This happened one evening when the nature gave out its power.

One evening around where I live, there’s something the world usually sees happening…

The nature state was silent, except ‘whooooo’ in my ears….

It became darker than ever,even my camera couldn’t shoot what really was happening..What my mother did was plunging a sword into the ground; a magical way of making sure the wind would stay away sooner!

On Friday, Cat and I were respectively busy since the next day, she had to leave forAustralia. I wanted to do my best to finish what she planned to do. However, not everything was successfully done but I was glad we could do a lot of things, though. I remember, one morning we went to check out with Phorn Vuth’s family and in the afternoon, we had an appointment with a guy from Friends International. At that time, I felt a very strange sleepiness I had never experienced. Actually, something could explain it. The night before, I stayed up very late and before the meeting, we had a very hot Vietnamese soup.

 

In the evening, we both made sure we could again see the girls at Tuol Kork, whom we met before. While riding on the road to Tuol Kork, I looked at the blue sky, though, with some white and black clouds. I was wondering if it was going to rain. Today, something felt very different. The road was not absolutey busy. It seemed like there were no chances of traffic accidents at all. Suddenly, I became agitated and was wondering if I was losing the way.

 

Somehow, I tried not to worry Catherine. I didn’t wish to let her see his a bit unqualified fixer riding her to the place any fixer shouldn’t have forgotten when he/she has been there once. As if God helped me, I turned my motobike’s signal to the left side and stopped in front of the right brothel. Looking at my telephone clock, I knew it’s too early to come here today. It was about 4:30 pm. I supposed that every brothel started up at a darker evening, perhaps about 5 or 5:30 pm. Yet, today was different. I knocked on the door. A new Cambodian woman opened the door. I didn’t know if Catherine felt the same as me. I reckoned I was on the wrong brothel. Yet, it’s the one and only!

 

This young lady had brown skin with a gentle big smile. She was perhaps in her early 20s. After a few words to get familiar with her, she let us in. We asked her where P, a bigger woman among other girls there, was! She told me P was in the room with a man! I know it is simple to expect this. But now it was happening close to me. I was in awe of confusion, frustration and doubt if this woman who told me she would stop would ever stop and go back to a normal job.

After 5 minutes later, the lady went in to tell P to come out and meet us. I was really ashamed! I didn’t know what I was doing! Waiting for someone to finish their business here in the brothel??? I felt I wanted to with all my energy knock down the door and kick the man’s ass! (childish thought). We turned to the lady and asked her if she’d just come and worked here. “Today is my first day,” she said. I thought, “Oh, my God, what on earth is she doing here?” I felt that she’s going to be victimized and stigmatized. I wished she had gone out any minute. Right now!

 

Cat persisted asking her if she wanted another different and decent job! We obviously were offering instant help if she said yes. We told her there were a few organizations that could assist her life. She shook her head and said she didn’t know and needed to consult her family. Immediately I wanted to know who is her family. Then, P came out and told us that the lady had already received two customers so far. Oh my! I couldn’t believe this. Why did it happen? Why couldn’t she wait for us to help? These ladies meant business. They didn’t need our help. The lady didn’t identify herself much, just telling us she’s a divorced mother with only one son and a family to support back at the village. My heart felt heavy. For one day, I had to bear this painful experience, the experience that I vicariously felt.

Coming out was a rather old bald moto-taxi driver! I wanted to yell at him, “What the hell were you doing up there? Aren’t you bald enough to go back home to feed your own family or go into a coffin?” This reminded me of Ms. Theary Seng, CSD directress who interview a moto-taxi driver, a regular customers of sex workers. He told Theary Seng that he went to a brothel and slept with those girls ‘because he felt he could do or enjoy more with the girls than his wife. (Sorry if I embarrass you). I shook my head and mentally pinched my skin to wake myself up from thoughts…floating…waiting…heating with hatred!

 

P came out with a big smile because she could recognize us, like old friends getting together again. Cat told her that she would go back toAustraliatomorrow and wanted to come to see how P was. P, after hearing this, smiled and said nothing. I knew she felt we treated her importantly, but for her maybe we’re just strangers that would come and go. Cat asked her the same question whether she would stop this job soon. P told that she would quit sooner or later and go back to live with her only son and ill mother. Just now she longed to make more money to save for her debt and her mother’s future medical treatment. ….

At that day, I felt complete confusion. Cat and I had a strange senstation that P might not stop. She was proscrastinating about whether she was supposed to stop or hold on to the same job. A new girl comes and an old girl goes out. It’s a circle of life where ‘new’ replaces ‘old’. Will it ever stop? The new ones don’t realize that they are going to be victimized and the old ones feel fed-up and want to start a new life. The new girl we met looked so naive.

She looked very comfortable at the place. She smiled and laughed with P. She and P were villagers and when unemployed, she folllowed P and came toPhnom Penh. Now that she’s here, she isn’t willing to go back to a very poor village and hard life anymore. To those girls, prostitution is not a very hard job that requires hard work or intelligence. Because Cat saw that the three girls with us now were quite quiet and seemed busy with their business, it’s time to go back. Cat had too many questions in her mind to ask them.

Told to study very hard and learn to ignore other people’s suffering sometimes, I can never obey it. Every moment, there is a person already suffering. Every minute, there is a person who is a dire need of help. I cannot avert my eyes from all forms of suffering, just like the way Buddha expeirenced the three forms of suffering of an old age, illness and monkhood. I am always wondering if I can reach, talk to them or know them. I have a childish dream to have inexplicable (magical) powers to help stop suffering. Let’s forget about this unexistable thing. I long to start doing things pratically by helping other poor people or people who are in need of help, of course as much as I can.

And this boy earning money every day on the Stueng Meanchey dumpsite has moved our heart. Catherine (Australian journalist) and I found him working heart and soul there on the dumpsite. He looked desperate to stuff anything sellable into his bags. He had an equipment to pluck any rubbish into his bag just as other garbage pickers do there. It was a handle with a sharp turned head like ’1′ . Covered himself completely with very old/tattered clothes, he could be half safe from rotten vegetables or yellow elephant dungs. Somehow, he could never be completely safe. His clothes stank!! He smelled like he should have taken a bath three days ago. He didn’t care, though. He went on working on his own. He looked like a very skilled worker who did nothing except work. His face showed his strong determination to survive. My heart was swinging. How great he was! Through all the hell rubbish, he behaved as if it were a rice field to walk back and forth.

This was three months ago when we first met Phorn Vuth, a desperate boy.

He is the breadwinner of his family besides his father. He’s the pillar of the family’s roof. Though he can earn $ 2.5, he can never get enough. He works morning and evening at the dumpsite to pick anything for his daily life. The effects of the dumpsite gets him ill often.His lips look very dry and pale. He is just 14 years old this year but he looks like a 9-year old boy, seemingly a malnurtured child.

Yet, something good was going to happen to him. Catherine had worked so hard and selflessly to find a good and convenient place that can provide him with free and good education. With two organizations (PSE and Friends International) which are dedicated to help poor and destitute people, Phorn Vuth’s future is quite promising. After consulting Friends and PSE, Catherine decided to try PSE first because the organization is nearby his home located adjacent to the dump. It is important to find him a nearby school so he can go on and off the dumphill quickly for it. Sometimes,very poor people can be very disappointed with life and too distressed to do anything. Psychologically, their brain is shut and their eyes are closed now that what’s in their mind is ‘food’ and how to survive for tomorrow.