“We NEVER saw ourselves being missionaries.”
美佳之窗 His Window 88 (Oct - Dec 2019)
Text by Hannah
Hi, my name is Hannah and with me is my husband James. We’re both just your regular “kakak” and “abang” that you see on the streets of Malaysia. I was originally from Brunei and James is your fellow Malaysian who loves food of all sorts just like all the Malaysians I know. Just to give you a snip bit of our career background, I was once an English as a second language teacher and James was a management consultant.
In December 2015, I recall God started stirring something in both of our hearts ‘to go’ but we weren’t sure where or what we were meant to do. When 2016 came around the corner, the desire grew and we found ourselves looking into voluntary work overseas. Next thing you know, we were filtering through types of NGOs and the different causes they were fighting for. By 2017, we had a rough sketch of where God was leading us to go for the first half of the year, which entailed partnering with a mix of Christian and non-Christian organisations where we learned and grew.
It was during our time in Pemba, Mozambique in July 2017 that God placed “Asia” on our hearts. Since we were at Iris Global’s main base, we thought we’d reach out to the Cambodian base which was where we found ourselves serving end of 2017 through to 2019.
James and Hannah
What did we do?
Iris Cambodia is a Christian NGO based in Cambodia that fights against child sex trafficking and human trafficking.
We found ourselves co-leading a trafficking prevention team working at an urban slum in Phnom Penh, the country’s capital. The team comprised of a multicultural mix of locals and foreigners, which meant that there was never a dull moment. Each day provided plenty of opportunities for surprises, God-moments, learning and challenges (more on the challenges later).
Iris Cambodia family
Flooding
Teen Challenge
Situated in the midst of busy streets, expensive government buildings and fast, upscale development largely driven by Chinese investments, the urban slum we worked in had changed and shrunk a lot over the years. Yet, the very real risks of human trafficking loomed large. Risk factors such as poverty, an undereducated population, drugs, domestic violence, unsanitary living conditions made it a hotspot for traffickers. These risks factors interconnect in complex ways, which makes helping the community a challenging prospect.
Our team delivered the following projects:
Kids Day Centre: The team spends two days a week delivering educational programs to local kids to keep them away from danger. It is always fun and noisy and quickly becomes beautiful when God’s Presence shows up. We are always reminded of how much Our Father loves us and these little ones who are forgotten by the world.
Family Development: Social workers from our team build long-term, trusting relationships with local families and provide support where appropriate. We believe that when families are stronger, children are safer and communities become more secure.
Raising Education Levels: Parents with very real financial stress can struggle to see the long-term benefits of educated children. Our social workers convince parents about the importance of committing their children to school as we know educated kids are far better positioned for employment in the future, which reduces the likelihood of labour trafficking.
Kids centre & family ministry
Kids’ club teaching
Drug Rehabilitation Partnerships: Iris Cambodia partners with Teen Challenge, a world-renowned Christian NGO that works with addicted individuals. Our team builds trust with individuals who are addicted to drugs (especially if they are at-risk of being trafficked) to relocate them to a safer place and start their healing process.
Small business microloans: We identify opportunities to support individuals who want to start or grow microbusinesses to change their financial situation. So far, we have issued loans to drink sellers, at-home hair-dressers and fresh meat and vegetable
sellers in the community, some of whom are parents of our Day Centre children.
What challenges did we face?
Jesus asks us to drink of the cup of joy AND suffering. We found this to be so true in missions as we faced all sorts of challenges. We had to invest a lot of money and time in language learning and accept the fact that we sounded like little children to our Khmer friends; which is very humbling. Whenever we visited the community, we had to deal with searing heat, mosquitoes, lice, rubbish and dirty children climbing all over us. We clearly remember the times when we were robbed on our motorcycle, regularly drove through flash flooding, mourned the losses of team members far away from home and came face to face with our many inadequacies.
Yet our experience tells us that Jesus is more than enough. He never let us down, He was always close and He was always pursuing for an intimate relationship with us.
What next?
We have relocated back to Melbourne, Australia for the mean time and continue to support our NGO family in ways we can. Real people are at risk of being trafficked as you read this, which absolutely breaks the heart of God. This happens in Cambodia, Malaysia and even Australia.
We hope our story inspires you to understand it doesn’t take anyone special to make a difference. All it takes is ordinary people like you and us who are willing to partner with Jesus.
Visit the following websites if you want to learn more about:
- Iris Cambodia’s work and support it: www.iriscambodia.org
- Human trafficking and modern slavery: www.antislavery.org
- Tenaganita’s work in Malaysia and support it: www. tenaganita.net – you can call their hotline if you encounter signs of potential trafficking activity
