by: Chhorka LY
 |
| UP CLOSE: Somaly Mam. - Republished from www.zimbio.com. Photo taken by Kris Connor/Getty Images. |
Can you imagine a
woman who could save and change many women’s life from their darkest moment to
have a brighter future? She is Somaly Mam, a 42 years old woman who is an anti
sex-trafficking advocate. She used to be a victim of child sexual slavery, but
she has a strong will in helping other fellow women who are sold or forced to
be prostitutes.
Somaly was born in a
small ethnic group in Mondulkiri, Cambodia. Her family was very poor and
desperate. She lived with a man that she called grandfather, and she was abused
and sold to another person. Then she got married, but her husband beat and
raped her and forced and tortured her to have sex with clients.
Somaly introduced her
book The Road of Lost Innocence which reveals about her bitter
life story. She wrote the book because of her life experience, it has brought
her to where she is today. In her book, you can feel the hard situations that
she faced and how she tried to survive and build back her strength to be able
to live and escape from the past.
In order to help the
victims, Somaly has built the Somaly Mam Foundation. The foundation is built to
fight against woman and child sex-trafficking. They teach the girls who work at
the brothels about condom and hygiene. They also have a clinic with psychological
counseling where the girls can come and talk to them for free. Moreover, they
provide shelter and education to the girls and teach them some skills that they
can do for their living.
The reason that she
built Somaly Mam Foundation is because of the pain that she has gone through in
her life, and she just could not leave the girls who are facing the same
situation the same pain as hers. She needs to help them because helping them is
like helping herself too.
To be successful
until now, Somaly indicated that she alone could not do anything. She has her
team and donors that work closely with her to save the girls. The donor that
play an important role in helping her is LexiNexis. They are not only providing
fund, but also provides technical training and, because of this, Somaly, her donors,
and her Foundation have become mutual partners for good cause.
Up until now, Somaly
and her team have saved around 7,000 girls. Among those, there are about 4,000
children that they have rescued.
Somaly has received
so many awards and international recognition because of her great work. She was
chosen to be a CNN Hero in 2006. She has received a World’s Children’s Prize
for Rights of the Child in Sweden based on her dangerous struggle that she has
faced in order to protect the rights of Cambodian children. Recently, she has
just received a Nomura CARE Award that focused on her extraordinary work that she
does to help and improve the lives of the future generations in her local
community.
The very simple
things that can make Somaly happy are the hugs and kisses from the girls she
has saved. She said those hugs and kisses bring her happiness because those are
from the honest heart of the victims and survivors. She emphasized that she
wants to give up sometimes but because of the love, the laugh, and the affection
from the girls, it helped her gain more energy to continue to fight. They are
her vitamins.
In an interview with
Somaly published at www.claudiachan.com,
she gave some advices to the ones who have struggles in life. She remarked they
have to remember these words “Forgiveness and Positive Thoughts. Whatever
struggle they are facing right now, they have to recognize it and learn from
it. They have to also have faith in themselves because they do not know how
many people out there are facing the same problems or even worse. Do not be scared
to help one person because one can help many others”.
With good heart, Somaly’s
goals are to save children and women, to make them happy and be able to laugh
and love again, and to help them have education. In addition, her dream is to
have a world without slavery, trafficking, war, and violence.
Her last message to everyone
is to not look down on the girls who work at the brothels. “The more we look
down on them, the more ashamed they feel. No girl wants to be abused and raped.
We should ask ourselves why they are in the brothels. Maybe they have been sold
or forced to be there. Furthermore, if we cannot help them, just try to look at
them as human, as sister, as children to make them feel a bit better. If
everyone works together, we can change the world, so please help to fight
against woman and child sex-trafficking”.
Sources:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBqdhFbNxGM
http://www.claudiachan.com/interviews/somaly-mam/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somaly_Mam
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2012/06/15/somaly-mam-cambodian-sex-slave-turned-activist.html
http://www.nomuraasiaforums.com/2012/06/07/somaly-mam-foundation-honored-with-nomura-cares-award/
http://www.afesip.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=49&Itemid=79
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1894410_1894289_1894268,00.html
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