Tuesday, 7 August 2007
:: This is a beautiful write up by Martha Krienke that I took off the latest Brio&Beyond Aug 2007 Magazine. She visits a young missionary. Lindy, in Cambodia who uses her gift in art as therapy for victims of abuse. I hope that you'll be blessed and touched by this... =)::
I’m a virgin. But I never realized how privileged I am to have made that choice. Because in March, I was surrounded by teen girls (and some even younger) who never got to make that decision.
They’d love to be virgins, but saving themselves for marriage is a reality that they’ll never know. Looking into blank eyes grown numb by violence, rape and abuse, my heart broke for Cambodian girls who had been forced into prostitution. I knew this story would break me. But I didn’t know how deeply until I heard Srey’s story.
Thirteen year old Srey was sold to a brothel, a house of prostitution. No one cares to know her name. Her customers (usually over twice her age) only see a body can bring them pleasure. And Srey often blames herself for being tricked into this situation. She was told that she was getting a good job in the city to help her mom pay off a loan. In fact, her “job” is to sell her body to whomever could afford the price tag. Except she never sees the money. Someone else gets that.
In 2005, World Hope Internaitonal (WHI) opened an assessment center in Cambodia to be an initial placement for girls rescued by police raids on brothels. Some are also survivors of rape, usually by a community or family member. The center is high-security and low-profile. Most people don’t know the location, because that could endanger the girls or staff if the wrong people found out.
While the girls live at the center, the staff provides counseling, medical treatment, legal support, assessments and meetings with families to help decide what the next best step is. The girls also learn music, art, hair care, regular school subjects, sewing and dance.
Here’s a glance at how one young woman is using her passions for art and ministry to bring back these girls’ identity and self-worth.
Finding Hope
With a quick scan of the center’s classroom one Saturday morning, you’ll see about 25 girls ranging from ages 4 to 16 scribbling on 8-by-12 sheets of paper. Warm, humid air lingers in the room with little, if any, circulation. The entrance is open, shedding sunlight on the rows of flip-flops left at the door. Colored pencils rattle on the tile floor, and a faint sound of Christ Tomlin’s singing drifts from the CD player on the table.
Barefoot and dressed in a modest denim skirt, a 20 something English speaking woman surveys the room. Her name is Lindy Morgan. She’s come to practice art therapy as a way to help these girls heal from their past. This week’s project is to create books that describe who they are and what they care about.
Lindy helps girls find the art supplies they need, asks about their drawings and compliments their hard work. As Leang shows off her favourite animals, Lindy remembers Leang came to the center due to sexual abuse by her father.
She moves on to help Chan, whose family sold her to cover a debt. A wealthy businessman believed sleeping with her would bring him good luck.
Then there’s Thy, who arrived at the center only two weeks ago high on drugs. She had worked willingly as a waitress but was also prostituted out of a local restaurant. When asked her age, she lies by saying 22. She’s really only 14.
Yes, these girls are victims of crime, but despite their trauma Lindy sees girls full of life, resilience and love. When Thy entered their care, she said upon arrival she was a long-time addict. She would throw herself on the floor and beg to return to her other life. About two days later she had extreme withdrawal symptoms from the drugs in her body. The staff took her to a clinic, and they provided medication to get her through the worst days.
Two staff members rotated caring for her day and night. Lindy stayed with Thy most of the first 48 hours and wrote the following in her journal reflection on her time at the clinic and after: I had to “be OK.” I had to be strong. I felt the presence of God, not in a happy, feel-better sort of way, but in a battling over the darkness in the room- battling the darkness in her and in my own heart-kind of way.
Fighting for the hearts and health of these girls has often cause Lindy to feel empty and call on God for help. “It’s in those moments that you find out God is real and He is love in a deeper, truer way than any person could provide or emotion could muster,” she says.
After returning from the clinic, Thy told one of the staff members that she no longer wanted to go back where she came from. She told the staff that she realized nothing was left for her in her old lifestyle. She knew the people at the center truly loved her.
“The road will be long, but she won’t travel it alone anymore. She’s teaching us that love always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres,” Lindy says.
Art Therapy
Dring her year in Cambodia as a WHI Hope Corps volunteer, Lindy has use art as and for therapy. Art as therapy believes creativity can actually be part of healing. “Your soul is restored as you use your hands, mind and imagination to create things, sometimes by yourself and sometimes with others,” Lindy says.
Each Saturday she’s in charge of about three hours with the girls to exercise their creativity in a variety of ways. The projects include things such as group murals, puppet shows and a glass mosaic butterfly. Lindy designed the mosaic, and the girls put the 900 tiles in place.
“It’s about three feet square and is now hanging in the classroom,” Lindy says. “Occasionally I’ll catch [the girls] pointing out to each other the section they completed or running their fingers along the cool bright glass as they go by. They’re proud of what they’ve made. It also serves as a useful tool in teaching them about the plan that’s truly there in the midst of all the pieces and confusion we sometimes feel.”
The art for therapy method uses art in a counseling setting. Art is used to express and understand more about one’s life and experiences. Often events too difficult to explain or too painful to say aloud can be put into pictures.
“I haven’t tried to counsel the girls beyond my knowledge or ability,” Lindy says. “We’ve fantastic Khmer counseling staff equipped to do that work. I’m here to help in the process of expression and healing. I often pray and ask God to show me clearly what the girls need to express and believe and how I can help them dot hat. He’s really honored that request.”
Gaining Courage
Lindy co-leads a weekly group therapy/education session when the girls create collages and illustrations for stories that have meaning fro their lives. One particular week Lindy shared an allegory she had written for them. The story was about a kite whose string is cut, causing it to crash. The bird, who is at first a friend to the kite, later mocks the kite for being broken. Later, the owner finds the kite stuck in a tree and takes it home to mend its tears.
“Afterward we talked about it and how it might apply to their lives,” she says. “Girls who have been sexually abused and exploited feel a great deal of shame and guilt for what has happened to them. In Cambodia, especially, you never talk about these feelings with each other. So I was worried that no one would talk about the story.”
However, one teen girl spoke up. She told how she had a friend who was similar to the character of the bird in the story. She explained how her friend had lied and tricked her into a bad situation. She said she was grateful for this assessment center and thanked them for rescuing her and giving her a new life. Her honesty have other girls the courage to share their stories with each other.
“I was very encouraged by that day,” Lindy says. “We work with a lot of broken girls, and healing often takes a lifetime. We only get to see a tiny piece of that journey.”
The story Lindy wrote was simple, but God showed her she just needed to offer truth to the girls about His love, and He’ll do the rest.
“Sometimes I feel so helpless, but He reminded me that it’s His job to heal them. It’s my job to pray and to be a place they can find His love. These are His girls- His precious, beautiful daughters. He is our rescuer, our kite mender!”
Feel the vibe}};
19:46
19:46