This morning, I got up rather early just because I wanted to be an early bird once as it says ‘An early bird catches the most worms.’ For me, every day is special though activities I will engage might be dull or exciting. I promise to make the most of every day. Before I go to bed, I will think of what I have done during the day and think of what I change for the better. Especially, I will eradicate my bad feelings I receive from my environment. I will not keep them in my bed and head because the new day is awaiting a new ME. Whether every minute is dull or boring, at least they are all different forms with different colors that can make life tasteful.

Now it was time to go to my class! As I looked at my watch, it turned 9:30 am. I usually feel very good and fresh when I am nearing my university. The sight of my university’s roof cheers my spirit because it reminds me of my monkey friends and my funny lecturers. I like most of my lecturers and I respect all of them for who they are; their mature behaviour and knowledge. Today was like a normal day, just like yesterday. I saw two figures on a bike. They were my two classmates, going out of university when they should have been in class. They both looked pale and one of them, Rithy, was stuttering some words. It was “OurEconmics lecturer passed away yesterday”. I shook my head for disapproval. I didn’t want them to believe it though it was true. All of my classmates were going to his funeral with the agreement from another lecturer who had to teach us this time. I went along with them to the funeral because I knew it was right to do and longed to know what had happened.

My classmates and I tried to find out by asking a few other people who were willing to tell us. It would be very very rude for us all to ask my late lecturer’s wife about how my Economic lecturer passed away. Standing in front of his funeral photo, I couldn’t believe my eyes. There were three big bunches of yellow flowers, a piece of black cloth on which some letters were written on “Mr…….died of an ilness at the age of 34 at 3:30 am on the 24th of Feb, 2008″. And, his body lying in front of me!!! I couldn’t almost hold these tears that wanted to fall down on the ground. My brain produced a lot of images of him teaching, laughing, smiling, getting serious and angry with us. I couldn’t believe my eyes that he died at a very young age for men. I looked at his beautiful young wife whose face was really red from grief and sorrow. I remember his very pretty young face when I met her at the first time. She was pretty and a bit sexy as a young married woman allowed herself to be, for her husband’s honor (as people say). But this time, she was different to me. She was no longer anything of thing this moment. She looked exhausted and I was sure she wanted to rest a lot. My classamtes and I couldn’t help share the sorrow. We lit the incenses, lifted them to our forehead and asked his spirit to go to heaven. If people ask either of us students of his about how he was while he taught us, everybody will agree he was such a wonderful teacher. We all remember his healthily white chubby face and very fair long hands which my female classmates always admired. After all, he was a good looking young man with Chinese descendency. For me, I will never forget his personal words to me. Once I was laughing out loud in his class, but instead of scolding me, he said, “That’s very nice of you to laugh. I’m glad you are very happy.” He rarely laughed in the class but he smiled a lot. However, seriousness didn’t leave his face either. He looked quite strong and serious! Sometimes I wondered what he thought about. Soemtimes, I wondered if he was a very sad man. He told us he was just a poor countryside boy trying to learn very hard. While he was in a second year study at IFL, he luckily received a scholarship to learn in Japan for four years. Later on, he finished his Master’s Degree in Economics in Thailand. At his work place, nobody says he was lazy or incompetent. He was very wise about his job. So, that’s enough information that makes us ponder about what happened.

