Author: Michael Brosowski

The news from Blue Dragon last week was of both triumph and heartbreak.

After weeks of nail-biting planning and preparing, several rescue operations came to completion.

Most of the people we rescued had been enslaved in forced online scamming. These are compounds in Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos where people are forced, under threat of beatings and torture, to trick people out of their life savings using fake websites, phone messages and social media.

One of our rescues involved bringing home a 17-year-old girl from a brothel in Myanmar. She was held captive there for three years.

You can imagine the horrors she has been through.

Once each person is safe, Blue Dragon has lawyers to represent them, psychologists to provide trauma counseling and social workers to help them start over.

And while these operations were taking place, something equally transformative—but vastly different—was happening elsewhere.

Field trip

Thirteen kids from Blue Dragon traveled to Singapore to spend the week on a cultural and educational exchange. They were accompanied by staff and some of our alumni who went to support them.

The teens visited tourist sites, stayed in wonderful accommodation (thank you, Holiday Inn Express Suites Novena!), and spent time in the homes of families who live in Singapore.

The trip was funded by United World College SEA, whose students and teachers worked for a year to raise this money.

For all of the kids, this was their first time traveling abroad, staying in hotels, or even imagining a life outside Vietnam.

Seeing their awe at Singapore’s bustling streets and performing in front of an audience was a reminder of how far they’ve come—and how much potential lies within them.

Apart from having a great time, the Blue Dragon kids and the United World College students worked together to put on a grand performance at the end of the week.

Different worlds?

Moving from life-and-death rescue operations to cultural experiences in another country might seem worlds apart.

But Blue Dragon wants kids to hope for more than mere survival.

When we get kids off the street, or bring them home from slavery, we want them to have the world at their feet.

To have dreams and see what’s possible beyond their own horizon.

To live a life that they love, not one that’s simply free of extreme hardship.

We’ve been fortunate to have the chance to take kids to Singapore for some years. So we’ve seen the impact that experiences like these have on young people as they grow up.

What we find is that kids who are exposed to new possibilities are much more likely to pursue an education and a career.

Some even go on to study abroad, and many end up in jobs they would never have thought possible just a few years earlier.

These different parts of our work aren’t worlds apart at all. They’re simply different points on the spectrum of ending disadvantage and transforming lives.

The 13 kids have returned to Vietnam, exhausted from an intense week and buzzing with delight.

Their eyes have been opened to something they never imagined. They’ve made new friends and performed in public.

And most importantly: They’ve shown themselves that they are more than ‘survivors’.

They were offered a chance to shine. They took the opportunity. And they succeeded.

Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation is on a mission to end human trafficking.

This week, I spoke on two webinars about Blue Dragon’s 20-year journey.

We started out as a handful of volunteers teaching English to street kids in Hanoi.

Today we’re working around Vietnam preventing human trafficking. We’ve led law reform initiatives, put thousands of children through school, and have rescued almost 1,700 people from slavery. So far!

During a webinar, someone asked: In our work, how do we build trust with the kids we’re helping?

An excellent question, because trust isn’t assumed. Blue Dragon’s 20 years of experience means nothing to a child we meet sleeping under a bridge, or a teenage girl locked into a brothel.

The people we meet in these crisis situations have been abused and neglected. They might not trust anyone, let alone a stranger from an organisation they’ve never encountered.

But we can’t help if the person doesn’t trust us. So how do we do it?

Playing games

Back when we were starting up as a charity, we had a handful of brilliant supporters… as well as plenty of critics.

Some people assumed our work either wasn’t important or wouldn’t last long. That we’d soon discover how difficult the work was and give up.

As we continued to grow and become established, I remember one person, vastly more experienced than me, telling me that Blue Dragon’s work was useless. (To her credit, she told me this to my face).

We were doing “worthless things,” she told me. Just playing games with kids. There was no real benefit to our work.

No strings attached

One of Blue Dragon’s key activities at that time – and still today – was weekend football for street kids.

And yes, a lot of our effort went into social activities like a drumming circle and art classes.

Much of our time was spent simply getting to know kids, meeting with them, listening to them. We did all of this with no expectation or obligation.

It was up to the kids to decide whether they wanted to go back to school or continue on the streets and our care for them had no strings attached.

The purpose of all these “worthless things”? We were building trust.

Today, as we reach thousands of children and families around the country, we continue to work by the same principle.

Trust must come first and it must be earned.

