Last night I saw the prettiest lady boy. His eyes were dead. He danced at a karaoke bar on stage in front of mostly men. He dressed down to a G-string and nipple covers. His body looked like a woman’s to a tee. His eyes were distant. When he is finished he walks table to table allowing the men to rub him down. It’s hard not to be disgusted. It’s hard not to gawk.
Abby and Kassidy’s “Gawking faces.” 🙂 Pretty sure they hate that I shared this one.
There are bar girls sitting at our table. We are trying to build relationships with them but I know when they look at me all they see are money signs and a chance to not be taken advantage of. The girls compare their bodies to the lady boys. They grab their boobs and say that his are so perfect.
They point to the white woman from our team that are sitting around the table and say they are beautiful. They love the American’s noses. The girls at our table are wearing tiny red dresses but at least they are covered. They go to university Monday through Friday but Friday night through Saturday they are selling themselves.
Some of it is for the really good pay and another part due to culture.
We dance at the table and sing “BABY I’M WORTH IT”
as if we are home with our besties on a Friday night. We throw our hands up trying to portray that we are having a good time- or at least to distract the girls from the reality of the situation. In between the dance parties I look at one of the bar girls sitting across from me her face turns to stone. A table of men near by keep sending her shots, a sign that she has late night customers once we leave. The girls take shots and make faces at each other.
A drunken man keeps coming up to our table and interrupting us. Even the girls try not to make eye contact with him. It’s hard to love the men as much as we are trying to love these women.
Finally Thom our translator and friend from Samaritan Creations give us the signal that it is time to leave. She once danced at a bar and now sings at a church. We pay 2,800 baht to sit with the girls for about two hours (roughly 80 US dollars.) We hug the girls, invite them to coffee, get their contacts and suggest that we hang out on their off days.
I heard God in that bar.
As girls sat in what seemed to be a fish tank to be bought for the night and men spent their family’s hard earned monies.
I heard God say,
“They are my beloved.”
It was hard not to break down and weep.
It was hard not to hate those men.
The woman who are used and the men who objectify- all for what they think is love.
To love and to be loved, and the whole time God loves them.
God loves the men at the bars.
God loves the woman who are working them.
It is my prayer that God will use Samaritan Creations and other organizations that are here in Thailand to change the culture. It is my prayer that the woman from the bars will know that they are loved. I pray that the woman would experience HIS LOVE, TRUE LOVE.
Would you pray with me today? Would you pray for Thailand? Would you pray for the women who are trapped in the bars? Would you pray for the men who are swayed by lust and culture?
Would you pray that they would understand that they are HIS BELOVED.
YOU ARE LOVED.
<3
Ash
www.AshNicolOwens.com