Everybody who heard this new was really shocked! How could we believe such a young man with a great future would resort to this way? At 3:30 am (last night), he hung himself in his house. I believe there must be a reason why he decided to end it all. According to different sources, my lecturer had an incurable disease, too much stress. He went to other countries for medica check-ups and treatments many times but this time the doctors he saw often asked him to repeat his visit. However, he didn’t while he should have seen his doctor again. What kind of illness? I don’t know. Always to me, he looked young and healthy. He was a mature man with high dignity and kind heart! While his wife came back from seeing traditional Khmer doctors, she only came home to see him hung up in the room. What a poor sight she saw! Other people say he had serious problems at his work place. Recently, he was promoted as a minister! Yes, he was a very competent staff who devoted all his time at work. I remember asking to borrow his book ‘Wealth of Nation’ by Adam Smith. He had his own library and had collected many books he loved, he used to say to us. But why did he decide to resign from his job when he was in the position for a very short time? The old man who claimed himself to be a neighbour told that my lecturer had just come back from Japan (work) and Malaysia( check-up). Different ideas say “He killed himself due to too much pressure from work. He killed himself because of voodoo, a bad attempt from other jealous workers. ” Mind you, he had attempted suicide several times before but failed. He wanted to jump off a high building. But I believe more than the other that he decided to finish his life this way because he thought of giving no more burden to his family. Two years ago, one of his friends died of the same way. This year, he died of the same way. He had a middle-aged mother and a beautiful wife with no children at all. That makes it even more heart-breaking! That makes his wife have nobody to turn to for love and care.

What we repent most was that he was not more open-minded with his wife and family. He should have had more open communication with them, telling his own feelings and thoughts. However,we’ve been told that his wife and family were very busy people. His wife was even busier than he was. So was there time to talk?No. I feel that he really needed encouragment and support from us. If only we all had known it. We are waiting for his wife to recover from this shock. It will take time for her. Only his wife knew what had happened to him. I yearn to know how he felt or what he thought before he killed himself. What was in his mind? How did pain work in his body?But we want him to rest in peace, rest in a quiet place now. Thinking of his body lying on the floor with a yellow cover makes me think of how uncertain life is! It’s so uncertain that every human being can’t change quickly enough to suit the unexpected circumstance. Yet, we’re sure tax is certain but not life. One more thing is ‘Never keep sterss’. I’m sure stress can kill.

Day 2

While I was coming out of school and zigzagging on the way to where I set in my mind to around 5 pm, I was also imagining what would happen after I got off my bike. Taking a deep long breath, I realized that now another mission was awaiting my consciousness. Then, I shook my head to remind myself not to dream an idealistic dream that the women who worked there as prostitutes were satisfied with the jobs and well-fed as they looked pretty. I noticed when the traffic around me was going as usual, another world was not. Again, I was going to explore that worl that I always dreaded listening to or looking at(scary). Come what may, now I can’t offord to ignore it any longer. “Go for it now,” was jumping anxiously in my head.

Once again, Catherine and I dashed to the same brothel where the same very pretty girls were lounging inside and in the doorway waiting for their guests. I told myself to be very determined to do my jobs, stopping my bike in front of the brothel and going straight into the house without looking behind my back, although many eyes were on us. I made it! It was the same feeling stepping into the brothel lit with dark pink light. I saw the same girls I met the other day and here they were,beautiful, standing in front of me and asking me to come inside and sit down just like the way the house owner was warmly welcoming their guest. Like a normal nice hospitality I have ever received!! Cat and I sat down and we both, I believe, felt quite awkward to receive this kind of warm feeling and hospitality from them. However, we observed the girl we interviewed the other day was not there today. The big woman I called Marmasan before was not a Marmasan/Madam at all, yet in fact she was just working like every girl there. She informed us that the girl we intended to meet was absent today since she had to tend her sick little sister who had to be taken into a hospital. I suddenly felt ‘Oh, Big Sis, you’re here.’ Honestly speaking, I have three sisters, but this girl or big sister makes me feel that being an older sister means so much to the little ones. She does every kind of job for her little sister and their living. Look, this profession is considered a dirty way of living, but I appreciate the woman and the fact that she didn’t let her little sister go hungry. I vicariously feel that this big sister is a good one she did the job and stopped doing the job for her closest relative. Now she was playing a role as a second mother to the small girl. Do people know that women working in this profession have such powerful inner feelings inside their heart? We might have heard that a lot of girls were forced and threatened to work in this profession. This is very crazy! Further, it’s even very sad and crazy seeing that many more do this kind of job as they are willing to make money to support their daily lives. The difference between the situations is that when women who are forced tend to stop while women who do it willingly don’t tend to stop so easily. They mean it. I believe that the young girl we talked to will not have another life ruined (meet the same kind of destiny (like hers) in the future).

