I Moved Four Years Ago

It's been an incredible four years! Enjoy a brief recap of my journey so far (highlights - no lowlights in this one)...represented through photos (the transformations especially of B&L):

June 2014 - My last class of students bid me farewell (and this didn't go without tears)

YEAR ONE - 

I moved into the girls home, sharing a room and bunkbed with the house sister, Titi. I had to get used to cockroaches, mice, and beans and rice (but I didn't complain about the beans - the way Gogo cooked them made me enjoy eating them for every meal!). Also at end of that year, Baby boy was supposed to be put up for adoption or moved to an orphanage, but we fought for him. And we got to keep him. He is still our only man of the house. :)

[Note: This move was only made possible by two women who went before me --Christina Venerick and Sandy Gallardo, our first and lone volunteers who had to do the impossible for an entire year without support. Truly, they are the missionary heroes. Hosea's Heart would not exist today without them. ] 

July 2014 - Hello new home!

Full House - First year with Kiley, Rachel, and Gogo Martha.
The year would not have been successful without Kiley and Rachel,
not just serving Hosea's Heart, but becoming two incredible friends -
as loyal and selfless as Ruth to Naomi. <3 td="">

But I got to keep a little bit of La Crescent with me -
Ally, one of my first students and the first to join me in Swazi!

And even got to have a piece of HOME with my new home -
My sister/"twin" lead the missions team that summer

Lucia and Benny (2 and 1 yr old)

Cutie and Chunker

Little stinker peaking at her baby bro (probably teasing)

Chunker just chillin and enjoying being center
of all girl's attention

YEAR TWO 

After some disagreements on how to treat the girls and run the home, we split ways with our partner organization. At first they had demanded I move out of the house and they would take over the operations of the girls home. We had to comply - with tears and fear, but God fought for us. A new director took over the partner organization and asked us to take the girls home back! I had already moved out, but it ended up being healthiest for me anyway, as my heart had its share of bumps and bruises. I moved out into a house with another missionary friend but maintained daily commitments at the girls home. And I took on the mothering duties for Ben and Lu fulltime. 

July 2015

Paralleling last summer, my second student joined the mission!
Rachel Schuster took on this adventure to bless my heart
with connections from back home. Afterall, it was my first year
not teaching, and I missed my kids immensely.

And sisi wami led our missions team for her second summer!
Rachel, Rachel, Sarah, Jenna (missionary onsite), and Laura

ALSO, paralleling last summer, this time
it was my brother Garret who brought home with
him - and his friend Tony - to bless us girls!

Rachel Palmberg braved the unknown by signing up to be
our intern (and even extended for a second year!) 

We are also blessed to have two volunteers from the UK
 for the whole year! Thank you Ali and Tara! 

Lu and Ben now 3 and 2 years old

Beautiful family 

YEAR THREE

I moved for the third time to a beautiful house on the campus of African Christian College, where I was teaching English to first year students. This was by far my favorite place to live, especially because there was a playground for Benji and Lucia. This is the year we (Hosea's Heart) were recognized as an official home through the social welfare department, which also meant strict regulations we had to meet. The Director of Social Welfare told us we had six months to move out of our current rental house because he said it was necessary to own our own land/housing. Furthermore, the social workers had previously begged us to build more homes because there were numerous girls needing placement with us, but we had been full - basically within five months from initially opening. We tried many options to buy an existing house, find affordable land, etc. but came up empty. Until... we found our promised land - 7.5 acres of freedom and hope waiting for our feet to touch it. However, it took long into year four to make the dream come true. 

July 2016 - I think you'll notice some patterns :) 

AND for the THIRD summer, I was blessed with one of my students!
Liesl came on the mission team and came again J-term -
and is coming to volunteer long term after she graduates!)
I've now had THREE students! All from my first class -
La Crescent Class of 2015 <3 td="">

Full family! We were blessed with incredible new interns:
Lora (and Adam), Alyssa, and Brittine! God chose them for a very
important year in growing our ministry into a homeschooling success!

Just mama and her girls :) 

Ben and Lu now 3 and 4 years old!

They were not in my mission plan. But when has my
life ever actually gone according to plan? Thank God
for His way and not mine. They are now two of the greatest
surprises and blessings I could ever receive. I am humbled
always in this journey of being Mom.

Baby J added to our family mix! He stays
with his awesome grandma on his dad's side full time,
but we come get him for outings and family fun.

YEAR FOUR 

I moved for the fourth time. Yes, fourth time. Yes, it was annoying, unwanted but necessary. (I cannot wait until year five when I get to tell you that I've moved for the fifth but last time to the staff house on our new campus!) I moved to a flat (their name for apartments) in the middle of Manzini. My first daughter was living with me and her kids full time (she had been for a couple months while we were living at ACC), and it was amazing. Unfortunately, the flat was near a bar and the streets she came from, so every weekend she could hardly sleep from all the music and temptations calling her back to her old life. The move to the flat was hard for both of us but even harder when she ran away again. We are praying that year five brings her back again. 

