Antislavery Usable Past

Maya B

2014 (Narrative date)

Lebanon is a destination for Asian and African women trafficked for the purpose of domestic servitude, and for women from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union trafficked for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation. Lebanese children are trafficked within the country for the purpose of forced labour and sexual exploitation. Women from Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Ethiopia who travel to Lebanon legally to work as household servants often find themselves in conditions of forced labour through withholding of passports, non-payment of wages, restrictions on movement, threats, and physical or sexual assault.

Maya was forced to work long hours in her employer's house, and in a shop in Lebanon where she was subjected to physical abuse by the people she was living with. After an incident of physical violence Maya was taken back to the agency. Despite repeated attempts to bring her back, Maya refused to return to the house.

I was very afraid, but had no other option than to stay at my workplace… I was forced to work both in the house and in a shop. I had to work for 18 hours a day, seven days a week. None of the people in the home were supportive, and I was tortured on many occasions and in different ways… At the end of my stay in Lebanon, the last day was terrible. My mistress was out until late at night, and I was again attacked by a family member in her absence… I shouted as loud as I could but he did not stop beating me. They even closed the door and did not let me go out. Afterwards, in severe pain, I could not contain myself and opened the door and shouted from the balcony. A neighbour heard me screaming. She ran to the house and asked the house owner to stop beating me. The neighbouring lady took me into her home, where I stayed for two days. Thereafter I was left at the agent’s office, where several times the house owner came to take me back but I refused to go with them. All I wanted was my life.

As told to researchers at Anti-Slavery International for their report 'Into the Unknown: Exploitation of Nepalese Migrant Domestic Workers in Lebanon'

Country

Theme

Domestic slavery

Type

Narrative

Tags

VOICES: Narratives by Survivors of Modern Slavery

This is the world's largest archive of modern slavery survivor narratives. Across more than a million words spoken or written by survivors of modern slavery, we can see why slavery persists in particular hotspots, analyse patterns in trafficking routes, identify vulnerabilities, understand more about the challenges survivors face in liberation, and discover new antislavery solutions. These narratives offer the chance to systematically design new antislavery strategies based on the experiences, ideas and solutions of enslaved people themselves.

The database is searchable by country, name, theme, and narrative date. Narratives can be viewed in list or map form. A short introduction provides context to each narrative. Narrative provenance appears after the main narrative text.

For ideas on how to use this database, please see our accompanying guide.

Project Lead: Zoe Trodd. Team Members: Andrea Nicholson, Lauren Eglen, Rosemary Pearce, Olivia Wright.

Project Funders: AHRC Antislavery Usable Past grant (2014-19), ESRC/AHRC PaCCS Modern Slavery: Meaning and Measurement grant (2016-19), and AHRC-GCRF Antislavery Knowledge Network grant (2017-2021).

For any queries about the collection please contact: rightslab@nottingham.ac.uk. If you wish to cite a particular narrative, please acknowledge the survivor’s name, the provenance of the narrative and cite: Voices Database, the Rights Lab, University of Nottingham.

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