Training weekend

This weekend, IJM partnered with another international nonprofit here in the city to conduct a police training on identifying, rescuing and preventing child trafficking. One of our talented advocates delivered a dynamic presentation to about 60 police officers, first defining what trafficking is and how children are exploited in this way, and then explaining what laws exist and how they protect kids and prosecute traffickers. Not much help during the lecture or case study groups which simulated trafficking scenarios (and were conducted in Tamil), I took photos during the event and wrote up a brief story highlighting the significance of the event for IJM headquarters.

Our office is in an exciting position right now, expanding from specialized casework to a total structural transformation. Our investigators, aftercare managers and lawyers will continue to rescue, rehabilitate and advocate for individuals who have been forced to labor as slaves. But we are also seeking to change the political and social structures which allow the injustice of forced labor slavery to exist, despite laws against it.

The police training was an important "first" for our office. IJM has a team of talented lawyers who really understand the laws surrounding forced labor. We hope to be a resource for local law enforcement agencies, to offer our expertise and aid them in enforcing laws that already exist.

Work is busy as usual, but I'm working on a variety of projects which makes the days pass quickly and the mundane stay away. It's getting hot; it was over 100 degrees today, plus A LOT MORE humidity. And there's no salty breeze, just sticky city air. So I'm grateful for the AC in my office and the juice bars on many a corner, blending just-in-season mangoes for a refreshing afternoon treat.

Paradise Part Three: Unwinding in Seminyak

Our final destination: the hip beach town, Seminyak, on Bali.

This door speaks for itself.

Road to the beach. Best by motorcycle.

Surf? Shells? Massage? Cocktail? Knock-off watch? This beach has it all.

My view of relaxation.

Dusk at the beach is pretty.

Sunset is nice too.

Who needs shoes when you're walking around a blissful beach town? I found out they're necessary as we followed my suggested shortcut through a construction zone. Chardaie offered a piggy back ride and Joel laughed (a lot).

Typical cafe. No walls, lots of breezes. Chalkboard menus are casual and practical: only the freshest food is served.

Not just a paradise for beach bums and foodies, this town is full of art. Detail of a wood carving set into a random wall along the road.

Fascinating art.

A home grown art gallery.

Final night on vacation.

Paradise Part Two: Discovering Ubud

Welcome to Bali. Yes, this is a wild orchid.

Me, Joel and Chardaie. About to enjoy another delicious Balinese meal. (After watching a dance/theatrical perfomance of the Hindu legend, The Ramayana. Complete with elaborate costuming, dozens of men chanting and shouting to create the rhythmic beat and a man who not only walked on burning coal, but kicked them ferociously around the stage--barely contained by low metal partitions.) A lovely art gallery featuring a local artist right next to the tiny alley leading to our homestay. Also across the street from "Cafe Des Artistes," a chic restaurant where I sipped a glass of vino and enjoyed Crepes Suzette one evening when my traveling companions opted to head home early-ish.Ala's Hibiscus. Our "bungalow." Two bedrooms. A terrace. Surrounded by verdan green rice paddies. Fresh breakfast served to our rooms. Hot tea every evening before retiring. Total: price-less at $35.

The aforementioned rice paddies.

I enjoyed the ubiquitous stone statues in Ubud.

A typical street in Ubud.

Also a typical street in Ubud.
A typical way to carry fruit to the market or temple in Ubud.

Typical, beautiful woodwork. I was in love with the intricate wood carvings, from picture frame to door frame.A typical assortment of offerings. These tiny boxes were crafted from banana leaves or other natural materials, filled with bits of rice, cracker, flowers and lemons. I actually spied a few offerings with cigarettes! The offerings are put out periodically throughout the day...everywhere. In front of stores, homes, car dashboards, motorcycles, mailboxes...you get the idea.
Not your typical tourists to Ubud: Chardaie and me. While Bali is a tourism hotspot for Indonesia, most of the backpackers we met and honeymooners we observed were from Australia or Europe. 8 times out of 10, when we told a curious, friendly Indonesian shopkeeper (or random passerby) where we were from, they responded with an excited "OBAMA!" One man told us to tell his good friend Obama hi when we got back to America.

These little boys had the most adorable laughs. I happily agreed to pose for a picture.

So long, Bali. I'll be back someday...

Paradise Part One: Getting to Gili Meno

All for one and one for all, Joel, Chardaie and I began our adventures in Singapore.  

My favorite sight in the city of Clean and Green was a Christian Lacroix exhibit at the museum.  The funky displays of opera and ballet costumes were accompanied by lots of fabulous sketches and drawings.

After extensive transportation through three countries in 48 hours, a night on an airport floor and a lot of hassle and ridiculous red tape to get tickets to three different, uncomfortable budget airlines, we arrived safely in the land of R&R and fabulous food.

Exhibit one: lunch at a roadside Warung.  There's one thing on the menu each day.  And it's good.

