The Goble's back yard is a beautiful place to host a dessert.
The intimate setting felt as though just a a couple dozen close friends had gathered to enjoy a beautiful Northern California summer night, but the evening was about more than just socializing. It was a gathering to save a generation.
In Thailand children are being sold, coerced, and manipulated into sex slavery. For some it is the only way they know how to survive. An entire generation is at risk of being lost to the horror of sex tourism. The SOLD Project is working to end that. They have created a video to raise awareness, and a scholarship program for prevention. The students receiving these scholarships come from a village that the UN has reported as the highest trafficking source in Thailand. Education is the first step in giving these children more options.
So last night we gathered, many of us strangers, all of us supporters of the cause, to hear the vision of The SOLD Project's next steps. Rachel and Carrie shared with us the vision that has evolved since their most recent visit to Thailand.
Sadly education is not enough. Joyfully they are willing to do more. Their vision is exciting.
Over the next 5 years they want the project to transition into a fully Thai project- they want to work themselves out of a job, and empower the Thai people to run the project themselves.
They want to create an after school program, so the children have a place to study and play. Many of them come from terribly broken homes and they need a save place to spend their evenings once the school day has ended.
They want to create a mentoring program. Most of the adults in the village left school after grade 6. In order for these kids to see they can have more they need to spend time with adults that have completed school and vocational training.
They want to raise awareness for trafficking among the students who are most at risk of being trafficked. As children leave the village to go into the city to find work many of them have no idea the risk they are taking. They are going into the city so that they can support their families, and once their they find there are no jobs and prostitution becomes their only option.
They want to create a prevention model that can be duplicated though out all of Thailand. Most trafficking work focuses on the aftermath. Someone has to stop the tragedy from ever happening.
I want anyone reading this to help them. I am posting their link. Please donate, learn & pray, and re:act.
TheSOLDproject.com
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