One Road, Six Ways

One Road, Six Ways - Part 1

Introduction

This novel although based on the experiences of the six Filipinas that was recruited from the Philippines to work as Cultural Dancers abroad, have fictional stories and names.

The stories contained in this novel if it likened to anyone's life and in one way or another hurt somebody, it's not intentional but purely coincidental.

The names of the characters were all fictional too and if it resembled one's name I sincerely apologized.

My intentions of writing this novel were to open the eyes of many in the Philippines about the truth or the true color of what they thought a good life abroad.  

This novel I hope could gave lessons to all women especially my fellow Filipinas. They must realized that over there in another country, they could be alone, nobody to support  or help them if it happened that they fall to misfortunes and suffered miseries. 

I hope that the parents will also realized that on far away country, danger was always luring and waiting.

One Filipina who was been a cultural dancer told me about one Filipina in Lebanon.

"I knew a Filipina in Lebanon. She had a boyfriend, a soldier from Syria. Her boyfriend abused her. Almost  everyday his boyfriend let her be raped to his friends or fellow soldiers, until this Filipina lost her sanity or became insane. For a quite of time, this Filipina carrying always her religious statue, the Santo Nino, was frequently seen on the streets talking to herself. One day her boyfriend take her to the dessert in the boundary of Lebanon and Syria. This Filipina totally disappeared!"

I asked this Filipina, how came there's Filipinos in Lebanon? Especially the cultural dancers? She said most of the cultural dancers were illegally brought to Lebanon with a boat via Cyprus.  These cultural dancers first have to work in Cyprus and if their visa in Cyprus expired, most of them were brought anywhere, either to Lebanon or to different countries in Africa and Europe. 

"So pitiful the Filipinas! They were so young and beautiful! All over in every port of Africa, there were Filipinas working as prostitutes. When you asked them how did they reached so far away countries only to work as prostitutes, they answered that they were taken from the Philippines as cultural dancers. The Filipinas said they don't like what they were doing but nothing they can do. It's a matter of survival!"   

Every time I had a chance to met Filipino seamen or sailors I asked them about these Filipinas, and they answered me always the same. All over, in every corner of the world there were these young and beautiful Filipinas working as prostitutes. One would say, that you can compare these Filipinas to a beautiful and fragrant flowers worthy to be proud of but instead they gave only shame to the country where they came from, the Philippines or worst a trademark to every Filipina in the eyes of many.

But actually no one can blame these Filipinas. When they left the Philippines, they have no intention to do what they were doing abroad. As a cultural dancer they thought to represent the country, picturing the ways and traditions of their native country thru the glamour of dancing but the reality of what happened only defined the truth that these Filipinas if not all of them, were victims of human trafficking. Far away from home their lives were on the hand of the people that forced and abused them. These Filipinas just sustained to survive holding fast on their one and only dream and what they promised to themselves and their love ones, a dream of good life for them and their family, the promise of help to their parents to uplift their family from poverty.

One may asked, were all these things true? These things really happened to all cultural dancers? True or hearsay, who knew? The fate of one never could be the fate of everybody or some one else. People that talked about these open but the same time hidden reality were fellow countrymen, Filipinos after all, when they were on far away places, enjoyed schooling together if there's any chance and vocal about their experiences, a way of easing  their homesickness.