For the ministry, we bought our promised, got our title deed, cleared the thorny-forest that it was, and began building our new homes! We are currently at 56% funded/finished of phase one! How incredible! Other amazing things happened that year, too: Ayanda got accepted to Viterbo University and moved across the ocean to attend university full time to pursue her dreams of "Being a Voice for the Voiceless" through her social work major. I watched my first class of COLLEGE students graduate, we had a successful basketball season and they even awarded me MVP of the women's league, I had a much needed great family reunion when I visited home. Truly 2017 was one of the best years yet. 

July 2017 

We were blessed with intern Erin for several months and Brittine
decided to come back for year two of serving with H<3 td="">

Missions team lead by Board rep, Rachael, (whose husband joined us later)
came for J-term! All returning volunteers, isn't that amazing?
And they brought with them our next yearlong intern, Danielle! (Who
is also considering extending for a second year!)

Ayanda arrived to America! She had a thrilling
plane ride and loved the Wisconsin corn fields.
I introduced her to all my favorites, of course my
first stop was Culvers. :)

The only females of my first class of 21 at
African Christian College. 

Our team, Superladies, getting hyped up by incredible Coach, Andile!

My fam :) 

My real fam! Sibs and nephews and niece. <3 td="">

OUR PROMISED LAND, and our campus plan

Man of the land... keeping watch as house #1 is finished!

Lucia and Ben, 5 and 4 years

School mates! Now 6 and 5 

Sometimes they love each other

*Be a part of my year five! Join the journey! It is still just beginning... :D

<3 beginning...="" is="" nbsp="" p="" still="" the="" this="">

Suffocating for Freedom

As we rounded the corner, I took in a sharp breath. My chest suddenly felt suffocated like a heavy blanket had been thrown over my face. This time, it wasn’t from the shock of the humidity. For, when I had left Swaziland, it was “winter” but when I arrived in Thailand, I was hit with the heavy air of humidity. This time, though, it wasn’t the humidity that felt heavy. It was something else.

When I walked those same streets earlier that day, everything was quiet, calm, with not a hint of evil. But now, tonight, it was like walking into a completely different realm.

The red light district. Indeed, it is its own dark world.

Before I saw anything, I felt it. The dark wolf-skin blanket hovering over the strip of clubs. My chest felt like it was being pressed upon, and my spiritual senses set off alarms. I was walking into a battlefield masked by music, loud laughter, curtains, and carts and carts of items being sold. All that to mask the BODIES being sold and the SOULS being bound.

I saw with my eyes, but I tried not to see. All it took was one – to make my heart come undone.

Our eyes met for maybe a millisecond. I had looked in the open doors as we continued walking through street, but when I met her eyes, I wished I hadn’t. She was one of at least a dozen women standing on a stage. She was holding a pole as if it was her life support, as if nothing else and no one else would hold her up. She and the other dozen women were wearing ironically white bikinis. But the only thing pure about the scene was the pure cry for help hidden beneath their eyes. That I could see – clear as water droplets in the midst of a storm – their hearts suffocating for freedom.

There’s a scene in Taken where the daughter is the last “item” up for bid, and as she’s “unveiled,” she wobbles around and looks as if she’s a zombie – like she’s not even in her own body. Multiply that by a dozen women is what it looked like on that stage. They were zombie-like, lifeless, wobbling, empty.

A once undercover investigator who was a part of busting brothels and sex-trafficking businesses said, “Sexual abuse is perhaps the very worst crime against humanity…It strips them of their heart and soul. It murders the person, but leaves their bodies alive” (Daniel Walker, God in a Brothel). “They appear to be in a trance, or under a dark magician’s spell,” he explained.

That’s exactly what I saw that night and that’s exactly what I see in the eyes of women on the streets in Swaziland, too. Each place might look different, each country, region, street/club masked by different “reasons,” but the heart of the issue is the same everywhere.  

Sex-trafficking - and the sick idea that buying someone, even for a few minutes, an hour, or a night - is a world-wide problem, a globally operating network of corruption, lust, greed, and dehumanization. African women as far south as Zambia were found trafficked to Bangkok, Thailand where I had visited. Luckily for a few, they are discovered, rescued, and even able to be transferred back to their home country. But “rescue” is not enough. Freedom is not just physical, it is psychological, emotional, spiritual. There must be a holistic approach to rescue/restoration, and the fight to end sex-trafficking as a whole. Thankfully, there is hope!

Rescue: Freedom International is an organization that exists to partner with and connect organizations worldwide who are fighting sex-trafficking. We have been so blessed that they chose us, Hosea’s Heart, as one of their partners! We are so eager to continue broadening and expanding our own efforts in Swaziland to impact the global anti sex-trafficking network as a whole. And the best news yet? YOU can be part of this global initiative, this global fight, as we celebrate Freedom Week starting July 1st!

