(For security reasons, some details have been left out. Also, I have tried to make this post as objective as possible by simply stating my observations and leaving out my opinions and emotions- ya know, because it's the internet. )
Was it happening right in front of me?
Or had I read too many statistics and made myself too skeptical?
What was really going on?
We had traveled for more than thirteen hours in a crowded micro bus so that we could be there. The air was filled with dust and the streets were heavily littered. Everywhere I looked, men and women were traveling towards the border, and I couldn't help but wonder about the intentions of each passing man and about the future of each girl.
This was it. This is the point of no return for girls who are being trafficked.
We found a sign at the border crossing that warns girls about the dangers of false marriages. The most common tactic for traffickers is to "marry" a girl and then immediately whisk her away to India and sell her to a brothel. These girls are usually terrified to leave their homes, families, and everything that is familiar, but it is customary for a new Nepali bride to go live with her husband's family, so the girls go obediently, despite their fears.
Once we had seen the actual border crossing, we traveled up the road a few hundred meters to a border monitoring station. We have friends who work for this organization, so they hooked us up with a meeting with the monitoring station's staff.
As we drank tea and asked a million questions, the staff would occasionally dismiss themselves and rush towards the road to stop pedestrians and rickshaws.
The staff stopped a rickshaw, containing a young man and a young woman. The girl was ushered into the office with the female staff member where she was asked about her plans for going to India. She was then asked to call her mother to verify that the story was correct. Meanwhile, the male staff was asking the young man the same questions. If all of the stories matched and nothing seemed suspicious, they continued on their way.
This happened twice, and each time the girls who were traveling were giggling and laughing because they had been suspected of being trafficked. Their confidence was an indicator that they were safe.
The staff let them go along on their journey to India.
It was good to observe these things and we felt like we were starting to understand the process of intercepting girls at the border.
Then, as we were beginning to ask some questions about preventing trafficking at its source, the female staff person got up and stopped two men who were walking towards the border with a younger girl.
They repeated the questioning process and as the girl answered the questions, her nervousness suggested that something was not right. The girl's answers and the man's answers did not match and when the girl's mother was phoned, she asked the staff to keep her daughter with them until she could come get her. The man said that he was taking the girl to her husband who lives in India, but the mother had no idea that her daughter was going to India!
When the staff warned the girl about the dangers of going into India with a man she does not trust and without proper paperwork, she was surprised at the danger that was involved and decided that she wanted to stay and wait for her family to come and bring her home.
Praise God that this girl's life was spared from immeasurable torment.
But that is just one girl.
Thousands of girls get sold every year. Please pray that we can help end this at its source- before it is too late.
