Mien's Story

Svay Pak is a small village 11km outside of Phnom Penh. Essentially it is a collection of wooden houses and huts. But Svay Pak is overrun by pimps and human traffickers who pressure families into selling their children into the dozens of brothels that line the streets of the village.

Mien’s family was destitute, her father a violent jobless alcoholic. Just to put food on the table her mother regularly borrowed money from local loan sharks on unmanageable terms. Their financial situation was not a secret, and as pressure mounted, multiple pimps and brothel owners began pressuring Mien’s mother to sell her into the brothel to ensure the family’s survival. At first Mien’s mother resisted, but finally she succumbed. And at age 14, Mien’s virginity was put on auction at a local brothel about a block from her home.

On the Cambodian sex market an underage girl’s virginity can be sold to wealthy foreigners for anywhere between $500 and $5,000. Because of her “value” to the brothel owner, Mien and other young virgin girls were locked in a pink room of the brothel called the “virgin room” to prevent them from running away. Once a man was found willing to pay a high enough premium, Mien was raped for the first time. She was then allowed to return home but required to report back to the brothel on a moment’s notice. She had become a commodity.

From that first day forward, she was raped an average of three times a day. And she was “worth” less and less every day because, at age 14, she was no longer “new.” In 2003, just a few months after Mien was sold into the brothel, IJM conducted a large operation in the village of Svay. Sadly, because of the many lies the brothel keeper told her, Mien was very frightened when she saw the combined IJM/Police operation happening. She hid in the bushes. Mein watched as 37 other girls aged 5-17 were rescued that day. But she was left behind.

When the brothel was shut down, Mien’s family migrated to a town in the north called Siem Reap – where Mien was once again sold into sex slavery with seemingly no end in sight.

But Mien’s story does not end here.

Miraculously, three years later, at the request of the Siem Reap police, an IJM undercover investigator entered a local brothel looking for minors and among 20 other girls, the investigator discovered Mien looking destitute and sad. In January of 2007, IJM and the Siem Reap police conducted an operation in this brothel. Mien was rescued and brought to Agape Restoration Center back in Phnom Penh. It took time, but Mien eventually learned that she was finally safe.

After significant care and trauma therapy, Mien, along with 8 other victims, was actually able to testify against those who had perpetrated these crimes against her. Because she was able to tell the truth about what had been done to her, all five perpetrators were convicted and sent to prison. Results such as this send a clear message to other traffickers in the area that the trafficking and exploitation of young girls will not be tolerated and those who do it will be held to account.

At AGAPE, Mien says, “My life went from bad to good.” She resumed her education and enrolled in a vocational training program to learn to become a tailor. Mien now works part-time in a successful tailoring business, thus offering her a legitimate income and the chance to be successful, independent and free. She also works at the aftercare home’s SilkWorks Vocational Centre, which employs former trafficking victims and produces beautiful silk pillow covers.

Today, Mien is a remarkable woman who has since got married.

The story does not end here, either.

About the same time Mien was rescued, Agape decided to open an Outreach Center in Svay Pak – the village where Mien grew up and was sold to the first brothel. 

As a site for the center, Agape rented one of the former brothels that had been shut down in IJM’s 2003 operation. It turned out to be the very same brothel where Mien was first raped.

This center now holds classes for children, a health clinic, Sunday services and other community services with the goal of completely transforming the community of Svay Pak – a place that was once a scene of horror, slavery and the most unspeakable crimes against children.

The main thoroughfare of Svay Pak used to be jammed with brothels in which hundreds of young girls were on open sale to sex tourists and foreign paedophiles.  But today there are no more brothels lining the village’s main street.  Now, there are outreach centers; once a place of abuse and exploitation, today the area is a beacon of hope.

And now, three years after her rescue, Mien volunteers at the center, sharing her story with other children at risk in the village of Svay Pak. Here’s what she says:

My first time there, when the car stopped, I felt so scared to get out. But when I did get out it was good. Everything has changed. Before when I was here I was forced to be a prostitute, now when I teach the children I feel like I am staff. I am proud of this.