Remember Nhu: Working to end child sex trade

Carl and Laurie Ralston with Nhu, the Thai girl that they helped save from the child sex trade. The Ralstons were in DL this week to share their story.

Several years ago, Carl Ralston was in Thailand when he heard about Nhu, a 12-year-old girl that had been sold into the sex trade world. It was the first time he had even heard of child sex trafficking, and he is working now to make sure it’s the last.

September 23, 2011

By: Pippi Mayfield, 

Detroit Lakes-Online 

Several years ago, Carl Ralston was in Thailand when he heard about Nhu, a 12-year-old girl that had been sold into the sex trade world. It was the first time he had even heard of child sex trafficking, and he is working now to make sure it’s the last.

That was in November of 2003, and Ralston, who is originally from Ohio but now travels 10 months out of the year, began to pray that he could make a difference.

He said God spoke to him, “Remember Nhu,” and a month later, Rolstad promised to find Nhu and work as long as it took to end the child sex trade industry.

“The strategy is for the children’s home to meet their needs for food, clothing, medical care and education,” he said last week while in Detroit Lakes.

Ralston and his wife, Laurie, spoke at different organizations throughout the week, sharing their story of eventually forming Remember Nhu, building homes to save other young girls and boys from sex trafficking. They had a special guest who accompanied them, sharing her story as well — Nhu.

Though the average age for child sex trafficking is becoming lower and lower — in 1997, it was age 17, in 1999, it was 14, in 2000, it was 12 and in 2003, it was 2 years old — Ralston is sure he can end the trafficking in time.

“I look at this that we can end it in six years,” he said because of the work they have already done and will continue to do. “This should not go on in our society.”

Since the first house has opened, Remember Nhu has opened two houses in India, two in Thailand, two in the Philippines, two in an unnamed country and one in Cambodia. Before the end of the year, they will also open two in Gambia and one in Mongolia.

The homes provide shelter, love and education for the children — who aren’t just poverty stricken, but in real danger of being sold. They can either provide training in a technical trade or send them to college and pay for it, which will make the young people self-sustaining.

That is just what happened with Nhu.

At the age of 12, Nhu’s grandmother was in a large amount of debt and sold her virginity to pay off the debt.

Nhu, a Christian who begged God to protect her and make it stop, had to spend three nights in a hotel room with a man without any food or water the entire time. In the next six months, she was sold two more times.

For months after that, Nhu begged her grandmother to let her attend school and learn the hair and nail business.

Her grandmother finally relented, and after going through the education — which she paid for by working as a janitor at the school — at age 14, Nhu got a job working in a salon 12-hours a day with two days a month off.

After hearing about Nhu, Ralston said God put it on his heart to find her and save other children like her.

He searched for two and a half years for Nhu, taking a photo to Cambodia and asking people on the street if they knew the girl in the picture.

After his sixth trip, he finally found her.

“Immediately, I got people back here praying for her,” he said.

Now, Nhu is the manager of Agape Beauty Salon in Cambodia, which the Remember Nhu organization runs. She was the first paid employee of the Remember Nhu organization.

“I teach the girls how to do hair and nails. I’m so happy to see they can go to school and have people to take care of them and love them,” she said of the Remember Nhu homes.

Nhu, now 22, travels with the Ralstons sometimes to see other countries and to share her story.

“I feel like Nhu is our daughter. We’ve adopted her in our hearts,” Carl said.

The house parents and helpers at the Remember Nhu homes are paid to take care of the children.

But, in the United States, all those helping with Remember Nhu are volunteers. Even the Ralstons support themselves through businesses they sold before starting Remember Nhu.

That means that every dollar donated to Remember Nhu goes to support the children, not administration costs, he said.

The number of children at each home varies, right now around 43, but they can house up to 60 kids per house. They are caring for over 400 children right now. The organization started with just girls, but now support boys as well.

“We want it to be a home, not an orphanage,” Ralston said.

When they first started opening Remember Nhu homes, he said the plan was to have them all in one area, but they got leads as to other countries and areas that needed homes and decided to spread out and help in other countries.

When the organization finds out that a child has been sold, they go to that village and talk to the chief about the Remember Nhu program and homes. Ralston said they’ve had mostly positive response, and that determines where they will build a new shelter home.

“Many are in desperate conditions and lack education and make poor decisions,” he said of the families that sell children.

The Ralstons spend the majority of their time overseas at the homes they have started. Carl works the business end — holding meetings, interviewing children, keeping up with e-mails and contacts and “not often enough, just sitting down to play a game with the kids.”

Laurie also spends time in the homes and takes care of the child sponsorship portion of the organization.

Carl attributes some of his success to the fact that while working on his master’s degree, his thesis project was Remember Nhu.

He visited with several others who have started other childrens’ homes and found out the pitfalls and the must-haves. So when it came time to start Remember Nhu, he said he approached it academically.

“By the time I opened it, I felt I had 100 years of experience by then.”

The true success though, he said, comes from God.

“I really do give all the credit to God for this,” he said. “It has become a lot bigger than I thought it would.”

For more information or to give, visit www.remembernhu.org.