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After her parents kept writing Taew letters asking for more money, Taew relented and went back to work as a prostitute. Taew’s story is not an aberration. Women’s groups around the world have begun to mobilize against the international big business of prostitution. Such demonstrations are essential if the sex trade is to come to a halt. But they are not likely to succeed unless there are more profound changes, both in the presence of the U.S. military and in the export-oriented development strategies of Asian countries that depend on foreign exchange—at the expense of their most impoverished women. —Jill Gay has written and worked on issues of women’s rights and global health for more than two decades. Memoirs of a Normal Childhood Bonnie Urfer october 1986 I had a normal childhood. It was Wlled with violence and abuse. Most of it I don’t remember. Some things I will never forget. The Wrst time I was abused by a man I was six years old. His name was Elmer, and he managed the gas station next to our house. One summer day I walked over to visit him. He led me behind the counter, sat down on a chair, and lifted me onto his lap. I was scared, I was always scared. The Wrst thing I heard as I sat on Elmer’s lap was a zipper opening. He took my hand and led it behind me where I felt something soft, something very strange and wobbly and squishy. I remember trying to Wgure out what it was I was touching without looking. I didn’t know. Then as my hand was guided over the soft thing it began to get hard and large. I wanted to cry. I still didn’t know what it was. I didn’t know until I grew up and had an adult relationship with a man. But I never forgot that day at Elmer’s gas station and I never went back. Shortly after that episode Elmer took my brother on a trip with him. When I was eight years old I visited my cousins with my family. My aunt needed to be picked up from work about twenty miles away through backcountry roads. My cousin Tim was going to get her and asked if I’d ride along. I said yes. I was scared, I was always scared. We were somewhere on our way when he stopped the car and started fondling my body and kissing me. I was so angry, I Xew into the backseat where I kicked and kicked as hard as I could each time his hands came toward me. He Wnally stopped trying, told me I sure wasn’t part of the family, and drove on to pick up his mother. Urfer / Memoirs of a Normal Childhood 87 When I was eleven years old I went to the grocery store for my mother. When I got there I wandered up and down the aisles looking for the items ordered. On my way down one side aisle a man came toward me from the opposite direction. I didn’t look at him. I was scared, I was always scared. As he went by I thought I saw his penis out of his pants. I hurried by, not wanting to disappoint my mother by leaving the store without the supplies I was sent for. I went down the next aisle; so did he. And his penis was out of his pants. I ran out of the store and went home with nothing but tears running down my face. One warm day when I was thirteen my grandfather came to town to visit us. It was always a very special event and a big deal was made of his time in the city. We were preparing a picnic outside, so that’s where most people were, except for my mother, my grandfather, and me. My mother walked down the stairs and went outside. That left me and my grandfather. I was scared, I was always scared. He was standing close behind me when the door closed behind my mother. As soon as it slammed, his hand went down the front of my pants. In the next second the door opened, and as fast as his hand went in, it came out. I never let myself be alone in the same room with my grandfather again. I am only one person and these are only a...

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