The new job

I worked from home yesterday. In less clothes than my pajamas! Hurray for new jobs where I pick my own schedule, how many hours I want to work, where, how, why, and who. What a fabulous idea. My living room is a mess of papers and manuals and empty chocolate pudding cups, but nevermind.

So, my office. Have you ever been on a mission trip to Mexico, to work in a church down there? Wait, let me back up. My office is in the Salvation Army Hollywood Corps, which is a fancy word for church, slash all the other programs they do there. I think in Hollywood there is a youth center, church, old peoples home, and some other youth programs with lots of buildings. But, the church. It reminds me of my childhood times in Mexico with brightly colored walls and odd furniture.

So, my office! It's in the Weingart Youth Center (please don't stalk me), which is a great facility equipped for all kinds of fancy programs for kids. Only the Officer in charge is a lot more excited about repainting the stairwell and getting new tables for the multi-purpose room and getting carpet that matches the division office downtown than he is about putting internet in the building (which might come in handy for the COMPUTER LAB they are supposed to be running in there) or, say, setting up my office.

Anyway, about my office. When I walked in with my boss last Friday it was still the little catch-all room with the soda machine, 472 printers and copiers, some kid's basketball shoes, random files, paper snowflakes, a mini desk, 29 file cabinets, and a unicorn. At some point one of those soda cans spilled (you know what happens when soda machines aren't locked up and there are rambunctious youth around who'd rather break something than pay for a can) and left a neat design on the carpet. My boss was a little annoyed that it wasn't ready for me, so they started scrambling as we went with the Officer (Demetrio - interesting guy!) to Louise's Trattoria for lunch (my second free lunch of the week). Apparently there was a computer and a desk somewhere on campus designated for me, they were just wanting to know when I was starting in order to set it up. Hey - there I was, ready to start!

So we came back and there it was. The junk was cleared out and I had a computer, a gigantic copy machine and printer, only 139 little printers left over, and a new desk. Now here comes my Mexican church flashback. Blue stained carpet, bright mint green walls, a desk with a drawer missing, random stickers on the windows. Thankfully I won't be spending much time there. Not that I have anything against Mexican churches...las amo, gracias a Dios. But I have an office and a key and a desk and a computer that is not hooked up to anything. I love social work!

I've learned more about my job in the last week by being introduced to others at the TSA offices than I knew before taking the job. A big part of it is education and training seminars for local churches and other organizations, as well as a lot of volunteer recruitment. But I will be doing outreach on the streets of Hollywood to low income communities to raise awareness about human trafficking. The idea is that many of them will have ideas of where the victims are, which massage parlors or strip clubs are harboring or using victims.

I also keep a record of the surveillance I do. Yes - surveillance. I'm Sidney Bristow over here with my platinum wig and big sunglasses. Today I was reading over the notes from the girl who did this job last year from her stake-outs of massage parlors and strip clubs. Often they advertise sex online, but usually late at night you can see the girls being brought out and put in vans and taken away. Sometimes they are kept in the same place they are made to work. The high walls and barbed wire are not there to keep people out - they're there to keep people in. My job is funded by a grant from the Department of Health and Human Services, so I will need to keep detailed records of my surveillance, trainings, any victim rescues, conversations with potential victims, internet research, etc.

Later this week I'll spend some time at the youth center during drop in hours; Hollywood has a significant number of homeless people, a lot of whom are youth. Often troubled youth who come out here to pursue their "dreams" of stardom hit the harsh realities of sexual exploitation on these streets. The majority of homeless girls, and an increasing number of boys are sexually exploited via prostitution and/or pornography. It's also highly likely for them to know of places where trafficking and exploitation are taking place, so this will be a good starting place for me.

Onward, into the underbelly of society.