First dinner.  Looking a little wearied from all the travel and pink from the four-hour ferry ride.  Incidentally, the ferry ride took us to Sengiggi, where we planned to then take a bus and catch a boat to Gili Meno.  Alas, we'd been duped into overpriced tickets and the next little boat to the quiet Gili island did not leave until morning.  Luckily this nasi goreng saved the night.

Welcome to Gili Meno. 

(the boat to the left was our promised, belated, mode of transportation to our first stop in Paradise)

And our final mode of transportation to the bungalow, where we intentionally lost track of time and threw our worries to the ocean breeze.

A fun fact: "Gili" means island.  So the "Gili Islands" is a rather redundant name.  But hey, when the island's this nice, why not say it twice?

We stayed at the Good Heart.  How could you not fall in love with this place?

Beautiful.  Chaotic transportation and hectic spontaneity totally worth this view.

Dinner view.

Back to [my] reality

Indonesia was nice. Actually, Indonesia was gorgeous. But it's good to be back.

Though I still haven't exerted any effort to understand Celsius, I can tell you that the mercury is rising here. The days are hot and humid--and the nights are ceasing to cool down. I couldn't help but smile to myself and think, "welcome back to reality," as I drove in a reckless auto last night and saw multiple men relieving themselves on the sidewalk against the wall (have I mentioned this normal factoid before?)...on my way to buy a loaf of French bread for a wine and cheese party with women from a church I've visited several times. My reality is, as I've written before, a bundle of contradictions.

While we were in Indonesia (aka Paradise), we talked a lot about our work and the strange country we're living in. While I loved the clean streets of Singapore and the green, glorious nature of Indonesia, I'm charmed by the little details of this city. The pretty gate hanging on a dirty, nondescript stucco wall. The drum beat and unfamiliar, piercingly loud wind instrument ringing down the street this morning as I left for work--Happy Tamil New Year! Or the non-English speaking but always smiling woman who sells me tiny bananas and flowers for my hair next to the temple beside my office. Most of the customs are still unfamiliar and many mundane scenarios are still uncomfortable, but I am altogether grateful for the opportunity I have been given to live life alongside people who are eager to explain and field my endless questions. I'd never discover these lessons and laughs on a mere vacation--no matter how clean, green or relaxing!

Of course, my days aren't simply spent wandering chaotic streets and musing scattered thoughts. I spent much of today starting to read through another case file for a story I'm writing about a rescue operation at a brick kiln a few years ago. Another amazing story of cruelty and courage. I also spent time photoshop-ing and designing a layout for part of our upcoming newsletter. And set up some meetings and helped coordinate details for a presentation IJM is giving this weekend for a police training. Yep, vacation's over!

The return from R&R

I type this from a free internet access point in the swanky Singapore airport, my first taste of technology in over a week. I'm soaking up the final hours of vacation relaxation, despite the overpriced airport food (also irresistable--how can I pass up Starbucks and an oreo McFlurry?!) and a sore back from sleeping on the Jakarta airport floor last night (the cockroaches in the cracks deterred us from the otherwise desirable wooden benches).

One of the perks--er, stipulations--of a business visa in South Asia is the requirement to take a trip to another country just before the 6-month marker. Though I've been in-country just shy of 3 months, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to make a "visa run" with two other IJM interns and get my passport stamped in Indonesia.

A few highlights before my fifteen minutes of freedom to roam cyberspace are up:

* The food. A favorite and repeated dish: Nasi Goreng with (Fish) Satay. Out of this world (or at least any world I'd ever been in) fried rice teeming with ultra-fresh seafood and a blend of fabulous spices; fish grilled to savory perfection on skewer-like sticks and smothered in a delicious, not-too-heavy gravy. Key ingredients: coconut, peanut and fresh, fresh, fresh fish. Average price: One or two bucks at a Warung, a roadside cafe/plastic chairs and a wok--frequented by the locals. Or splurge and spend $8- $10 to enjoy this top-notch cuisine in an ambient restaurant cooled by ocean breezes, candlelight and funky glass lanterns and/or chandeliers.

* Holding a cobalt blue starfish in my hands and swimming a few feet above a majestic (and surprisingly fast!) loggerhead sea turtle as I snorkeled off the pristine, hardly touristy beach of Gili Meno, Lombok.

* Sitting on the terrace of our "bungalow" (perhaps more appropriately, "villa") in Ubud, Bali, staring at the stars in the clear sky and fireflies in the surrounding rice paddies, listening to the bamboo chimes and distant instruments of a parade processing to temple to celebrate the new moon.

* Walking behind and beside countless monkeys--greedy, mangy and adorable--in the Sacred Monkey Forest. I tested the limits of my luck and tentatively (of course also courageously) posed for a picture sitting right next to one loner who was busy peeling a banana.

