It was not that I resisted being in Singapore. I was more than happy to regain easy access to hawker food, speak Singlish freely and enjoy efficiency at its best.

But to fall right back into everyone else’s rhythm of life? No thanks. I wanted my friends to know I am different.

My four years in the United States have been in many ways transformative.

To immediately call Singapore ‘home’ almost felt like a renunciation of the life I once had; an abandonment of all I’ve been through with my best American friends.

A week into my life in Singapore, I was homesick. ‘You mean you didn’t know?’ friends who returned before I did teased as I whined about my adjustment issues.

Apparently, moving back home is often thought to be the most difficult part of the overseas experience. Organisations even prepare moving-home manuals for those who spend years abroad.

‘It gets better once work keeps you busy,’ a friend encouraged gently.

But I didn’t want to be distracted.

I wanted to know that I could settle back into life here without losing the person I had become. I didn’t want to let go of the familiarity of the place I had abroad.

Facebook and quick e-mail updates had kept me in the loop here, but what would stop my Singaporean loved ones from rejecting the new me?

To my surprise, I found our hearts were still connected in spite of distance and time.

My dreams might have been sown in foreign soil, but it was on home soil that I found a support system like no other.

After four years, I still have a phonebook full of people I can rely on – people who have seen me at my worst, spent years apart from me, and will still be there for me when it matters.

For all these and more, I think it’s only fair to them that I finally say: ‘I’m home.’

The writer, 25, completed her postgraduate studies in international law and government at Georgetown University

I’m a little concerned that post-editing, trafficking and prostitution appear synonymous, so I must say now that there is a difference, but here is the piece as it was published.

We are all smiles in this picture, but this was one of those days where the stories you hear are so disturbing, you can’t understand how Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Agents Gary Phillips and Hung Nguyen do it every day.

There are four ICE agents designated to investigate violations of the US Protect Act of 2003 in Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia. Phillips and Nguyen are two of them.

Under the Protect Act, any person who sexually abuses a child in another country can be subject to criminal proceedings back in the US. The law dictates that there is no need to prove the intention to have sex for a person to have violated the Act.

And so mostly based on tip-offs by non-governmental organizations (90 per cent of the time), Phillips and gang move in to extract the children from the situation, and arrest the pedophile in question.

So far, the youngest child they found was 8 years of age, and the oldest, 15.

A couple of observations from his encounters with pedophiles:

• Most are single
• Most that he’s caught are teachers (!!)
• All of them had fantasies about children
• Most child sex abusers don’t use condoms
• Invariably, KY lubricating gel and Viagra is always found on them
• Their common excuse is, “I’m taking them out of poverty.” or “They fell in love with me; they came onto me.”
• None interviewed by Philips admitted to being sexually abused as a child

Be surprised not that the most common facilitator for child sex, at least in Cambodia, is… their mothers.

Break my heart, will you.

Phillips went through a number of cases that he’s encountered over the years. I thought it was really disturbing that some of these men would visit brothels that specialise in child sex and record every encounter.

Yes, you read right. These men would describe what they did together, and then grade the children accordingly. Another would cut off some of the boys’ pubic hair, take photos and then create a scrapbook. It made me so mad just to hear about it, and see photos of what Phillips and his team have found.

One man even founded an NGO called Socrates Foundation. He went to areas of trafficked children to distribute school supplies, giving him unlimited access in Svay Pak, Cambodia.

He had several girls living with him, and tied four of his seven virgins up. After his arrest, police found lots of drugs that were used to make the children sleepy and groggy.

He was a former US Marine Corps Captain with over 20 years of service. He was convicted on seven counts of sexual exploitation, and is looking at 210 years in prison.

“These guys cannot be rehabilitated,” Phillips says. And so many of these men are transferred back to the US to be prosecuted. (Conditions in Thai prisons could be worse, but they can easily bribe their way out of jail.)

Clearly all of this is so disturbing, and this is what Phillips has to deal with on a daily basis: broken people, both men and children, hurting themselves and others.

Why do you do it? we ask.

He says: “My motivation every day is getting these guys off the street. If we don’t do it, no one will.”

Photo: Nicole Adenauer

When we visited the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, I had two burning questions.

I got to ask one during our meeting in the conference room, and one in a slightly more casual setting as we waited for lunch to be served.

Question #1: Since Thailand takes its fight against human trafficking so seriously, why has Thailand not ratified the Trafficking Protocol? Does Thailand have any plans to do so?

First Secretary of the Social Division in the International Organizations Department, Ms Maratee Nalita Andamo, took my question.