Hearing that the girl didn’t come, we decided to switch to the other big girl who was not at first willing to talk to us. “What are you afraid of?” I was thinking of the answers. She hesitated for a while after my request. I was not a good/sweet talker because I had no ideas of how to say next to people or to talk them into doing it. That’s why it took some minutes to see her head shaking for an approval. Yes, I was relieved because due to her facial expression, I was worried that she would not talk to us. I thought, perhaps saying that Cat would pay her made her consider our proposal. I felt these women desperately need money for one reason, survival.

Taking one chair for herself to sit on, this woman smiled at us and said she had no ideas what we wanted to ask her. She was a woman of 24 with brown skin and a chubby face and body. Her name was P. P looked pretty but not as pretty as the other younger girls. She’s like an older sis to every girl there. She said she was considered the biggest girl here because she was older and had more experience in life. She, like other girls, was from a rural province, but she was married before with two sons. Later, she divorced her husband who was a drunkard and decided to come to Phnom Penh to earn some money. She chose PP since it was famous for lots of available jobs. Nobody knows she ends up working here in this brothel, except her mother who, as every common mother, feels very sorry for her own daughter. Her feeling for her daughter is just like millions of needles cutting into her heart when she sees her daughter in that state. P had no choices after all her gasoline she was selling along the road in PP was taken by the police; for they claimed it was illegal gasoline trafficked into Cambodia and had to be confiscated. There, she was in a huge debt! She had now paid some of $ 500 she has owned somebody by working as a prostitute. I immediately felt very angry after hearing that some organization also offered her some training to work as a seamstress but she refused. For heaven’s sake, she explained that she was in a dire/emergent need of money to pay back some money. I didn’t want to imagine how she would have been if she hadn’t worked as quickly as possible to earn money to pay back. Perhaps, the debtor was some kind of a gang group who sucked blood from poor people.

While explaining, other girls became a bit panicked. They saw something? I asked them what’s going on. They told me that some patrol police were pointing their fingers at them. I thought perhaps that police’s finger point meant that it wasn’t time to start their business yet. But the fact was ‘today, some district officials came along the road and the police were afraid to let them see such businesses on the road. I asked the big woman there if the police had eve caused them trouble. Her facial expression changed. I knew that they had! Instead of telling bad stories about the police, P told me that those girls were just normally afraid of police. “It was as simple as that.” After a few minutes of my nodding of understanding and sympathetic expressions, she decided to tell something she wanted to keep as a secret. I told her a few things I’ve heard about the police. She agreed. If I hadn’t told those few things to her, she would not have told me more that some police came and took some money from them every night and they didn’t intend to cause problems with the police. She continued that all the girls couldn’t stand staying in the police stations as those police demanded a lot of money from them. They couldn’t afford to bribe them. This situation, to me, was like ‘bat men/bad men sucking blood from other poor people’. I’ve heard a lot of times police can’t help but instead abuse the girls by taking a lot of money from them or even selling them to other brothels. Are you there to help or cause trouble? Is it more of a hindrance than a help? Despite this, P tried to assure me and Cat that the police never caused them much trouble at all and were not willing to further this case with us. I understood that they did not want to protest against the police or even speak ill of them in front of us. There’s a Cambodian saying “You must cut your flesh and give it to the tiger if you want to live undisturbed in the village.” This implies to this situation that the prostitutes have to pay some money very hard to earn to the police who has power control over them. Likewise, these tigers will come and jump on them, tearing their flesh and blood.

