge of Hope center.  The boy or girl you sponsor will learn Bible verses, stories and songs that bring the Gospel to life, learn to read and write, receive a healthy, balanced meal, medical care and learn the habits of good hygiene.

Do you know that when you take care of a child’s physical needs you are also breaking the cycle of poverty, illiteracy, superstition and the bondage of the caste system?  And your love and care of this child will extend to his or her family because the child will take the message of God’s love home. Sponsoring a child will bring hope to the family and even the community.  The Gospel will penetrate hearts that resisted it at first.  You will make it possible for parents to be in the training sessions which are an integral part of the Bridge of Hope program.  You will provide the child and his or her family “a future here on earth and one for eternity”.

I encourage you to prayerfully consider sponsoring a child.  Help to bring the message of salvation to a child who has not heard of Jesus.  You can change a life forever.  Invest in a child today.

As cold water to a weary soul, So is good news from a far country – Proverbs 25:25

Source:  Gospel for Asia

Living in Slums

I told them that even if their situation seems like a mountain, God is mightier than the problem – Nitya

Can you imagine being so poor that you live in a shack made of cardboard and plastic?  What if you had to struggle daily just to survive?  Imagine sharing a shanty with ten other families because you and your family can’t afford your own space?  This is the reality for people in India who dwell in slums.

In India, slums are growing rapidly.  Millions are living in extreme poverty and everyday is a struggle for survival.  They are trapped in a world filled with desperation and hopelessness.  Open sewage, polluted water, lack of healthcare, illiteracy, superstition and diseases such as tuberculosis and AIDs are some of the problems they face.  It is a constant battle for them to find or keep a job.  No job meant that they would have to beg, scavenge or turn to prostitution.  It’s worst for them if they were too sick or too old to work because there was no social agency to help them to survive.  This is why many of them turned to alcohol for solace.  When the men drowned their sorrows and fears in alcohol, their wives and children were left to fend for themselves.  One woman who was a tailor had to work outside because there was not enough room in her tiny hut.

People should not be living like this.  And this is why God had to intervene.  He did so through a man named Nitya.  Nitya had a dream about a shack by the sewer.  And he moved into one!  How many of us would leave our nice, comfy, clean homes and families to live in a slum among complete strangers?  Nitya had no reservations.  Why?  He knew that God had called him to serve in the slums.  Sometimes the harvest is in places that we normally wouldn’t imagine ourselves going but when God calls us to go, we go.  Nitya made his home among the slum dwellers and through his actions, demonstrated God’s love and acceptance.

In Nitya’s eyes, these people were God’s children.  God called him and is calling others to share the Good News of Jesus with people who are hurting and are shunned by society.

Watch this video of Nitya–a real life hero who has a true servant’s heart.

God transformed the lives of the people in the slum. Darkness gave way to light and despair turned into hope.  When Nitya found out that children were unable to go to school because their parents could afford to send them, he started a Bridge of Hope centre.  At the centre, children learn about Jesus, receive quality education, medical care and daily meals.

Nitya also began holding worship services.   At first the attendance was low due to lack of interest but now more than 40 people attend.  At each service Nitya teaches them from the Bible and prays for them.  Thankful for the hope they have found in Jesus, believers take part in Communion to remember the great sacrifice He made for them.

One couple’s lives changed dramatically, thanks to the church.  Achal and Malika used to follow their traditional gods and Achal beat Malika but one day she slipped into a coma.  Nitya, his wife and other believers prayed for her and she was healed.  When Achal and Malika saw the Lord’s power, they gave their hearts to Christ.  Today they are among His faithful followers.

How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?  And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written:

“How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, Who bring glad tidings of good things!” – Romans 10:14, 15

The Goa slum is home to the illegal prostitution trade.  Life seemed hopeless for the people there until a Gospel for Asia missionary team began to visit the area, bringing hope in the form of Gospel literature.

 As I went through the photo gallery of Team Ministers of Slum Area, tears came to my eyes.  It drove home the fact that there are people out there who will gladly accept the Good News if only there were people to share it with them.  These photos touched my heart.

“Most of the people they meet are open to the Gospel message. Almost immediately they become engrossed in reading the literature.”

“After he told them the Good News, many raised their hands, indicated that they wanted to follow Jesus. John is the pastor of a GFA-supported church in this area of Goa. He is overjoyed to see so many from the slum become part of the Body of Christ.”

Find out more about Gospel for Asia’s Slum Ministry and see how the work they began in 1999 is still impacting the masses of “desperate people who have no means whatsoever to better their situation or escape their surroundings.”  Share Nitya’s story and take a look at the photos.  Pray for the slum dwellers and the missionaries of the Slum Ministry.  Ask God how you can help.