Andamo: As you know, Thailand just had its new anti-trafficking law enter into force on June 5, 2008. We do have plans to ratify the Palermo Protocol, but because it supplements the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, there are some clauses in the treaty that need to be fulfilled domestically. Once we have done this, we will ratify the Protocol.

Question #2: Will there really be a human rights monitoring body as mandated by the ASEAN Charter?

[Ms Kanchana Patarachoke (pictured above), Director of the North America Division, and I were chatting about a number of things when I brought the topic of the ASEAN Charter up.]

Patarachoke: Yes! In fact we are in the process of getting the working group for the monitoring body up and running.

Me: Oh but isn’t there an unofficial one already set-up?

Patarachoke: Oh yes, but that one has been around for a long time already.

Me: So this is the working group that will actually make the monitoring body happen?

Patarachoke: Yes.

Me: Let’s hope so. (smile)

Some of you may be excited to know that many of the foreign affairs officials were educated at Georgetown University, including Ms Patarachoke!

This is everyone!

Photo: Andrea Bertone

I emailed Rohit Brijnath to thank him for his piece on Phelps that I posted earlier this week.

He wrote back: “I will never forget these Olympics because there is something rewarding and inspiring about watching a young man chase an incredible dream. Today, when the Chinese hurdler limped out of the heats, I thought, how hard it is to win even one gold, how much can go wrong. And Michael Phelps has eight. It still amazes me.”

Today, I see he managed to get some face-to-face time with Phelps. I take some lessons from the world’s greatest Olympian.

Photo: Albert Sim, Straits Times

Over and over, it seems, the notion of perseverance keeps surfacing as the key to success.

Brijnath writes:

Time defines Phelps. If this is his time, then it is because of the time he has put in the pool. To the point where he could write a thesis on tiredness and a dissertation on pain.

To comprehend how he could race 17 times in nine days, we have to briefly revisit his youth, when he began his tryst with the ridiculous.

The longest race at the Olympic pool is the 1,500m (1,640 yards), but Phelps famously did 5,000 yards straight in the pool. At 55 seconds per 100 yards. No rest in between every 100 yards.

To give this perspective, the 100m world record holder Eamon Sullivan would swim the 100 yards in about 43 seconds. And Phelps was doing the 100 yards 50 times. He was also 15.

It was so wearying that even now Phelps winces: ‘It was the worst thing. I used to always complain to Bob (Bowman, his coach), ‘I’m not going to do this, I don’t need to do this’.

‘And Bob said, trust me, it’ll pay off down the road. He used to have to give me little incentives. I used to love BYOC, which was Be Your Own Coach for a workout, which means you do whatever you want (i.e. play games).

‘He gave me incentives when we had timed swims because he knows I like to be rewarded and that was his way to get me to swim fast. It was so tough, and you’re so sore, you climb out of the pool and pretty much go to bed. It takes every ounce of your energy.’

Ian Thorpe recently spoke about his body shaking uncontrollably after a torrid workout, and he loved it; it was proof of what he could withstand. He called it ‘an athlete’s feeling’.

Phelps knows this feeling, he has understood also, as only athletes do, the idea of investing hours for a moment of a few minutes that comes four years later.

As he explains: ‘It’s something I learnt from Bob at a very young age. That everything you do you’re not going to see immediate rewards, it’s going to take a long time before we see the improvement. If you stay positive, and you think anything’s possible, you can do whatever you want.’

All those lengths of the pool was like a machine tuning itself, being tinkered with, being oiled, getting prepared, obviously, for one insane fortnight in Beijing.

It’s why Phelps says, once on the blocks, he is not thinking, he’s ready. ‘Once I’m getting up to race, to compete, I don’t think. I’m there to do a job, that’s all I am thinking about.’ What he’s done, he says, is ‘programmed myself’ for greatness.

But before races, after races, to get to his point of brilliance, Phelps’ real weapon is not body but mind. His virtues are both the quantity, and purity, of his desire and his perseverance.

He admits there were days this past week ‘where I was so tired, exhausted, I just wanted to go back to bed’.

But his response was always mighty, for he told himself: ‘This is the Olympic Games, I can’t be tired, I’ve got to get up. If I didn’t get up, then why am I here. This is the biggest of the big.’”

The second lesson is to never question yourself or your abilities. Fix your eye on the prize, the goal, the finish line, and just go for it; there is no room for doubt.

The interview continues:

Surely, I ask, there was one moment, where doubt visited. After all, what he was trying had never been achieved.

He shook his head. ‘You can’t doubt. If you doubt, then that’s it. The biggest thing is staying positive and imagining anything is possible. Because it really is.’ Yes, now we know.