Whether it’s the rescue of someone from slavery or meeting a child on the street, the decision to receive our help is theirs.

For them to make that decision, they need to know us. Not our web profile or what awards we’ve won. They need to know our character. Our heart.

Down in the dirt

That’s why Blue Dragon staff can be found sitting by the side of the road chatting to a family. Or taking a group of kids to play games and have a meal.

It’s why our anti-trafficking initiatives in rural areas typically begin by helping communities to meet the needs that they identify: a bridge to cross a stream, or a water filter system for the local school.

All of these activities meet a local need and at the same time build trust with people and communities.

That trust gives us the stepping stones to then make sustainable, transformative change.

When kids know they can trust us, we can help them rebuild family connections and get back to school.

When communities see that we really do have their best interests at heart, they will work with us to keep human traffickers out of their village.

It all begins with trust.

And nothing could be more valuable.

Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation is on a mission to end human trafficking.

Thuy’s story

When she crossed the border back to Vietnam, Thuy’s first words were: “I never thought I’d survive.”

She ventured out from home at age 28, leaving her 3-year-old son in the care of her mother and extended family.

All she wanted was the dignity of a job. To earn money for her child and parents. To have a better life.

But Thuy was tricked by people online who had gained her trust.

Instead of securing a job in a restaurant, she was trafficked to Myanmar and sold to a brothel.

The many months that she was enslaved there are a story too terrifying to tell. Trapped in a war zone, separated from her family and used as a disposable object, Thuy was sure she would die before she could ever get home.

It was almost two years before Thuy found a way to call for help. Blue Dragon organised a rescue operation and brought her home.

Even though she was free from her captors, the journey from northern Myanmar to Vietnam was frightening and tense.

Only her hope of seeing her son kept her going. And now they are back together.

Tuan’s story

Tuan was deceived with similar tactics: an online connection that seemed completely authentic.

Until the moment he was overcome with force and locked into a compound.

Tuan traveled to Cambodia in search of work.

He did his research beforehand, talking to friends and scouring the internet. He believed he knew the risks and was confident no harm would come to him.

So when he realised he had been tricked and was being forced to work in captivity, his initial reaction was to demand his freedom.

Tuan was beaten and tortured into submission, then put to work in an online scamming operation. It was more than a year before he could get word to Blue Dragon, who got him out and back to his family within a few weeks.

The chapters to come

Even though I’ve been involved in rescue operations like these for many years, I still can’t comprehend the trauma that Thuy and Tuan are living with now.

Both put their trust in others. They went in search of employment, believing they were doing the right thing.

Their choice to leave home and travel for work was not easy and their decision was not made lightly.

So the betrayal that they experienced, and then the violence they endured month after month, left them feeling helpless and weak. And guilty.

Neither Thuy nor Tuan did anything wrong. But one of the great tricks of human traffickers is to make their victims feel like it was their own fault.

On top of the physical pain of torture and the loss of freedom, they live now with doubts about their self worth. And the question that will always haunt them: Why did this happen to them?

The toll of human trafficking is a lifetime of regret, guilt and pain.

Thuy and Tuan have a chance to start over but will need help for many months and years to come.

They were fortunate, in one sense, to be rescued: hundreds of thousands of people just like them are enslaved around Southeast Asia in brothels and scamming compounds, as they were, with no way out.

But they will carry these scars for many years to come.

Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation is on a mission to end human trafficking.

Ngoc celebrated her first birthday this week.

She turned 15.

Growing up on the streets of Ho Chi Minh City, there’s not much joy in Ngoc’s life.

Her days are about survival. That means hanging with a group of friends who can protect her and moving about the city to places she feels safe.

Ngoc has a grandmother and younger siblings. She cares for them very much. But things never seem to work out when she’s with them, so she escapes to the streets where she feels that she belongs.

Blue Dragon has been getting to know Ngoc and her friends but it takes time to build trust.

We wish we could get her back to her family right away. We wish we could heal the years of damaged relationships around her and restore the childhood that she’s lost.

And while we’d like to move fast, we know that we have to move at Ngoc’s pace.

All this will happen when she’s ready.

So day by day, we do what we can to make her life whole.

Celebration

Friday was the first time she’s ever celebrated her own birthday.

When we learned that she had a birthday coming, we saw an opportunity to create a moment of joy.

We bought a cake and set up in a cafe where Ngoc could invite her friends to celebrate with her.