P had paid some of her debt but not all her debt and she is willing to go on doing this kind of job for some more months to pay all the rest and save some more to start a small business somewhere. P told that her life had no more meaning to her and she could never look back and become normal. What does being normal mean? With all her words she told us, we understood that all the girls here were forced by any pimp to do the job. We haven’t seen the pimp until now so we believe so. To me, the pimps exist in the brothel too; that is the police who come and take the money from them. They may have the same sad and tragic stories. I am sure they all come from different provinces. In my mind, P is a mother of two sons trying to look at the world in a different way. She doesn’t let other people like her villagers and friends know that she’s doing this job but only her mother knows about this. As soon as she talked about this family thing, her face became red. She’s going to cry but no. If she cried, she would have to make herself up again. She couldn’t afford even a cry now.

P explained that this house used as a brothel belongs to somebody else who takes the rent of about $ 15 to $ 20 every day. In contrast, the owner doesn’t come and take it yet hires a motor-taxi driver to take the money from them daily. I really want to know who owns the house and what’s the motive behind building a house for prostitution. P takes care of the girls well because every week she takes all of them to an organization’s clinic to get some medical check-up. So far, there have been some organizations which want to help them by offering them training. They want them to earn money in a different and moral way. P is one of them who is eager to finish this job off soon and get a proper job somewhere in her hometown. Every month, she saves money and sends some remittances to her mother in the province and is looking forward to coming back and building her life in a better way. How about other girls? They look quite younger than P is and I’m not sure if they want to do something different and better. Their persistence to work in such profession makes me think that they feel for nobody now but themselves. They can’t stop it just because no matter they stop it or not, the society looks at them in the same way. In another way, it makes me think that they are too lazy to do some other job. I’m wondering if they really like their job! I’m certain they don’t use drugs. With lots of mouth to feed, they have to work hard to save some money and send it home. They tell me that some other jobs can’t earn as much money as this job. Their family are dying and what they need is quick money from the girls. Yes, one wrong decision leads to another and one wrong situation causes another one. After all, they won’t change their profession now and wait until they save enough money to go back to their hometown. But I don’t feel hopeful for these if they don’t stop it now. They don’t want to be a seamstress/garment factory worker, a profession that most organizations offer to train them to be. That makes me think of something bad about being a seamstress or a garment factory worker. People told me that there are many prostitutes who change their previous job and work in those jobs. And so garment factory workers are looked down on and reputed to be former prostitutes. But isn’t it good that they are doing a better and honest job? I don’t want to talk about the hardship and present bad conditions of a lot of garment factory workers who, as a matter of fact, are a workforce of the country’s economy or a catalyst for a better economy, even for my small family business.

After talking for some time, we asked P to show us one of the rooms in the brothel. I told myself to feel tough and not get shocked easily. I knew in my stomach that I was going to see what my mother doesn’t let me go near. The whole brothel is made of wood and so are all the rooms. One of the rooms we looked at was quite small with the same pink light, I guess, about 2 meters square. There was a tall shelf where neatly folded clothes were put on. I spotted a big tape recorder/radio/gramophone. The mattress was there with a flower cover on. Many pictures of Thai film stars and cute babies were on the wall around. To me, this looks like a bride-groom room. But this room isn’t for couples or for love; it’s for pure lust and money.

Still, the door was closed and opened; the girls became a bit less panicked but suspicious and looked at the road. P sat down on the chair again and asked us if we had more questions. Sometimes I had to ask some embarrassing questions. I was embarrassed to ask! But I wanted to! Well, not my questions but Cat’s. However, I like the questions as I want to know the answers. How much does a man pay for one sex per se? P told it’s around $ 2.5 or less than that and the sexual intercourse lasts only 10 minutes. My God! It made my heart fall to the ground. Is it what they deserve? I don’t understand. I don’t know what they think and how they can survive!!! P continued that each of the girls could find 10 or less than 10 men every day. They couldn’t find more than that because in the area there are so many brothels like this so the price has to be low for competition. I was asking God to help me, to tell me if this is true and what kind of world I am living in. It is very hard to figure out whether it’s day or night; I am not them so I don’t understand them. Looking at them just as a stranger, I felt I knew nothing at all. My mind went blank. Would I faint? No way.

