Living in Dar es Salaam has its advantages.  We have actual grocery stores, restaurants, nice hotels, the Indian Ocean, and even a movie theater (although we see the occasion rat climbing near us, it is still a movie theater!).   Our family was taking advantage of one of these hotels when our guests were in town last week.  After a long couple of months, I was very content to relax, sip some espresso, stare at the beautiful Indian Ocean and enjoy a much-needed break.

As I sat quietly I couldn’t help but hear a familiar accent to my own (that catches my attention here).  I heard “J-U-D-Y, is that your name?”  I turned to see a middle-aged, over-weight, messy tourist.  He was holding the hand of a beautiful Tanzanian young woman with a Tanzanian man by her side.  I knew exactly what was happening and my heart sank. 

I continued to hear these men make arrangements for what Judy would do for him that night.  There were a few formalities and then young Judy walked away promising to return.

Sometimes I wish that I was the type of person that could ignore…someone who could gather up her children from situations like these, walk away and forget. But our Lord did not make me that way.  He also didn’t call us to a land where that is an option.  Judy has no voice.  Sure you can explain it away.  Sure you will hear the voices of others shake it off with a “that kind of thing happens all the time here.”  It’s true.  It does.  Girls like Judy, moments like these, sex-trafficking and exploitation of young women is happening all over our city, all over our world.  I looked at my husband and we exchanged the all-too-familiar glance where he knows that I am past the point of no return.  After some very intense conversations with a few men and management (which does no good because this is a lucrative business for most hotels here in Dar) I went to Judy.  I asked her to sit with me and in attempts to listen and even for a moment, give her a voice.

Judy is 20 years old.  She was raised in the village until her mother died.  Her father moved her and her two young siblings to Dar es Salaam to find a job.  Shortly after the move he abandoned them.  Judy was left to provide for herself and her siblings with no education, no help, no guidance, nothing.  But Judy is beautiful.  To quote the nauseating words of her fellow-employee acting as her pimp, “she was made beautiful…why should she waste it.”

“she was made beautiful…why should she waste it.”

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Judy has had this job for two weeks.  She was petrified, but she was also desperate.   That desperation is the exact thing that these men in the sex trafficking industry prey upon.  The desperation that drives them to believe lies, do unimaginable things, lower themselves to nothing more than objects to ensure their survival.   She believes the lie that in exchange for sex these men will give her a better life.  When I told Judy that this man was not interested in giving her a good life, he was only interested in one thing she looked at me and said, “Please, then will you help me?”

“Please, then will you help me?”

The truth is that I couldn’t help Judy that day.  I didn’t have another solution for her.  I don’t have a job or alternate path to offer her to walk down.  It was painful to tell her those words.  I promised to pray and kept myself from promising any more to her…as she was clinging onto my every word for hope.   Both anger and sadness filled my heart as I looked into her pain-filled eyes one last time knowing that I couldn’t help. Not now anyway.  One day.

This is why we are working so hard to have a refuge for women, like Judy, who are forced to make unimaginable decisions to survive. We pray that the Lord will continue to bless our efforts in offering His love to these women.  We pray that His name will be glorified as these women turn from desperation to dignity and see their wealth and beauty and hope in Christ. 

Christ spent his time on earth with people like Judy.  We plan to do the same.