Everyone sang happy birthday and enjoyed the sweet cake, completely forgetting the hardships of their lives.

Later, Ngoc messaged the Blue Dragon social worker to say with pride that she was so happy and had taken the remaining cake home for her siblings and her grandmother to enjoy.

I’m sure she’ll never forget that first birthday celebration.

A crack in the armour

In Hanoi, meantime, we’ve been caring for a teen boy named Hoan.

He’s from a town 4 hours south of the city and has been on the streets for a couple of years now.

Like Ngoc, he has a family that he cares for but just can’t live with. He works at night in the tourist district of Hanoi, making enough money to get from day to day.

He enjoys meeting with Blue Dragon staff and loves going for a milk tea or a bowl of phở. But he’s wary of receiving help, guarding his independence above everything.

Two weeks ago, Hoan perforated his eardrum. It’s caused him terrible pain.

In fact, it’s been so bad that he finally accepted some help. We’ve been taking him to the hospital to treat his ear and making sure he has enough to eat while he can’t work.

His eardrum is starting to heal now. Another trip to the hospital on Saturday confirmed that he’s on the mend.

And after the checkup: a bowl of phở and shopping for new clothes.

Hoan beamed with joy as he chose a couple of simple t-shirts.

This tough young guy who has learned to survive on the city streets transformed into a cheerful little boy. He looked like a child on Christmas morning.

Transformative moments

Blue Dragon’s work is about so much more than buying birthday cakes and t-shirts.

But somehow, these moments are exactly what we’re about.

We all dream of changing the world. Making it a better place for those who are poor and suffering.

And much of what Blue Dragon does is focused on systemic change to end human trafficking and keep kids safe.

From day to day, though, change is incremental. Step by step.

There’s no wave of the wand, no granting of a wish to make everything better.

Instead, it starts with buying a birthday cake for a girl who’s never had one before. And taking a boy for an ear check and some shopping.

Creating those moments of joy is where change begins.

Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation is on a mission to end human trafficking.

Because it’s Blue Dragon’s 20th birthday, we’ve been looking back at kids we helped long ago and writing stories about where they are now.

This week, we shared Hien’s story.

We didn’t know it at the time, but Hien played an important role in shaping Blue Dragon in our early days.

Hien’s story

I met her 20 years ago, when she was living with her mother in a truly decrepit house.

The roof had holes large enough to see the sky above. There was no toilet or bathroom, and on the first day I went there I saw a snake.

And yet, Hien was going to school every day, dressed in her uniform looking cheerful and studious.

It wasn’t that she was unaffected by her difficult home life. It was that she had learned to hide her fear, to hold it down, and just get on with things.

Blue Dragon was tiny at that time – we had no resources or staff, just a drive to help kids.

Seeing Hien’s appalling living conditions, we knew we had to do something.

Something big.

Taking action

You can read the whole story here, including an update of where Hien is today.

But in short, what we did was: everything.

Everything that Hien needed.

We found someone to donate land to her family, that is now hers forever.

Then we built a house. It is no mansion, but it was big enough for mother and daughter, well constructed, and included a private bathroom – the first time in her life Hien had had one.

While we did this, we started assisting Hien with her studies. Her mother was unwell and had no stable income, so we relieved her of the burden of paying Hien’s school fees.

Once Hien completed Grade 12, we gave her a scholarship to university. Even after that, we helped her secure an opportunity to study abroad.

Hien now has a great job and family of her own. Her son has had a very different childhood to his mother’s; he could not imagine the hardship that she once endured. And that’s exactly as it should be.

The intergenerational poverty cycle has been broken.

A big idea

At Blue Dragon, we call this a “massive intervention.”

When we meet a child living in hardship or crisis, we don’t look for the quick-fix solution. We don’t just deal with the most obvious problem.

Instead, we look at what it will take to make a lasting change. To really make a powerful difference.

This means we don’t always choose the cheapest or simplest option. And it also means making a long-term commitment to each child.

It takes a significant effort and it’s worth it.

Our experience of helping Hien taught us that interventions to keep kids safe had to be “massive.”

And we still do that today.

Every rescue of a trafficked person is a massive step of an even larger intervention to change someone’s life. It’s how we have had so much success over the years of working with kids in the toughest of circumstances and transforming their future.

That Hien now leads a happy, independent life free from the fear and shame of poverty is a testament to Blue Dragon’s “massive intervention.”