* Exploring the streets of Seminyak, Bali and oohing and ahhing over every single window display. Think: Anthropologie's inspiration--in everything from product to presentation (except a sliver of the price). Good thing this was our last stop and my Rupiah were quite limited. (Example: last night we stopped into a convenience store where we whittled away our purchases to the bare necessities--not even splurging on Mentos mints--to share one water bottle and a tube of aloe-vera gel. Proud of our efforts to use up every bit of small change and stick to our budgets, we were devastated when we arrived at the airport and had to withdraw from the ATM to pay a whopping fifteen bucks each in taxes...hence the forgoed hotels on either end of the trip and exciting overnights spent in the dimly lit--but of course safe!--Jakarta airport.)

* The transportation. We traveled intentionally light, with only our backpacks, one Lonely Planet: Indonesia and open minds; the theme of our trip was spontanaeity, but we encountered our fair share of initial frustration. Our first 48 hours: a train, three flights on three different budget airlines, a bus, a ferry (and a liar of a salesguy to accompany that ticket--we're almost at the laughing-about-it-after-the-fact point), a couple of taxi's, a wooden fisherman's boat crowded with us and non-English speaking Indonesians, and a rickety horse/mule/? drawn cart. All totally worth it as soon as we dumped our bags in our respective rooms and walked the 20 yards to the peaceful Indian ocean.

Freedom

This weekend in DC, IJM will host the annual Global Prayer Gathering. Like the name implies, people will gather together from all over to pray for IJM's work around the globe. Each of the Field Office Directors from IJM's 14 international offices will fly in to lead participants in prayer for the unique needs of their particular field work. Part of my role as a Community Relations intern has been preparing our "prayer room" with slideshows and power point presentations, planning and producing the gifts for the participants who will visit our room, and working with my Field Office Director to put together stories and speeches. Additionally, our director will speak at one of the main group sessions and conduct a live video interview with one of our victims. I have had the privilege of writing the story and getting to meet this endearing and inspiring individual: Madhaav.

Madhaav is twelve years old. Reserved and bashful at first, it doesn't take long for his big smile to light up the room. Last fall, IJM investigators found Madhaav working in a rice mill, day and night, earning about a quarter--yes, 25 cents--each week. Instead of going to school or playing with boys his age, he was forced to lay out rice paddies to dry and work in the machine room alongside adults. His parents and older siblings also worked at this rice mill and the one across the street. The entire family was being forced to work to pay back small loans the father and older brother had taken out; they were not free to leave the facility nor seek additional work to pay back the loan. When his grandfather passed away, the family had to leave one member behind as human collateral to ensure their return--Madhaav stayed in the rice mill. Their debt continued to increase because they were forced to "borrow" money to pay for basic expenses, like additional food necessary to survive and medicine. The women feared the owner's sexual advances, and the men were helpless to defend their wives or own dignity because of the owner's abuses towards them and apathy towards the law. Though he was only a child and also blind, Madhaav was forced to work tirelessly alongside the other forced laborers. When IJM investigators met Madhaav, he told them that he wanted to be rescued from the rice mill because he wanted to "see the world."

The IJM team put together a compelling case and presented the evidence of forced labor to the local authorities. A rescue operation was planned and executed successfully; Madhaav and fourteenother laborers from the two rice mills were presented with official release certificates granting them freedom. Today, Madhaav lives happily with his older sister and her husband.

Last week, I got to visit him in his village with one of our aftercare managers. (After victims are released from a facility, an IJM aftercare manager is assigned to each family. The family receives regular visits from this IJM social worker for the next two years--guiding and supporting their gradual and stable reentry into a free society.) I had read through all of the victim statements taken by the investigators and pored over the many reports detailing the rescue operation. I had in fact written a case narrative summarizing the entire case from the first phone call referral to the current aftercare of each family to the nascent legal stages. I had already submitted a story about Madhaav to Headquarters. But as I sat on the hard floor of a tiny hut with a roof thatched together with twine, thin sticks and palm leaves, I heard Madhaav's story like it was the first time.

I was there with my Field Office Director to meet Madhaav and ask if he would be willing to come in and share his story before a video camera, to be broadcast at the Global Prayer Gathering. So I scribbled down notes in my moleskine, translations whispered by a colleague and dear friend. But I didn't need translation to understand the bond between Madhaav and his IJM aftercare manager, the steady hand placed gently on Madhaav's shoulder as he sat back down on the mat after standing to pantomime the motions he was once forced to perform, raking and moving the rice paddies. I didn't need words to smile and make funny faces at his younger twin brothers and cousin, three small boys in the first grade who proudly counted to ten and recited their fractured ABC's as they struggled to sit still, flanked by their mothers and older siblings sitting quietly to observe these strange outsiders asking Madhaav so many questions about a hard past. When we asked what Maadhav remembered about the owner of the rice mill, his permanently unfocused eyes shifted downward and his thoughtful silence spoke more than words ever could.

Love, laughter, fear--these cut quickly across culture and circumstance.