Still rebuilding from the devastating impact of the Khmer Rouge from the 1970’s, Cambodia’s paying the price by trafficking its children. Adventures short term teams meet with those on the front lines in Phnom Penh, prayer walk the city, and live the Gospel wherever they are.
Angkor Wat: The ancient temple city is on the short list to becoming the 8th Wonder of the World. Every year tourists climb the ruins, eager to photograph the sunrise and post on social media. They brave the heat to scale the walls, to run their fingers on the rough rock and touch a piece of history.
But that’s not the only reason to visit Cambodia.
Because in the last few decades another hot tourist attraction has arisen:
Children.
In the early 2000’s, the capital city, Phnom Penh, was paradise for pedophiles.
And hell for a child.
It wasn’t always this way.
During the end of the Vietnam War, a military coup known as the Khmer Rouge destroyed all traces of culture, history, education, foreign influences, hospitals, banking, finances, currency, and religion. They even started the calendar over, calling it “Year Zero.”
Then the the genocide began.
Between the years of 1975-1979, approximately 2 million people were starved, tortured, and killed – approximately 21% of the population. Over 200,000 mass graves have been excavated throughout the country – some with as many as 450 bodies. People were targeted because of their ethnicity, their occupations (doctors, lawyers, and educators), and even if they wore glasses. Those suspected of “treason” were taken to S-21, a high school converted into a prison, where they were starved and tortured. Everyone else was taken directly to land outside of the city where entire families were executed under the cloak of night.
Three decades later, the same Killing Fields are open to the public. Visitors walk the grounds – but need to beware of the clothing, bones, and teeth still rising up out of the ground. As the mass graves, now excavated, continue to sink into the ground, the paths around them still lift remnants of the victims to the surface.
And then, of course, there’s the “Baby tree”, scarred forever by blood that ran down its trunk and fertilized its roots.
The Khmer Rouge was eventually overthrown and Pol Pot (the leader, and his followers) imprisoned, tried, and executed for his crimes against humanity. But without currency, education, and religion, how does a country rebuild? How can it have commerce and banking, economics and government?
On a practical level, how do families put food on the table?
A solution came from a newly-thriving industry from Thailand: traffick the children.
That’s right. Parents sell their children. All in a day’s work: get up, go to with man (or woman), be back in time for dinner.
Prostitution is illegal in Phnom Penh, technically. But the karaoke, beer gardens, and those working the streets tell a different story. Go to the riverfront and see the little boys selling books under the watchful eyes of their pimps; watch the little girls at the local temples climb into a tuk-tuk with Western men.
One of the many Non-Govermental Organizations (NGOs) working in Cambodia is the Hard Places Community (HPC). They are committed to bring hope to the hopeless in the darkest corners of this world. Through prevention and restoration centers for girls and boys, as well as a safe house for young women, they are a relevant and loving presence to the sexually exploited in Cambodia.
Adventures short term teams meet the Hard Places Community, as well as other NGOs, during their times in Cambodia. This particular trip is very different; it’s largely education and missional living: prayer walking, listening to the voice of the Lord, and loving those right around wherever they are.
They have some pretty cool stories:
- Like the potential john who left a high-trafficked area due to the presence of a prayer team,
- Meeting, hearing the stories from, and praying for survivors of the Khmer Rouge while prayer walking S-21 and the Killing Fields,
- The two men who accepted Christ during the team’s off day in Siem Reap,
- Being the hands and feet of Jesus while going throughout the city,
- Visiting a performing arts school and teaching an impromptu English class, and so many more.
The reality of trafficking in Cambodia is heartbreaking. But God is at work there. Men, women, and children are being helped to find safety, aftercare, and alternate means of employment. Laws are being created, pedophiles are being arrested, and brothels are being raided.
As the truth of Jesus Christ is shared and lived in this country, chains of oppression are broken throughout the nation.
It’s $20 to tour Angkor Wat for a day.
The price of a child is negotiable.
But not for long.
Is your heart broken for the sexually exploited in Cambodia? Adventures returns with short term teams again this year in May and October. Click here to find out how you can join us.
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