Source:  Gospel for Asia

Baby Girls are not Celebrated

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you – Jeremiah 1:5

 

 

Imagine as you hold your baby daughter in your arms for the first time or you remember the first time you looked into those big, innocent eyes, that there is another baby girl who is not wanted simply because she is a girl.  As you tell your daughter or grand-daughter how much you love her, imagine a little girl whose father doesn’t love her because she is not a boy.  As you reminisce about the day you brought your daughter home from the hospital and laid her in her crib, watching her lie there, surrounded by stuff animals, and pretty wallpaper, welcoming her to her new home, think about another little girl who is abandoned–with no home to go to or a pretty room to call her own.  Hard to believe, isn’t it?  However, this is the reality that many women and girls face in South Asia.  It is Mayuri’s reality.

After five years of barrenness, Mayuri finally got pregnant.  For nine months she and her husband Rafat were looking forward to the day their son was born.   This child would restore peace to a home that had been fraught with years of disappointments and bitter arguments.  He would be the pride and joy of his family.  Things were finally looking up.

The big day arrived.  Excitement filled the air as Mayuri went into labor.  However, when the baby boy turned out to be a baby girl, the celebration was over.  Hope turned to horror as Mayuri was to face what usually happens to a woman when she gives birth to a girl instead of a boy.  It is the same thing Mayuri’s mother no doubt faced when she had her.

Like most girls, Mayuri was not loved by her father.  In fact, he drank, gambled and chased after women while she and her mother worked everyday to earn enough money to feed the family of five.  When they refused to give their wages to her father, he beat them.  Sometimes he beat her mother for no apparent reason.

Life at home was terrible for Mayuri.  So much so that her mother, Olimani prayed to all the deities and local goddesses, hoping that her husband would change but her prayers went unanswered.  He remained the same.  As any mother does, Olimani wanted a better life for her daughter.  She wanted Mayuri to escape her father’s abuse so she married off her when she was 14 years old.

Sadly, Mayuri’s new life turned into a nightmare.  She escaped abuse at her father’s hands only to experience abuse from the man she was to spend the rest of her life with…

The abuse women face for bearing daughters is so great that many have resorted to gender-selective abortion and infanticide, resulting in millions of “missing girls” in Asia. Discover more about this and other issues facing South Asian women in Gospel for Asia’s new film documentary, “Veil of Tears.”

At first, life with Rafat seemed promising but that soon changed when they were unable to have children.  The couple’s infertility caused tension in their relationship.  Unfortunately, in South Asia, the woman is blamed for the couple’s inability to have children.  Mayuri bore this shame alone for more than four years.  How she must have suffered.  I can’t help but think of Hannah who was barren but had a husband who loved her dearly.  And of Abraham who didn’t love Sarah any less because she couldn’t conceive.  Yet women like Mayuri are blamed, scorned and mistreated because they have trouble getting pregnant.

And when Mayuri finally got pregnant, she gave birth to a girl.  She could not even celebrate having a child, regardless of the gender, after trying to get pregnant unsuccessfully for five years .  She is punished by her husband.  It’s unthinkable that the woman is blamed for the baby’s gender when it’s the man who determines the sex of the child.  Ultimately, it is God who decides the gender and in His eyes, a child, whether it is a boy or a girl, is a gift from Him.

God blessed Mayuri with a second daughter but this made life worse for her.  The abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband got worse.  She got no sympathy from her mother-in-law and her husband disrespected her in front of the family.  Things got to the point where Mayuri had to flee.

Furious at Mayuri for having two daughters after five years of infertility, Mayuri’s husband and mother-in-law abused her until she ran away.

Alone and with two daughters to raise there was nowhere for Mayuri to go except to her parents’ home.  It grieved Olimani to see that her daughter had suffered abuse at the hands of her husband just as she had herself.  Thankfully, Mayuri’s father was no longer living there.  He had left and remarried.  However, Mayuri’s problems were far from over.  After losing her money to a con artist, she had to find work and the only option she felt she had was to turn to prostitution in order to keep her daughters from starving.

Desperate to support her daughters, Mayuri became a prostitute, which meant being shunned by the entire community—except for a GFA pastor.

It’s heartbreaking to see the lengths a mother will go in order to take care of her children.  It’s also heartwarming to see the way God works.  It was when Mayuri had a health crisis that she came to know Him.  In search of healing she visited temples and offered sacrifices but her condition only grew worse.  Until one day, Gospel for Asia pastor Patakin offered her the chance to pray to a different God.  That meeting changed Mayuri’s life forever.  Through the prayers of the members of the church where she was invited to worship and fellowship, God healed her.  Today, Mayuri sees God’s faithfulness in her life and in the lives of her daughters as He has provided her with a respectable job and a school for them.

“Today, I am living; that is only by the grace of God.  I was totally healed from my sickness by the blood of Christ. … Now I am living by faith in Jesus Christ” – Mayuri

By His act of love and mercy, God showed through Gospel for Asia and their missionary work that every life is precious and cause for celebration.  If you are interested in helping other women and girls like Mayuri and her daughters, sponsor a woman missionary.  Find out how here.

I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Marvelous are Your works,And that my soul knows very well – Psalm 139:14

Source:  Gospel for Asia