Broken & Unclean

I don't know how anyone sleeps well at night, knowing all that happens under the cover of darkness in this world. Below is an excerpt from Somaly Mam's story told in her book "The Road of Lost Innocence" (2008) - a narrative which shook me to the core. Somaly was born in a village in the Cambodian and sold into sexual slavery by her grandfather when she was 12 years old. Her story is how she suffered the brutality and horrors of sex trafficking, only to endure to rescue others. The Somaly Mam Foundation is now part of the growing fight against modern day slavery.

This fight against injustice is like a marathon. Only the strong endure. I am amazed by the courage of survivors, which make my fears look really really shamefully small. My resolve is deeper than ever knowing that children suffer like this night after night.

"Some prostitutes are sold to the meebon by their parents or relatives, or by their husbands. The price depends on their freshness and beauty, as well as the cleverness and connections of the seller. Today some girls are kidnapped into prostitution, but I don't think that used to happen so much when I was young. Most of the girls at Aunty Peuve's house were there as a kind of downpayment, to pay back a debt. They were supposed to work until they paid back the money their families owed--unless the families took out new debts that extended their daughter's servitude.

Nobody wants you back after you've worked in a brothel. The word for prostitute in Cambodia is srey kouc, "broken women'--broken in a way that cannot be mended. You are forever ruined and your existence shames the family. Nobody wants people to know they have a prostitute in their family.

The clients were horrible. To them we were meat. They would say "I paid a fortune, and you're not even pretty," and smack, hit you against the wall. Some of them like hurting us and did it for sport. They were dirty. They stank. In my memory, their dirtiness is the most repugnant thing. That and the smell....

I tried never to look at a client in the eye. I didn't pretend to like them. I closed my eyes and I often cried, though this never bothered anyone. Clients were policemen, shopkeepers, soldiers, construction workers. Young and old. Sometimes they were truck drivers or long-distance taxi drivers who rented beds on the sidewalks along the Central Market. They were just beds, wooden platforms with mosquito nets, which people brought out onto the sidewalks at night--you could rent one for about twenty-five U.S. cents. Being with a client on one of those beds was humiliating in another way.

It was common for a man, most often a Chinese man, to hire one of us and take us to a room where there were ten or twenty men. When the same people came back, we still had to go, even if we knew what was waiting for us. If we didn't go, we were punished.

We wore thick white makeup, like geishas--a kind of paste we made of white face powder from Thailand mixed into coconut oil. It made our skin whiter, which was what the clients wanted, and it hid the bruises.

The worst thing was how dirty I felt all the time. Aunty Peuve's brothel was filthy, the streets were filthy, the beds were filthy. I felt I stank of sperm. I hate that smell. Sometimes, even now, I am invaded by the stench of it, usually after I've been talking to a girl about her experiences as a prostitute. Never during--she needs me to be controlled, to listen to her. But afterward, I'm overwhelmed, I feel sick, I feel I stink--it's as if I will never be clean. I keep a cupboard full of perfumed creams, but nothing takes the smell away.