Since sex-trafficking is an ORGANIZED, well-connected corrupted business world-wide (connecting country to country), we MUST then be a well-connected incorruptible world-wide network (connecting country to country, org to org, person to person) in order to fight it.

To end the network, we must BECOME the network.

Don’t wait. Whether it’s through your time, talent, or donation, please join us now.

www.hoseasheart.org

Our network of abolitionists through Rescue: Freedom International

Cold as a Courtroom

            My body is pulsing with slight shivers, and I curl my toes to bring heat back to my iced feet. It’s Swaziland, so it can’t be that cold, right? But the wooden courtroom bench beneath me is stony and the air above feels as if the sun hasn’t shone in weeks. For her, it must feel like years. She stands like a statue, her hands clenched behind her back while I sit and stare at the defense attorney who has been questioning her for over an hour and a half already.

            I can’t tell if my stomach is quivering because it’s cold or because it’s keeping me from standing up and punching him.

            “I put it to you, _________” he says her name as if he knows her, and it feels like nails on a chalkboard. “You are lying. Tell us, when did you become such a promiscuous girl and wayward child? You were having a relationship with __________ and tried to hide it by blaming the accused.”

            “I don’t know anything of that. What I know is he raped me,” she responded, her voice cracking like icicles melting.

            She was eleven years old during the time that this occurred. And this defense attorney is telling her she was promiscuous and wayward and willingly having a relationship with an old man – and to cover it up, she made up a story about the accused who sits there soaking up this moment of watching her squirm.

            “Why didn’t you report it right away? Why did you wait three years to report it?”

            “Because he threatened to kill me.”

            “No, I put it to you, __________, that you didn’t report it for three years because it never happened. You reported it to get on better graces with your grandma who didn’t like the accused.”

            “I don’t know anything of that. I know that he threatened to kill me,” she repeats.

           

            It went on like this for two straight hours. She stood for TWO hours as this attorney spat pointed questions – no, not even questions! Half of his approach was telling her things, making statements and then saying, “What do you have to say about that?”

            There was a point where he kept mentioning things like, “If you were really traumatized, you would have reported… or You wouldn’t have gone back to him when he called you… or You wouldn’t have listened to so-called threats…etc.  I wanted to yell at him that he was simply making a fool of himself by clearly knowing NOTHING about trauma.

            Ooh, he was horrifically good at his job. So much so that I can’t picture him sleeping that night, recounting the abusive comments he spat out at a victim while defending so relentlessly the perpetrator.

           

            He actually came to confront me at the end, though. It was about a letter of complaint that I had submitted to the Ministry of Justice about him and his “convenient” lack of appearance for the past SEVEN court attempts. Over the past FIVE YEARS, the case has been in existence, and the defense attorney never showed up once. So the case was always postponed. Thanks to the advice from some local Swazis, I followed their steps and submitted a letter of complaint to the correct offices. The authorities were quite upset and moved by the complaint and carried out their investigation. I don’t know what he – the defense attorney – was told, but he had serious pressure breathing down his back. And he came to confront me about the letter, claiming it was pointed and unfair.

            I simply repeated, “No, sir, what’s UNFAIR is this girl having to tell her story SEVEN times over and over, to be traumatized, exposed to her perpetrator, and undefended in a place where justice is supposed to reign. Not excuses from the defense attorney to not show up.”

            “But, they were good excuses…”

            He continued talking and I couldn’t help but scoff. He said something like, let’s all focus on her and how to finish this case, and I said that’s exactly what the letter is for. While he still tried intimidating us that the letter could cause problems, I stood unmoved by his pity party. And I gloried in the fact that someone in authority had clearly warned him something severe. He ended by saying although the letter was unfair and blah blah blah, he respected me for taking the right steps and not taking it to the media. Again…thinking only of himself.   

            Meanwhile, the girl whose trial it stood there while he and I bantered back and forth until he left after his last comment. When I left, I asked her what she thought of this whole process and me personally getting involved. Did she think I was overstepping anything? She had read through and approved my letter of complaint, but she was so silent that day, I couldn’t tell if she was bothered more or not. She wrote me a letter the next day entitled: To my Wonder Woman:

            “How blessed I am to have someone to call her mother. Educated people say a true mother fights for her child…Thank you for choosing me and for making sure my case proceeds, really my case was not going to proceed without you. The letter you wrote was perfect. In the end, whether he is found guilty or not, I don’t’ care for he knows the truth deep within his heard, which is the one that will set him free. You stood for the forgotten, least and the last, and by doing so you brought peace, joy, and freedom in my heart. You are my hero, Mom.”  

           

The case still has a long ways to go. At least she is done with her part. The witnessed will be called to stand next month. And then the defense still has his part after that. I don't know when this case will be concluded, but I am now reassured that at least she feels fought for - not just by me, but by those in authority in this country. We are deeply grateful for the positive feedback from the Ministry of Justice and the DPP. <3 p="">