February 19

This morning we went over to ARK International’s office/house.  It was the first time we’ve seen it – it’s an absolutely amazing building.  They have 2 houses that were given to them to use – one is for the family that runs ARK, the other is for the offices, and some more housing. The places are so nice – you could stick them in a Canadian neighbourhood, and they would be really really nice.  We did a bunch of prayer in the morning, and then work around the place, cleaning and doing inventory of stuff.  Also, another girl and I worked on planning crafts for the kids for one of the ministries that we’re going to help run while we’re here.

Then at night we went out with the counselling school and ARK to part of the Red Light District to do ministry stuff.  It was insane, seeing how open everything is here, there’s no hiding what goes on in the district at all.  The area I went to, it was a big open market, and as you walk down the street it was just like, market stall… market stall… women… market… women… family looking around… market… people in the Muslim dress things… women.  It was so out in the open, I’ve never seen anything like it before.  We spent a bunch of time praying for the women working there, and then me, a translator, and a couple of the counselling girls went to talk with one of the girls.  Her name’s Sofia, and she’s actually one of the sweetest girls that I’ve ever met.  She was really eager to talk to us – she told us about how she was heart broken right now.  Then she went on to tell us about how she used to be married, and had 3 kids.  But 2 years ago, her husband took her kids, and moved to Canada, so now she has to live here alone, and hasn’t seen her kids since they left for Canada.  It was so heartbreaking, to see how much pain she was in because of it.  As we talked to her, it was obvious that she wanted to get out of her job so bad, but she couldn’t, because it was the only way that she could afford to live.  While she was talking, we just saw so much how she has the kindest heart – she said that any time any of her ‘friends’ need anything, she’ll do it for them, if it’s giving them money, or anything, without expecting anything back from them – but she also talked about how her friends were only her friends when they could get something from her, when she had money that she could share with them, or whatever.
We ended up talking to her for about an hour – she just kept talking, because she didn’t want to be working so badly.  At the end of our time, she only stopped because her friend literally grabbed her by the arm, and dragged her away so that she could get back to work.

Please pray for Sofia and girls like her – they don’t want to be in the situations that they’re in.  Please pray for opportunities, and for ministries, within the Red Light District that are helping to get these girls out of the lives that they’re in now.  Also, please pray for safety for the girls – it’s really dangerous down there for them, we were warned when we got there to be really careful about even talking to any of the girls, because if they’re seen talking to someone and not working, they can get into big trouble by the guys that own them.