The girls that we rescue from the circuses are at risk of going from one form of exploitation to another. In the circuses the owners who buy them off the agents see them as being a mere commodity whose sole value is their exotic looks and performance in scant clothing that attracts less than discerning audiences. And I have written previously about the extremes of abuse that they have to endure within the circus. The trouble is that the families who sold them off are as predatory as the circuses and only tolerate their presence post-rescue if they can get some early financial return back off them. The girls are caught in the middle and to a certain extent, so are we as we try to help and rehabilitate them.
An illustration of this happened two evenings ago when a father of one of the girls who has been on our art workshop turned up at our premises and kicked up a very public rumpus. He began shouting about how his daughter, Laxmi, was old enough to work and why was she not earning money? After a bitter exchange with our local staff he left, taking the girl with him (the father’s say is final in Nepalese culture). Very sadly Laxmi had been the top student on the course and if the idiot had left her be she’d have been earning a great deal of money within a couple of months.
So often the decision-making of these parents is fuelled by alcohol abuse. It is the need for the money that supports their dependence that often inspires them to send the girls to the circus in the first place. And when they’re back they’d rather see them earn a pittance working in the fields if it pays for a bottle or two of cheap spirits.
It is very likely that this incident could be repeated in the near future as two other girls from Laxmi’s village are on the course and their fathers may well follow suit. We are sending our field workers to see if we can reason with the parents. At the same time we will now merge the training of the workshop with the pre-existing workplace of “Himalayan Mosaics” so that the trainee girls boost the training allowance that we had been paying with earnings based upon sales of mosaics. It is sobering to reflect that our decision has indirectly been prompted by a drunken parent.
