Precious Women

Jun. 30, 2008 Newsletter by Tara C. Alverson

‘Precious Women’ is one of the newest programs added<br /> to the International Care Ministries in Dumaguete City, Negros<br /> Oriental . It’s designed to reach out to those women in the surrounding<br /> community who have been subjected into prostitution.<br /> ICM has been running this program in other areas around the<br /> Philippines since it’s induction over 15 years ago. Once a week<br /> they hold a bible study and give out 4 kg of rice to each recipient<br /> of Precious Women.<br /> Sol, the staff member in charge of the Precious Women’s<br /> program goes out and visits with each woman regularly. 27<br /> women in prostitution have joined the outreach program. After<br /> one year the women will be assessed and if they choose they<br /> can apply for the micro-loan program through the ICM. It’s<br /> designed to help the women who want out of prostitution find an<br /> alternative livelihood. The ICM will fund any necessary training<br /> and education for them to succeed. Every year the ministry<br /> goes out and finds a new group of 25 women in each area for the<br /> outreach. ‘It’s a blessing to have 27 women, but the ICM unfortunately<br /> only has funding for 25 in each area.’ Sol informed me<br /> of the problem that she was facing with the new ministry she<br /> had helped start. She asked me, ‘How do I turn the two women<br /> away?’<br /> Each week 4 kg of rice is distributed to each precious<br /> women’s recipient. 4 kg of rice cost roughly 158 pesos ($3.75<br /> US). This is meant to last the recipient and their small family<br /> for a week of meals. One month for one recipient cost 632<br /> pesos ($15.00 US). One year, 7,584 pesos ($180.00 US). The<br /> supplement feeding helps the woman and their families with a<br /> small part of the cost of living. It’s a simple way to encourage<br /> and allow them to look elsewhere for a source of livelihood. If<br /> you would like to donate to this cause you can either go to the<br /> ICM website and make your donation specific to the Dumaguete<br /> ICM, Precious Women’s Program, at www.caremin.com, or you<br /> can contact me via email and I can provide you the information<br /> necessary.<br /> My family has donated toys and children’s clothing<br /> which has been distributed at the precious women’s program.<br /> Any type of support means so much. One of the women is not<br /> yet 30 and just gave birth to her 8th child a few days ago. She<br /> informed Sol that she started prostitution when she was 14<br /> years old. It seems so young but most women are introduced<br /> into prostitution at a very young age. The woman’s oldest<br /> daughter who is 13 has also begun prostituting herself. Nearly<br /> all the women subjected to prostitution come from very poor<br /> families, broken homes, and for one reason or another they<br /> were not able to attend public school. The government requires<br /> that all children be able to read and write before they are accepted<br /> into public schools, but if the family is poor and uneducated<br /> they may not have the time nor the resources to help their<br /> children. Some of the young women already have sick parents<br /> to take care of and younger siblings that are in their debt. Going<br /> into prostitution is often a choice that a young woman makes<br /> not for her own benefit, but for her family, and for her children’s<br /> welfare. Sol tells me that most of the women she talked<br /> to were neglected and sexually abused by family members<br /> when they were very young.<br /> Sex tourism is a huge part of the economy in the Philippines.<br /> You don’t have to walk down the streets very far to see<br /> it. I was in Manila a few weeks ago and I talked to a man in the<br /> hotel lobby where I was staying. He was from Arkansas, maybe<br /> 35. (We’ll call him John) John told me he was waiting for a<br /> girl, who was a prostitute. He alike many of the foriegners that<br /> come to the Philippines for the sex tourism travel to the different<br /> islands. ‘I guess I’m kind of wandering around, trying to<br /> find why I’m alive.’ He actually sad that, and I asked him why<br /> he came to Manila to find out why he was alive, he laughed.<br /> ‘Some of the guys I travel with are really abusive to the girls,<br /> ...they yell at them, push them around.’ Most the women in<br /> prostitution are treated as if they have no human rights, slapped<br /> around, beaten, raped and forced into other extreme acts of violence.<br /> It’s sick, but that’s how it works in the bigger cities like<br /> Manila. The economy here is dependant on sex tourism. It’s<br /> illegal, make no mistake. But the government turns a blind eye,<br /> just as long as they and their officials get paid off, all is favorable.<br /> It’s monstrous how corrupt the Philippines Government is,<br /> especially when it comes to the rights of it’s own people.