May there be many more to come.

Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation is on a mission to end human trafficking.

Typhoon Yagi seems like ancient history now.

Two weeks on and their are new crises around the globe to grab the headlines.

Without a doubt, there will be more next week, too.

But as the headlines move on, those affected are left to clean up, rebuild, and start again.

Which is exactly what has been happening here in Vietnam. It’s a very long road ahead, because the damage has been tremendous and widespread.

However: it has begun.

Blue Dragon and an army of volunteers have been assisting with the cleanup. Removing fallen trees, cleaning mud out of shacks and replacing lost belongings.

For me, there is one picture that most sums up Blue Dragon’s response to Yagi.

One of our social workers out in the community checking in with families. Down on her knees in a flooded street so that the child she’s talking to can look at her eye-to-eye.

This is our response: from the heart, human to human. Respectful and equal.

The cleaning and rebuilding will continue for many months. And it’s all possible because people around the world have donated, or put their hand up to volunteer, right at the time help was needed most.

To all who have been a part of this: Thank you.

Blue Dragon is still able to accept donations to help victims of Typhoon Yagi. All help will go to the effort to rebuild homes and livelihoods in northern Vietnam.

Ngoc is the first child we rescued from human trafficking.

Aged 13, he had been taken from his sea-side village to sprawling Ho Chi Minh City, where he was forced to sell flowers to tourists for 12 or more hours a day.

When we investigated, we found that hundreds of children from his central Vietnamese community had been trafficked. Like Ngoc, some were selling flowers on the streets. Most were in garment factories, toiling away for no pay in terrible conditions.

Chi was the first person we rescued from a brothel in China. She had been trafficked and sold at age 17 by someone she thought was her boyfriend.

When we went to find her, we released 6 other girls and young women who were also enslaved. We’ve been working on cross-border human trafficking in the years since.

But those initial forms of trafficking we dealt with no longer exist in any substantial form.

Shifting sands

Village children are no longer being trafficked to factories and to sell flowers. Blue Dragon worked with the community for 12 years on this issue before it reached an end. It’s now a relic of history.

Nor are Vietnamese girls being trafficked into Chinese brothels as they were. What was once a serious issue is now a rare phenomenon. This is largely thanks to efforts by Chinese authorities to crack down on brothels.

The issues that once fully occupied our radar are now occasional blips on the screen.

However, that’s not to say that human trafficking has ended. Instead, it’s morphed – several times over.

In each new iteration, it takes on new characteristics and new forms of brutality. Today, the main form of slavery we are dealing with is the trafficking of Vietnamese people to Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos for forced online scamming.

Just a few years ago, this was unheard of.

And what is now a significant crisis, with an estimated 300,000 people enslaved and forced to scam money from people online, will one day be an awful memory.

Online scamming will certainly continue, but AI is likely to replace the need for large numbers of people to be forced to work online day and night.

And as the pressure on governments to take action against organised scamming continues to grow, the traffickers are already looking at alternative business models.

The next wave?

In northern Myanmar, there are indications that some of the gangs running the scam compounds are turning their attention to cannabis production for the Thai market.

If this happens, they’ll be looking for slave labour for not only the growing, but also the processing and packaging of their product to give themselves a competitive advantage in the marketplace.

Is this to be the next major iteration of human trafficking in Southeast Asia? It might be. Or it could be something else that’s yet to surface.

Because the one thing that’s absolutely certain with human trafficking is that it will continue to change. The specific types of slavery we see today will end, or at least reduce substantially.

And something else will rise to take their place.

That’s why there’s no single ‘fix’ for human trafficking. No silver bullet.

The answer: Agility

Blue Dragon’s interventions range from prevention programs to rescue… and then to the care of people after they have been set free. Over time, all of this is needed.

Specifically where and how we do these things will keep changing. So we must be agile enough to keep changing along with them. And that change has to be quick.

We’ve built agility into our organisational structure and our mindset. When a new issue emerges, or even a global crisis like Covid, we’re able to pivot to meet the challenge.

This gives us confidence that we can really make a difference.

Because if some forms of trafficking can be ended, then they all can.

On Sunday September 8, the Blue Dragon Walk will be held around the world. Thank you to all who’ve registered to take part! It’s not too late for you to join – sign up here. And if you’d rather sit the day out, please consider sponsoring the Walk of our co-CEO Vi Do. Donations for his walk will be doubled by our friends at APT Travel.