Thyda looks like any other young girl – only she’s lived through trauma most of us could never imagine. At the age of 12 she was told that she needed to make money in order to buy medicine for her sick grandfather. Because she was considered to be very beautiful, her mother sold her to a friend for $300. This woman then sold her to a high-ranking Cambodian official for $800. She stayed with him for three hours on that first night. Thyda was moved all over the country, being resold over and over again. Her mother told her that her aunt was also sick and needed money for medicine. At the third brothel she managed to escape after being granted permission to go for a walk. She found a phone and called her aunt, whom she discovered was not sick at all. The aunt called a human rights’ organization, which sent police to rescue Thyda. She was brought to the Cambodian Women’s Crisis Center shelter because she had nowhere else to go.

“I never knew about my family – my father, my mother’s name or my sister’s name,” says Thyda. “All I ever heard was people telling me that this woman was really my mother. So I don’t know. Who is my mother?” Thyda now wonders if the woman who sold her into prostitution really was her mother because she doesn’t believe that a mother could sell her own daughter.

Out of all of the incredibly strong and resilient girls and women we’ve met, her story has touched me the most.

Many of my friends have been to SE Asia as backpackers. They have traveled there for the full moon parties, cheap souvenirs and exoticness of these countries. A lot of the people my age who come to backpack in SE Asia come because it seems to be trendy, which is an added benefit to how cheap these countries are to travel in. Beaches and bars are another bonus. The palm trees and fresh fruits all add to a feeling of a tropical getaway, freedom and carelessness. But on this trip I will forgo the beach and a much needed tan. I am here for a very different and specific purpose.

I’ve come with Outer Voices, a California based independent media group, to make a radio documentary program about sex trafficking in Cambodia. Outer Voices is making a series of documentaries on women in Asia and the Pacific, seeking to hear their voices, which are so often left on the fringe of media. I feel honored to be working with them – I’m learning so much about what women’s lives are really like.

My experiences with the group have been a much-welcomed opportunity to get out of the classroom and textbooks, and into reality. My lens for this entire trip is the topic we’ll be exploring, and thus, every man I see is a potential client and every girl or woman a prospective victim of trafficking and prostitution. In Cambodia, some legitimate businesses like bars, restaurants and vendors, mask a sex industry that exploits young girls and women. I have read so much about this topic, talked to professors and aid workers, watched documentaries – and now I am finally here, left wondering if everything that surrounds me is complicit in this world of trafficking and prostitution.

We make a funny scene – three white women carrying a mass of recording equipment. At times it is awkward for me to be here, because of the stares. Everywhere we go we are received with points and laughs – I can only begin to imagine what is being said about us.

On our first day in Phnom Penh we stumble across one of the markets used, it seems like, only by locals. The entire market is a mesh of tiny booths, all covered with an array of tarps. Around the outside are vendors selling fresh fruit, but as we go farther in we find an amazing mixture of anything we could ever, possible need – shoes, fabric, jewelry, brooms, soaps and offerings for monks.

This is not one of the tourist markets where Westerners are targeted with souvenirs, and we are pestered by everyone until we give in and make a purchase. Instead, we can barely squeeze through the tiny pathways lined with stalls, each holding an infinite number of clothing, food, fake flowers and offerings for monks and temples. We are stared at so much it makes me wonder if we are the first white people to penetrate this chaotic market. Babies burst into tears at the sight of us, and shy young teenage girls cover their mouths to giggle.

But other moments make it worth the embarrassment of being continually gawked at. One day we visit a temple outside of Battambang, and losing track of time, find ourselves there as night falls. This temple holds the old, crumbling frame of an ancient, stone temple, but is hidden behind a newer building, where I find young monks eager to practice their English. They ask me if I ’m married, and when I say I am not, tell me that I’m beautiful. These aren’t the words I’m expecting to hear from these religious men.

As we begin to leave the compound of the temple, we run into a tiny, old woman. She has a shaved head and is wearing a simple wraparound skirt and blouse. This woman is the nun that takes care of the complex. With help from our translator we ask her for a blessing, and I am somehow chosen to receive this honour – it feels sacred and personal, even with the boundaries of language, age and privilege.

My knowledge of this place and the situation of women are limited, even after months of reading, but what I did learn before we came is this: Cambodia is a small country nestled between Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. With a population of just over 11 million, the country has undergone many changes in the past fifty years. In the 1970s the Vietnam War spilled over into the country, and later the Khmer Rouge came to power, killing at least a million people. Only a few decades after surviving one of the worst genocides in human history, Cambodians continue to struggle to succeed economically and socially.