I helped the ICM survey the women in prostitution from<br /> around Dumaguete City. The first question was, ‘What is your<br /> occupation?’ I got flustered, thinking can I ask one of the girls<br /> that? But all the ladies answered, ‘waitress’, which confused me.<br /> I later found out from Sol that most the women work as waitresses<br /> in the bars around town that support the act of prostitution.<br /> The bar manager is the one who sets up the ‘date’ and is paid a<br /> flat some, usually about 500 pesos ($10 US). The woman who<br /> is referred to as the prostitute gets only 20% of that, being 100<br /> pesos (A little over 2 bucks). Talk about a crime! If a woman has<br /> three children to feed at home she would need to have at least<br /> two or three customers a night to be able to feed and support her<br /> family for one day. I can’t imagine the physical and emotional<br /> warfare it must conflict on a persons psyche.<br /> Poverty and lack of education is a real problem to the<br /> physical and mental health of people living in poor communities.<br /> Here, poverty is the real reason why women go into prostitution,<br /> whether lead by their family or themselves to make money.<br /> It must be hard to subject yourself to that kind of degradation<br /> everyday. That kind of humiliation seems to have taken a tole on<br /> the women. You can see it especially on the faces of the older<br /> generations who lived an entire life of prostitution. One woman I<br /> talked to in the Cebu Center had been beaten and raped repeatedly<br /> by her ‘customers’, forcing her to do things no woman should<br /> ever have to suffer. And most the women have mixed feelings<br /> about foreigner’s that come for the sex tourism. Sure they have<br /> more money but often times they are the ones that are most abusive.<br /> In my Lonely Plant, Philippines guide book the authors<br /> talks about the sex tourism, putting the number of sex workers<br /> in the Philippines up to 400,000 in 2006, and over 20% of that<br /> number being children. Pedophilia sex tourism is a reality here in<br /> the Philippines. It happens. ‘There’s big money to be made in pedophilia,<br /> ...Despite strict laws, the number of foreigners charged<br /> and convicted for child sex crimes in the Philippines is so low as<br /> to be an encouragement to foreign pedophiles.’ - Lonely Planet,<br /> Philippines. I’ve seen some of the older men staring at the young<br /> girls, I’ve been right their when they go up and start talking to<br /> them. I hate the idea that I can’t do anything, but there’s a hot<br /> line called, End Child Prostitution in Asia Tourism, www.ecpat.<br /> net. I’ve visited it a few times.<br /> It’s horrible to think of children being the crime of such<br /> a hennas act. And no one says a thing against it. A sense of false<br /> pride, or a sense of what is called ‘Hiya ‘ in the Philippines prevents<br /> the people from speaking out. I think also they are afraid.<br /> Not many Filipino’s have a reason to trust their government to<br /> uphold justice, and those that have spoken out against such corruption<br /> have been made martyrs.<br /> Sex tourism is destructive at every level. From the<br /> women subjected into prostitution to their children, all the way<br /> up to the government. I don’t see the global problem of sex<br /> tourism going away anytime soon. Not with pedophiles and sex<br /> addicts fleeing to other 3rd world countries to find cheap ways<br /> of pleasuring themselves. Honestly, it pisses me off! Where are<br /> detectives, Benson and Stabler when you need them most?<br /> Despite the madness, the ICM continues to reach out on<br /> a local level to each recipient. I think it’s the practical manner<br /> of how they go about it that really makes a difference. Maybe<br /> only 5 or 7 of the 25 women in the program decide to find<br /> alternate livelihoods. But what a positive impact that has on<br /> those women and their families. This program means something<br /> to the community. The 27 women in the Precious Women’s<br /> Program here in Dumaguete tell me that just by coming<br /> once a week on Fridays, at 3:30pm for the bible study, encouragement,<br /> and rice. I think Sol is doing a great job reaching out<br /> to the women in the community.<br /> - - - - - - - - - -<br /> We are going to take the orphan’s dolphin watching<br /> in the coming week, depending on weather. They are very<br /> excited. Lot Lot, the young girl with cerebral palsy says she’s<br /> excited, but tells me, ‘I like snakes more then dolphins.’<br /> I plan to travel to Manila in the next week or so to pick<br /> up my camera in the repair shop. I might go further north to<br /> Zambales (Near Mt. Pinatubo), where ICM has relations with a<br /> family that makes regular medical visits up the mountain to the<br /> remote tribal areas. It should be a good trip.<br /> I have bad news about little Blazela who lived on Paradise<br /> Island, Under The Bridge, of Cebu. She passed away last<br /> Monday, the 23rd of June. The complications from the hole in<br /> her heart were too much. She was 1 year old. The money you<br /> donated for her medicine kept her in the hospital more then 40<br /> days. I haven’t seen her family since. I’m sure they are struggling<br /> to cope with the loss. It’s tragic. I hope I can remember<br /> her as long as I can, she really made a difference in my life.<br /> You may have heard about the typhoon that passed<br /> over the Philippines last week, killing over 300 people, not<br /> including the 800 plus, still, ‘missing’ from the ship ‘Princess<br /> of the stars.’ It shouldn’t had left it’s port in Cebu, as half way<br /> through it’s journey to Manila it was capsized by the pounding<br /> waves of the storm. Unreported pesticides and chemicals carried<br /> in the cargo hold held back the rescue efforts. I wouldn’t<br /> be surprised if the government had something to do with it.<br /> The ferry boats here are really old and not always the most seaworthy.<br /> The typhoon left it’s wake. Their is still some flooding<br /> in some of the northwestern places in the Philippines, like<br /> Bacolod and Iliolo. Dumaguete was not hard hit at all.<br /> Earlier this month I helped design shirts, trophies and<br /> paint the backdrop for the ICM’s Grand Touch Point. It’s a performance<br /> and worship contest between the recipient churches<br /> for the entire Negros Oriental Province. The theme this year<br /> was ‘Lord of Blessings.’ It was fun. I hope you enjoy some<br /> pictures I have taken in the past months on Cebu, Bohol and<br /> Negros Oriental. I hope to have new ones for you when I get<br /> my camera back.<br /> I have three months to go. I’m still painting and planning<br /> on drinking a huge glass of whole milk when I get home<br /> and then taking a really long shower. Thanks again for the support.<br /> Pagpipinta Sa Pulo : Precious Women<br /> Tara C. Alverson / T.C. Artworks<br /> June 30, 2008

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pagpipinta sa pulo Newsletter © 2008 Tara C. Alverson. Reprinted with permission.