Cambodia's Red Lights

Trafficking - Red light district

7/01/11

     The girls/women are lined along the street. They, like the shops, are side by side and are crowded together like by the motorbikes and tables you must stumble through to reach the shops themselves.

     There are many types of trafficking happening in Cambodia, which is known as a transit country. There is child trafficking, typically for begging on roadsides and tourist areas, or house keeping. The children are moved into homes to do housework, and essentially become slaves, and in the case of young boys and girls, they often find themselves eventually in the sex trade as well. People are moved in and out of the country for many reasons.

     Labor trafficking is also very common. There are men, women, and children who can’t find work in Cambodia that take the risk of crossing the border with “brokers” who sneak them by the midnight moon into Thailand. They come expecting promised jobs, but instead they are handed off to Thai brokers who lead them to sweatshops, construction work, and fishing boats. The fishing jobs are particularly brutal, at sea for 3 months at a time. During that time the men are rarely allowed to sleep, fishing often from twilight, through the night, and into the morning…the best fishing hours in Michigan as well.

      The big difference is, when the sun comes up, they go to work on the nets, mending them all day until fishing begins again. They are not allowed to sleep, and the captain often will shoot them or force them overboard if they disobey. When the boat returns to port to unload its cargo, the men are not allowed to leave. They are often not paid, and any complaints are often met with arrest, where the Thai police will interview them, take their pictures, and their money and personal belongings. Like most traumas, they are often repeated, but in these cases, it is the authorities themselves that are supposed to protect the workers who victimize them again. Trauma becomes a way of life for people here…it is par for the course throughout regions history.

     The women in the sex trafficking often come from Thailand or China, to work in Cambodia. They are promised jobs in housekeeping or in the garment industry, but end up being cheated, finding themselves in front of a massage parlor or bar/restaurant, enticing men on the street to come in for “coffee.” The red-light area stretches for blocks and blocks and blocks and there are hundreds of young, made up girls in various stages of “light dress.” The neater, more expensive shops have the prettier women, and you are invited into the bars to buy them a drink. Sometimes you will deal directly with the pimp sitting at the table out front, who will take the money before you even have contact with her.

     The bus spilled us onto the street, and we walked for blocks, being serenaded with cat-calls, whistles, and smiles. Sex tourism is big business here, and we found ourselves often running into sweaty, rather large men who were clearly American or Europeans. Other men often looked almost like mercenaries. One bald headed man, about 6’3”, had a motorcycle, and was revving the engine on the corner with two young women staring and smiling at him, as if he were the prize. It seemed oddly sophomoric, with the handsome, dangerous looking “motorcycle” guy, trying to impress the “girls”. He was actually a predator, but the comfort level they all exhibited made it clear it was all part of the rhythm of life here.

     It was so strange to be in the center of all of this. Imagine a zoo, where you meander through the various exhibits, looking at the animals, and feeling an unusual sense they aren’t really here for your enjoyment, but are actually trapped in a cage, unable to free themselves from the world that has been built around them. Resigned to their fate, these women continue the dance of life the only way they know. Life in Asia we have seen has a pattern and culture in which people are essentially commodities, to be traded, transported, and exploited (expended) in one way, shape, or form. But for them, it is all in a days work, and everyone we see, despite their condition or state of mind, tend to offer a smile. Ignorance is bliss, I suppose.