Meet Nelly (story of trafficked vitim)

These are fictional, untold stories of different children around the world that share one thing in common, human trafficking.

Meet Nelly, the very definition of beautiful. Her almond shaped eyes and puffy cheeks were irresistible. Her mahogany skin was as smooth as it looked. And her little hands are as hard working as her little feet.This twelve year old carries two buckets of water, also known as jerries, to and fro. She is also quick on her feet when it is time for dinner or child care. She lugs in loads of dirty laundry and has clean pants, shirts and jackets available and dry within two hours. Anyone would like someone as beautiful and reliable around as Nelly.However, Nelly hates when she is needed by the soldier of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). At age 9, Nelly was snatched away from her tiny village in northern Uganda. Since then, she became a slave to the rebels, better yet, scoundrels of the LRA.In her village, Nelly would sing songs of birds chirping away in nearby trees and songs of cool breezes and laughter. Her brothers would run around her and scream with joy, as she whipped their legs with shirts from her mother’s laundry line.Nelly will never forget the night hen she awoke to her brothers screaming. The screams were those of something terrible and deafening, it could wake the deceased in the village graveyard! The LRA had come and were lighting fire to the villager’s meager huts and grabbing every child they could find. Nelly stood frozen as she watched her mother beat a child soldier to let go of her brother. Some blood even trickled from her mother’s strong fists. An older soldier approached behind Nelly’s mother and slammed a wooden club behind hr head. Her body simply slumped to the dusty floor and she lay there, motionless in her own pool of blood. Nelly’s brother was thrown into an rusted pick up. She was next. After what she had seen the brute of a man do to her mother, she didn’t even put up a fight.Now, Nelly was in the fight of her life. A girl I the midst of LRA men, is like a small cub surrounded by vultures. Both can’t get away and will be eaten alive! LRA men are taught that women are to be used for their own pleasure. And whenever they wanted, whether it be sex or food, their “wives” should give it.When Nelly was given to soldier on afternoon in the camp, she was told it was her beauty that blessed her. However, Nelly thought it was her beauty that cursed her.
She knew her new husband would be looking forward to night with Nelly. She came up with a solution. As long as you were seen as unattractive, you would not be called into a soldier’s bed chamber. With all the strength this girl could muster up, Nelly came upon a mound of jagged rocks and chose one of the sharpest. She looked around and miraculously no one was in sight! She crouched down, put the sharpest rock to her face and closed her eyes. With the speed of a rabbit, Nelly dug into that beautiful mahogany skin of hers. She bit her tongue, until she tasted blood, so she wouldn’t scream. Skin slowly fell away on her ragged shirt. Blood and tears ran down her swollen cheeks. When she couldn’t take her own skinning anymore, she let out a screech. Immediately, two soldiers appeared. She laid prostrate, face forward, to give the impression that she had slid on the rocks.A soldier pulled her up roughly, as if she wasn’t covered in blood. He grimaced in horror. “Ugh! Your beauty is gone now, you foolish girl. You could never please a man with such a hideous face!” he spat.Nelly’s face would never be the same. Those scars would last a lifetime. But for the first time in two years Nelly never felt better! And the soldier was right, her assigned husband was so displeased with the gashes in her face, he said she was not worthy of being touched. Hence she became his other wife’s servant. Nelly had lost so much. Her mother siblings, and community. Even her beauty, however she kept one thing little to no girls keep around the LRA -- her virginity.-Deborah Michel (thanks for your contribution

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