Empowering Families to Live a Life of Freedom
Cruel and unfair labor practices create conditions that can accurately be called modern slavery. By trapping victims into a cycle of debt and low wages, powerful people can exploit their labor and prevent them from escaping their predicament. Worse, the conditions created by contemporary slavery encourage other crimes and human rights violations. In these places, human trafficking, sexual violence, and other heinous acts occur frequently without any recourse for victims.
In our work to end the systemic cycle of slavery in North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, we encounter many young women who are facing the worst of the hardships that bonded laborers are subjected to. Many of them are under threat of being trafficked, sold for organ harvesting, being beaten, and being starved. Working women face particular victimization under modern day slavery, and the physical and emotional toll is overwhelming. The abuse and exploitation not only affects the victims, but their families and entire communities of working people. This is why we have launched Anna’s House, a safe home of restoration for these women and their families.
Our first home is called "Anna's House." Anna means “Grace” - empowerment to change; to move forward. Our goal is to help women at risk find grace and empowerment through emotional and physical support, as well as trade skill training to help them move into the future with everything they need to thrive.
The goal of Anna's House is restoration for the whole family unit. During their stay at Anna’s House, we provide families with shelter, food, clothing, and training so they can become self-supporting. After their stay with us, we help relocate them to their own homes and establish them in a job. We continue to support these families with regular check-ins from our staff after they leave Anna’s House.
In our work to end the systemic cycle of slavery in North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, we encounter many young women who are facing the worst of the hardships that bonded laborers are subjected to. Many of them are under threat of being trafficked, sold for organ harvesting, being beaten, and being starved. Working women face particular victimization under modern day slavery, and the physical and emotional toll is overwhelming. The abuse and exploitation not only affects the victims, but their families and entire communities of working people. This is why we have launched Anna’s House, a safe home of restoration for these women and their families.
Our first home is called "Anna's House." Anna means “Grace” - empowerment to change; to move forward. Our goal is to help women at risk find grace and empowerment through emotional and physical support, as well as trade skill training to help them move into the future with everything they need to thrive.
The goal of Anna's House is restoration for the whole family unit. During their stay at Anna’s House, we provide families with shelter, food, clothing, and training so they can become self-supporting. After their stay with us, we help relocate them to their own homes and establish them in a job. We continue to support these families with regular check-ins from our staff after they leave Anna’s House.
Program components
- Customized Plans
- Housing
- Food
- Safety
- Education
- Skills Training
- Medical Care
Her surgery was a success! We thank God for her healing! She had to be on bed rest and my father could still not make bricks, so I was left as the only one working hard for my family. Eventually my mother was able to start work again and my father could help bring us clay. I never asked again if I could leave the brickyard, but I never lost my hope in Jesus Christ. In May 2020, Brother Suleman came to visit us and we told him about our circumstances, and we felt that God had seen our pain and heard our prayers for freedom. Brother Suleman told us to get ready to leave the brickyard, that there was a house waiting for us, food to eat and new clothes. At first we could not believe it was possible! Then we realized that God had heard our prayers and sent him. I, Salomi, and my parents are all very thankful to God for His mercy and great miracles for us. I am happy and praying every day. I have started studying again at Anna’s House and I’m learning to sew. Soon we will begin learning to sew Bible covers, ladies purses and clutches. |
SaloMi's StoryI am Salomi Anwar and I am 20 years old. When I was a young girl, my family and I lived in a rented house in the village and I attended school and enjoyed playing with my friends. When I was 10 years old my father became ill and unable to work, we could no longer afford to pay rent. This left us helpless and hopeless and forced us to move into the brickyard. I began to work making bricks with my parents, the burden of this was so very heavy. Waking up before dawn, half asleep, working in the early morning to try to avoid the burning sun. Then trying to sleep at night was also difficult because of pain and sickness. I felt we were being punished by poverty.
Life in the brickyards is hard and painful. When brickyard owners don’t pay enough wages after working so hard, people are hungry and angry and many fights happen between workers. Even when we went to get water for drinking and cooking, often we were blocked and threatened. The homes are not clean and do not have washrooms for families. At the beginning of 2014, I told my parents that I no longer wanted to work making bricks, that since I was their only daughter, they must think about my future. They agreed. Then, in June of that year, my mother noticed breast pain and on the way to the hospital she and my father had an accident on their motorcycle. My father was injured so badly he was not able to work and the test my mother received showed that she had a tumor and needed surgery. My mother’s condition worsened, she was in so much pain and getting worse by the day, but we could not afford the treatment. In 2017 my father borrowed money from the brickyard owner for my mother's surgery, and we prayed every day for her healing. |