Nancy Valdes '06 - Thailand
“My trip to Thailand made me more aware of the horrors of human trafficking in Southeast Asia , but also cleared up some misconceptions I had on the subject.”
Nancy grew up in Elizabeth , New Jersey and calls Washington , DC home now.
She chose Trinity because of its small size; she did not want to be just a number in a university.
From June 1 through June 21 Nancy was busy discovering Thailand through a program hosted by American University . Accompanying her study group was an AMU professor, Julie Mertus, who is also a well-respected human rights lawyer and activist. Nancy is very enthusiastic about having been part of this group, and not at all daunted by the fact that she was perhaps the only undergraduate student! Nancy took advantage of this opportunity to do some traveling in the area independently before the start of the program, which helped to broaden and render her experience more meaningful.
Nancy's major is International Affairs and Migration Track. She chose the Thailand program because her particular interest is the study of human trafficking and she hopes to integrate this interest in her future career choice. After graduation she plans to get married and work abroad, preferably in Latin America or Spain.
Her personal account is compelling:
“This June I traveled with American University and Project Hope, a U.S. based NGO that works with victims of trafficking, to Thailand for a three week course on Human Security. The program focused on threats to human security in Thailand , with a particular emphasis on the human trafficking phenomenon. The group met with Thai officials, scholars, activists, and organizers involved in the global anti-trafficking movement.
During our three weeks in Thailand we spent about half the time in Bangkok , living in apartments, and the other half traveling to Pattaya in the south and Changmai, Changrai, and Mae Sae in the north. Bangkok was quite crowded and noisy, much like New York City or Chicago , but with five times the traffic and no rhyme or reason to the street grid. That said, there were numerous ancient temples that were unlike anything I had every seen before in my life; elaborately ornate, colorful structures that took my breath away. Changmai, Changrai, and Mae Sae on the other hand, were all spectacularly lush and green and much less chaotic than Bangkok . These cities in the north however, are much poorer and less developed than Bangkok and are trafficking transit points.
The speakers we were given access to and the places we visited as part of the program truly opened my eyes to the problem of human trafficking. Hearing radically different points of view on what causes trafficking and/or enables it, some of which had never occurred to me before, helped me form a more objective opinion as to why humans are trafficked and what can be done to stop it. It was often emotionally distressing and psychologically draining to speak with victims and/or their children in shelters we visited, and to hear social workers' stories of cases they had been involved with, but I wouldn't trade those conversations for anything in the world. They helped enforce my already-held belief that after graduation in May, I need to put my International Affairs degree to good use by working in the international community to help alleviate some of the world's problems.”