I wanted to leave. My left brain told me to stay but my right brain told me to leave. I felt that our presence was accepted at the brothel. Every time I talked to them, I tried to be nice and understanding, especially not insulting. I never had an intention to insult anybody. Cat, at the end, gave P some money. Cat knew that her time means some money. P looked a bit surprised but happy with the money, I’m sure. At least, the money Cat gave could stop some men from coming near her, I hope so. I don’t know. I left with a heavy head, hoping in my heart that there can be changes to their thoughts.

This long article is the comment from a sex-worker and was sent to me by the Australian journalist, Cat, I’m working for. Thank you very much indeed for this choking text. I want to read it over and over again and would like to find out about her feelings.

Phnom Penh Post, September 17 – 30, 1999
COMMENT
Sex worker demands rights and recognition
A member of the Sex Workers Union of Toul Kork, Dina Chan, gave this speech to the First National Conference on Gender and Development in Cambodia, held in Phnom Penh Sep 7-9.
I CAME here today as a woman, a Khmer woman. I came here today to tell you my story, in the hope that after you listen to me you can understand my situation and the situation of thousands of Khmer women and other women around the world.

It is very difficult for me to come here and speak to you; but I am doing this because I want you to listen, to me the real person; and I want you to remember me and what I say to you today when you are in your offices talking about policies and strategies that affect me and my sisters.
I want you to remember we are not “problems” we are not animals, we are not viruses, we are not garbage.

We are flesh, skin and bones, we have a heart, and we have feelings, we are a sister to someone, a daughter, a granddaughter. We are people, we are women and we want to be treated with respect, dignity and we want rights like the rest of you enjoy.

I was trafficked, I was raped, beaten, and forced to accept men. I was humiliated and forced to be an object so men, yes men, could take their pleasure, I brought profit to many and brought pleasure to others. And for myself I brought shame, pain and humiliation.

But worst of all I receive demeaning comments from you: you discriminate against me, you give yourselves a job because of me and you are busy thinking about the best way to protect the community from me.

The police come to Toul Kork almost every day. They always have a reason to come, but they come more frequently before festivals like Pchum Ben, because we are an easy target to extract money from.

In a public forum the chief of these police stands up and states “We do not arrest the girls”: lies and more lies. They arrest us and take our money, our jewelry, sometimes even our few possessions we have in our room like our bed covers.

If we cannot pay then they detain us for a day or two, they give us no water. When they are convinced we simply have no money to pay they take us to another brothel and sell us to a new maebon (pimp), usually for US$100 for one girl. Then we become indebted once again and have to pay off that debt to the new maebon.

This is trafficking. The police, yes, the police sell us for another cycle of slavery. Do you think it is in their interests to see my occupation decriminalized? Of course not: then they lose their share of the money.

In one day we pay almost 15,000 riel in bribes to the district police, to the municipal authorities and the local authorities. Then another group of police come and arrest us. If we do not run and hide we are re-sold to slavery.

Your solution is to ask these people to protect us. Think again. They live off our blood. Money is too important to everyone, money and more money. It is not enough to eat: people demand more because they want nice things.

I come from a poor family; they sent me to study at a cultural school in Phnom Penh. I was living with a family but I could not contribute to my living, so they helped me find a job in a nearby hotel washing dishes.

This hotel had many sex workers. But I just washed dishes and went to school.
One night a man followed me when I was on my way home and raped me. I was only 17 years of age. You cannot imagine how I felt and what impact this had on me. But after that, I was lured to becoming a sex worker under false promises.

I was sent to Stung Treng; I was beaten when I refused to accept men. Shortly after I was taken to Stung Treng a man came to pay for me to go with him. He paid my maebon.
He took me to the pig slaughter house where he worked and locked me in a dirty smelly cell. Then he came back with six other men. They all, one by one, raped me; one man raped me twice. After a whole night of gang rape I was faint with pain.

When the morning came I heard the workers preparing to start their work. I heard the pigs being pushed into the pens, they were screaming. I knew what that feeling was like: I was no better than the pigs to these men; they could have killed me. Something inside me did die, and I will never be the same.

