Support Me In India

Here is my official informative letter asking for support while I am in India. Read it for more info about what I'll be doing, who I'll be working with, and to find out how you can partner with me!

My Dear Friends and Family,

I hope this letter finds you and your loved ones blessed and healthy! I am pleased to say that my year since graduating from Butler has been eventful and formative for me as both an artist and a person. God has brought many amazing opportunities into my life, one of which will be taking me on a four-month trip to Calcutta, India. There I will be working with the non-profit organization Word Made Flesh from September 8th to December 15th.

In India, Word Made Flesh’s program, Sari Bari, serves a community of women and children who are attempting to leave the bondage of sexual trafficking. According to the U.S. Department of State, as many as 27 million people are currently trapped in modern day slavery, or “human trafficking”. Of these 80% are female and 50% are children. The majority of human trafficking victims are used for sexual exploitation, adding to the ranks of the 60,000 women currently working in Calcutta’s red light district. These women and girls are often coerced or tricked into the sex trade by people who promise them a better life but actually intend to make them dependent on those who prostitute them.

As an outreach of Word Made Flesh in Calcutta, Sari Bari seeks to release those women held in the sex trade by poverty and lack of empowerment. They provide jobs and opportunities for these women through their shop, which produces blankets, pillows and handbags made from repurposed saris. My hope for this trip is to be able to make a positive difference in vulnerable women’s lives through support, love, art, and the hope that Sari Bari brings them.

I am hoping you will consider supporting me during my time in India. You can do this by upholding me in prayer while I am gone, and also by giving financially if you are able. I need to raise $5,000 in funding for my trip. This will cover my lodging, transportation, airfare, and food while I am in India. Any amount would be helpful to me in achieving my goals. If you wish to give, you may do so online at wordmadeflesh.org and designate the donation with my name, or you can send a check to Word Made Flesh, PO BOX 70, Omaha, NE 68101, with a separate note designating the donation with my name. Checks should be made payable to Word Made Flesh. Please, do not write my name in the memo portion of the check.

This trip is a chance for me to realize my dream of using art and theatre to help disadvantaged groups in the developing world, and I am so excited! If you have any questions for me feel free to email me at amalia.howard@gmail.com. I will be documenting my time in India at fyiamalia.blogspot.com if you would like to keep up with me during the trip! Thank you so much for your prayers and support!

All My Love,
Amalia Lynn Howard

Changes

Hello friends!
There have been so many things to think about, to do, and to decide since I last made a post that I can barely decide what to say first. I'm planning a lot of big changes in the next few months! I've been accepted to the Word Made Flesh servant team going to Kolkata (Calcutta) India in late August. I'll be there for about four months, the dates are not set in stone yet. While I'm there I'll be working with an outreach of WMF called Sari Bari. Sari Bari works with escapees of the sex trade in Kolkata, helping women to leave the red light districts by offering love, support, and alternative employment.

 For a little more information on what they deal with here is an excerpt from the Sari Bari website:

How Human Trafficking Happens: A young village girl, probably from a poor family, is lured, tricked or cajoled by a “trafficker” who promises a good job, a marriage or a better life in the city. The “trafficker” could be a woman who has previously been prostituted herself, a young man promising marriage or jobs, or a family member. The young girl is illiterate (or close to it), unsuspecting and has hopes for a better life for herself and/or her family, but she soon finds herself in a horrible nightmare of slavery from which she will likely never be able to escape...

From Sari Bari's vision statement: Sari Bari seeks the sustainable restoration of red light communities and the prevention of the exploitation of women and children in the commercial sex trade... Sari Bari does not rescue women, but rather seeks restoration for those who have been trafficked or held in the sex trade by poverty and lack of empowerment. Approximately 65 percent of women in the red light areas no longer qualify for legal action in the form of rescue. While they were likely first trafficked in their teen years, many are now middle-aged and are trapped by circumstances that have bound them since childhood.

 While with Sari Bari, I'll first spend at least a month learning the Bengali language and developing relationships with the women already at Sari Bari. Once I've learned more about the culture of human trafficking I will be able to go with the Sari Bari workers to speak with and care for the women still involved in the sex trade. I may even get a chance to employ my art and theatre skills in projects with the women at Sari Bari, Word Made Flesh is very open to arts as a form of healing and outreach.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently was in Kolkata and visited a Human Trafficking focused event where Sari Bari participated! You can read about it on Sari Bari's blog: here. She even bought a bag from them and got to meet one of the women who Sari Bari has helped. Totally cool!

Before I go to India however, I have a lot to get done! I'm going to take the GRE test for graduate school admittance in about a week, and I'm studying/practicing like crazy. The test costs a LOT of money and I don't want to waist it and have to take it all over again.

After hopefully passing the GRE, my task will be to apply to as many places as possible before leaving for India since I won't have much time between August and December to complete the applications. Programs I'm looking at inculde North Western, NYU, Cornell, Brown, and Columbia University, so you can see how essential it will be to have strong test scores and applications. I want to go back for a PhD in Theatre at a program that will allow me to choose my own topic of study, blending theatre and social justice. I think that learning more about what others have done with theatre and justice will help me be prepared to practice it myself. I hope that one day I'll have a job either with a university or a non-profit that allows me to go abroad and do the social theatre that I am so passionate about.

Well, there you have it. That's the current plan! I'm sure it will change many times in the next few months, but I'm very excited about its current form! Stay posted for more info on the upcoming India trip, GRE scores, and impending move back to Indiana before leaving the continent!

Much love to all! - A