The country has not completely recovered from years of war, and poverty remains a problem for many, if not most Cambodians. There are few economic options available – over 80% of the country ’s population relies on the agricultural industry, which rarely generates enough income for a family’s survival. The garment industry has emerged as a wage earning option, but many of the garment factories are closing because of the end of the World Trade Organization’s quota system, which ended December 31, 2004.

The lack of economic options and a sense of desperation in Cambodia have created an opportune environment for a growing sex industry. To add to this, Cambodian girls and women often find themselves in situations of responsibility – they are expected to care for their parents, and with few viable economic alternatives often find themselves working within the sex industry to provide money to their families.

Girls and women work in the brothels of red light districts, karaoke bars and restaurants selling sex. Cambodia has emerged as a popular destination for tourists looking specifically for prostitutes, but foreigners aren’t the main customers of sex workers. Just under 10% of the men that pay for sex in Cambodia are from abroad.

Many of the girls and women who end up working as prostitutes come from rural areas and have been tricked or coerced into working in the industry – they are promised good jobs with decent pay (enough to send some money home to their families), a place to live and the experience of living in the city. Others are tricked into going to new countries, like Malaysia or Thailand. Those lucky enough to escape the brothels in which they are imprisoned find themselves in a foreign country illegally, and if caught are sent to jail, with no way to contact their families or return to their homes in Cambodia.

Our time in Cambodia was intense, and packed full from morning to night with work. I was so engrossed in our topic and this beautiful place, that I often forgot the reason for our trip - to make a radio documentary. Absorbed as I was in the topic and conversations that were happening around me, the fact that we were in Cambodia to get interviews and sounds onto tape was secondary to me.

One afternoon shook me awake to that fact - back in our van for a long hot ride from the border town of Poipet in northern Cambodia to Siem Reap and Angkor Wat, we encountered some farmers driving ox carts. It was beautiful to see these carts, styled the same for centuries, driving along the new paved highway, and enchanting to hear the sounds – the clop clopping of the oxen’s hooves on the asphalt, the creaking of the wooden wheels, the bells on their collars clanging to the rhythm of their slow pace. Our sound engineer, Robin Wise, asked our driver to pull over. We proceeded to spend the next half hour stopping and recording them driving by. The ox carts would trundle by, we’d pass them in our van, and Robin would leap out with the microphone to record them - again and again – four times in total. I’m sure these rural peasants had never seen anything as amusing as us, and it reminded me that I was there actually making a radio show!

Concrete facts about the sex industry in Cambodia are hard to come by. Because the sex industry is largely underground and transient, it is difficult to accurately assess how many people are a part of it. Some sources estimate that 1 out of every 10 girls between the ages of 15 and 25 has been trafficked, and others say that as many as 50 or 60 thousand girls and women work in the sex industry in Cambodia. Of these, at least 35% are estimated to be under the age of 18. Over 50% of the women involved in sex work are thought to have been trafficked, with the other half “voluntarily” choosing the industry. HIV/AIDS is a growing problem, and Cambodia’s rates are the highest in all of SE Asia at 2.2%, with as many as 40% of sex workers infected. They are thought to be among one of the largest at risk groups, and their infection rate is dangerous, because many of their clients are married men who return to their communities, going on to infect their wives. Condom use is low and most prostitutes have no say in whether or not one is used – most go without.

Traffickers are clever, and often they are women who are known and trusted in their communities, using that trust to convince the girls or women to leave their homes and families. These girls are sold and are then forced to receive male clients in brothels or the backs of bars. Conditions in these places are often unsanitary and hostile – many of the women we spoke with talked about being emotionally and physically abused by the brothel owners and patrolled by gangsters.

“I had to work all day, taking clients. When I wasn’t working I was locked up so I wouldn’t run away. Sometimes they would hurt us and give electric shocks. Sometimes they would shock a woman so hard she would die. They also gave us drugs before we received clients so that we would be happier when the men came,” says Mara, a former sex worker. By the end of our trip, having interviewed a handful of women who had escaped their traffickers, this story would become too familiar, becoming, it seemed, the standard story for most sex workers.

Corruption is widespread in Cambodia, with many officials earning little pay. In order to supplement their incomes many accept bribes. The sex industry and trafficking in women and children have profited from this, with many official institutions turning a blind eye to the problem for the sake of additional revenue. The head of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, Mu Sochua, recently stepped down, citing corruption as a major obstacle in her ability to work successfully in resolving key issues.