I am 24 years old and my life has been like this since 1993. I did not know the Khmer Rouge years but I have heard the stories of suffering. People say they were slaves.
Compared to my life for the last five years I think I and my sisters have suffered and are suffering more than you have. I know starvation, I know slavery, I know being forced to work all day. But I also know physical violation and torture every day, I know discrimination and hatred from my country-people, I know not being wanted and accepted from my society, the society that put me in this condition. I know fear, I feel it every day, even now that I dare speak my life is in danger.

This is a crime, but no one is punished. I fought the Khmer Rouge, I was a soldier in Phnom Pddei, fighting to protect you from the Khmer Rouge and risking my life.
I fought for the freedom of the Cambodian people, this is what the commander told us we were to do and I was proud I was fighting for freedom. I fought for your freedom – only to become enslaved and abused by you.

After all these years I now work as a sex worker. I also run a union to unite sex workers to fight for basic rights and for freedom. We bring our voices to forums like this to educate people like you, with the hope you can learn from us. Many of my sisters are scared to join our struggle because they live in constant fear of abuse and threats.

Some of you think that I am bad because I choose to remain a sex worker. My answer to those people is: I think your society, my society, my motherland Cambodia, is bad because it does not give girls like me choices; choices that I see are better for me.

I think it is bad that my country allows men to rape young women like me and my sisters and go unpunished. I think it is bad that my society lets men seek and demand the services of women like me. I think it is criminal that we are enslaved to make money for the powerful.
I think it is bad that my family are so poor and getting poorer because they can not survive as farmers with little resources which are getting smaller because more powerful people move them off their land.

I think it is bad the police treat me and my sisters like we are criminals but those who exploit us and take our dignity, our money and sometimes our lives live in freedom, enjoying their lives with their families. Because why? Because they have a powerful relative, because they have money.

Is this right? Is this justice? My sisters and I we do not create the demand, we are the objects; the demand comes from the men, the men come to us.
We are cheated, deceived, trafficked, humiliated and tortured. Why? Because men want us and we bring money to the powerful. But we are the powerless.

You give us AIDS; when we are no longer profitable you leave us to die, but we do not die in peace: you point your finger and you blame us.

You, the development organizations, give us condoms and teach us all the time about AIDS. We do not want your words, we do not want your judgment, we do not want you to tell us what is better for us. We know about AIDs; we watch our sisters die from the disease.

Ask us if we have the power to demand condom use from our clients. Look at me: you see a woman, but my boss sees dollars. An extra payment to my boss and the client does not wear a condom. If I protest I receive a beating. If I die tomorrow no one cares: there are many other girls who will be tricked and trafficked like me, because we feed many people.

I do not want to go to your shelter and learn to sew so you can get me work in a factory. This is not what I want. If I tell you that you will call me a srei koit (prostitute). But those words are easy for you because you have easy solutions to difficult problems you do not understand, and you do not understand because you do not listen.

My life has become this way now; for me there is no turning back, so let me continue to practice my occupation, but recognize my occupation and give me my rights, so I am protected and I can have power to demand justice.

I am a post Khmer Rouge child
But was a slave
I was forced to work against my choice
My body is tortured
I am full of pain
I am not a citizen
I am not a person
You see me as a virus
I am invisible
Your eyes do not see me
You hate me
You blame me
Some of you pity me
I do not want your pity
I do not want your charity
I want my rights
Not your lies and abuse

Recommendations
1. Formulation of legislation that protects us sex workers, so we can profit 100% from our work.
2. Formulate legislation that those who exploit us and feed from us are eliminated and arrested, and cannot operate.
3. Recognition of our work as a legitimate occupation: sex work is work.
4. End to police harassment, abuse and violence.
5. Human rights for sex workers.
6. Legalize sex work so we can have power to protect ourselves and use condoms 100% of the time.
7. Legalizing sex work will minimize trafficking because people can no longer profit from the sex industry.
8. If we have power and control we can protect the young children who are brought to the brothels. We can help in the fight to protect the children.