Would you like a sangsa with your coffee?

I’m sitting in Cafe Sentiment trying to check my e-mail and drinking some tea which I paid for as a price for my internet that I am supposed to be using, which won’t load. the cafe is bustling, regardless, and everyone else seems to be safely checking their e-mail, except for the few people who are just talking and enjoying coffee. Such as the two young khmer women and the older white man who are sitting near by me. I can’t help but keep glancing at them. The two stare intently into his eyes, elbows propped on the table. His back is to me, but judging from the prep yellow collared shirt, glasses and thinning gray straggly hair, I guess he is maybe 60, and they are around 18. Every time I see this kind of thing, which is almost every day, my stomach tightens a bit. They could legitimately be his wives or girlfriends for that matter, and not prostitutes. But either way, exploiting doesn’t even seem to remotely describe the situation. Or maybe he really is their long lost uncle.
There is nothing you can do to change this. My friend told me. It has to come from the Khmers. they have to decide for themselves that they do not want this.
I glance up again. The girl looks at me.
What do you want me to do? her eyes question? Please, don’t judge me.
Or maybe I am putting thoughts in her head. Maybe that’s just how I would feel if I was sitting in her shoes. Me, having no idea what it would possibly take to fill them.