Cambodia has one of the largest populations of non-governmental organizations, but some say that these NGOs do little to help rebuild Cambodia and rather, spend more time in bidding wars for contracts. The real work being done to solve the problem is happening on the ground with organizations like the Cambodian Women’s Crisis Center (CWCC).

“You have to be brave enough to protect the victim. People might feel threatened, but when we see what has been done to the women, then we feel angry and we don’t care much about the security, we have to confront those perpetrators.” This is our introduction to Chanthol Oung, director of the Cambodian Women ’s Crisis Center, and the focus of our documentary.

A small, soft spoken woman, Chanthol created CWCC in 1997 while working with another local human rights organization. At that time there were no resources for women facing situations of violence, and no services for raped or trafficked women. Chanthol was the first Cambodian woman to create such an organization; impressive in a country run predominantly by foreign male led NGOs. The group operates in three provinces and has shelters that provide a place to live, food, literacy education, training, counselling, community training, reintegration and legal services. CWCC does policy advocacy, working closely with the government to create appropriate laws and also works in conjunction with local police. Part of their mandate is to help women out of the sex industry through rehabilitation and reintegration programs. This means that many of the women that CWCC is able to reach are given training for sewing and computers and then receive help to find jobs that can support them and their families. Some of the women are given start up grants for small businesses like restaurants and small shops.

The Cambodian Women’s Crisis Center is one of a kind in Cambodia. Chanthol says, “Most of the more well known NGOs in Cambodia are run by expatriates. There are very few prominent organizations run by local people. But I feel that in order to be an effective organization we need to be aware of the real needs of the targeted groups. Some international organizations come into the country and work without the cooperation of the local groups, and many of them fail. It would be best to work to help supplement each other. I started CWCC from a small group of people, but as we have grown we have asked for help from other organizations and countries.”

In this regard, CWCC is often groundbreaking and works within a framework designed for Cambodia’s specific context and needs. You can see in the faces and gestures of the CWCC staff that they respect and genuinely care for the young girls with whom they work.

The director of a women’s shelter run by CWCC, Keap Noun, tells us “Now, the problem facing poor children is their lack of education. If someone asks them to come work in the city they will go because their families need the money. Because the work is outside of the home, and not in the family, what they do is outside the eye of the family. The families don’t know what happens to their children and the children must stand by themselves. They must decide what is right or wrong for themselves.” CWCC is working to remedy this with prevention, in the form of local training and scholarships for at risk girls.

I thought that after seeing and experiencing Cambodia for myself I might be able to come to some sort of conclusions about the situations facing the country and its women. Having studied international development and women’s issues I hoped I might be able to apply my theoretical background to arrive at suggestions for an answer to the problems facing Cambodia. But I can’t – it feels too heavy handed and I’m too much of an outsider. Besides, and even more importantly, these women I’m writing about are doing the hardest, most important work - they are finding the incredible strength and courage to escape their situations and setting up new lives for themselves. They are defying a larger system meant to imprison them, one made up of corruption, economic desperation and so few options. What Cambodia doesn’t need is more foreign organizations imposing top down measures or outsiders prescribing solutions. Our support for their own initiatives might just be the most important thing we can give.

Arriving back in North America after this trip is a shock. I’m expected to start school and work immediately – to resume my “normal” life. But nothing feels pertinent, important or real, after what we’ve seen. I see university, my friends and myself and my life differently. The every day stuff feels frivolous and fellow students strike me as irresponsible, complacent and uncaring, because most don’t even know that these issues exist, and that they are affecting girls and women their own ages. Because they were born here, in a developed country, most will never even have to face or acknowledge what we saw on this trip. It makes me angry, but at the same time, I feel privileged to know a bigger piece of the world, and I also have a keener sense of responsibility. I’m impatient to keep on this path – to continue learning about these real issues, and attempting, in some way, to make a difference.

One day, after several months of being back in North America, I find myself reading half a years worth of back issues of The Cambodian Daily, an English newspaper that comes out of Phnom Penh and reports current events. Cambodia, from so far away, strikes me as lawless – totally chaotic. It would be easy to be sucked back into seeing this beautiful country as a place where only poverty, destruction and death exist, a Cambodia of “issues” that the media covers and theorists write about.

Only now I’m able to stop and remember my own experience of the place. That side of Cambodia is real, but so too is all of the joy and resilience that comes along with life – love, creation and the spirit to overcome. The photographs I have come home with of the faces and smiles of the women we’ve met will remind me that they will survive, and overcome - and succeed.