Thank you Phelps for being such a great example of a dream chaser; of excellence; of positivity; of mental strength; of perseverance.

You have changed the world. Now it’s our turn to get in the pool.

I want this heart. I want to chase my dreams.

Photo: Albert Sim, Straits Times

BEIJING: The Water Cube is silent. The waters still. The scoreboard blank. The dream done. Michael has gone.

A champion has departed but he has left us fulfilled. Almost every morning, through nine days, I have arrived at this pool, collected the race schedule, climbed to the top stands of the Water Cube and watched a man chase his dream.

Always when he won, and always he won, I was on my feet. Michael does that to people, he moves them. He is an American, with a sad haircut, I do not know him, but it seemed impossible not to get involved with his dream.

To chase eight golds was not arrogance, it was simply desperately brave. If he failed, so be it, but he was willing to try. History anyway is never made by the faint-hearted.

What happens when we watch sport? We are thrilled, inspired, impressed, entertained. But with Phelps, unusual emotions came into play: We were grateful, we were humbled. Mainly because he let us be witness to something we have never seen before. Or possibly again.

Phelps fascinated us, he forced us to look at him, with those boy’s hips, a stevedore’s shoulders, arms like cables, stumpy legs, flipper feet, no hair, a physique so strange it’s almost like a human jigsaw puzzle gone wrong.

We liked him because he seemed unaffected, never shirking a press conference, sitting there, face long, mouth open, tiredness collecting at the corners of his lips, never complaining, never boasting, never sounding bored.

Once a Chinese journalist asked him the world’s longest question, Phelps couldn’t hear the translation, chaos ensued, other journalists wanted to move on, but he waited, another translation was made, he answered.

Champions are not judged on decency, but it is just pleasing when they are unaffected by their own heroics. Throughout the nine days, Phelps explained his goal as raising swimming’s profile, of altering its status as a four-yearly sport.

Yesterday, he revealed, friends had told him ‘it’s crazy’ in the US, that on television the swimming is always on. Actually it is he who is always on, he who America watches, but he didn’t say it. It was a nice touch.

We liked him, this revolutionary, because there is something pure to him, even noble, an athlete blanking out everything for nine days, just simply and singularly fixated on his dream.

How did he get up so early, find energy, push himself, not go out (movies and sleep is all he did), see his mother for only 30 seconds, manage his emotions, and then summon his best every time?

Maybe, we will never know. I don’t want to know. Because something so extraordinary, so beautiful, should just be enjoyed not completely understood.

If genius could be explained, it would take some of the mystery out of it. It would make it seem common. It seems fitting that forever we will look back at Michael Phelps and ask: How?

These Games are not over, but these Games belong to Phelps. Even if a swimmer, under two caps, behind goggles, obscured in the water, seems an unlikely athletic god.

Some believe he should say farewell. Eight gold is his measuring tape and eight gold is unbeatable. Of course, that’s what we said about seven.

But Phelps will swim on, and should swim on. He has to compete in next year’s World Championships because his mum has never seen Rome, he grinned, and she wants to. And he’s an obedient boy.

He has to keep swimming because he wants more people to go swimming, watch swimming and he’s not close to his goal yet.

He has to keep swimming because he still hasn’t discovered how far his talent extends, he wants to try new events, perhaps the sprints. And anyone who has seen him this week, do they want to say stop to this man?

Towards the end of his final press conference yesterday, a journalist mentioned that we had heard everyone’s view on him, but what did Michael Phelps think of Michael Phelps.

He grinned. He paused. He said: ‘I’m lucky to have everything I have. I am lucky to have the talent, the drive, the want, the excitement about sport. I am fortunate for every quality I have.’

He got up. People clapped. He slid his lanky body through the throng, adjusted his cap and strolled away. Just a man searching for a new dream.

rohitb@sph.com.sg

Love what was written on A W Mill’s:

When he came there was no light;

When he left there was no darkness.

Shine on, Carebears of the world. :)

I’m taking some time to work on my final report for the trip this weekend, so I will be disallowing myself much online access. But many of you my readers are also my very kind donors, and be rest assured that you will receive a copy when I’m done! :)

Thank you for your patience. Oh, and Happy Birthday Singapore!

The night began with the brothel-owner meeting, then we headed out to the Soi to give condoms out, and finally it ended with an hour or so at a Ping Pong Show.

O what a night.

If you’ve never been to the scene in Pattaya, it’s Soi after Soi of bright lights and girls/boys/ladyboys sitting on the outside of their bar-brothels, hoping to charm the next farang into their arms. (Farang is the generic Thai term used for white foreigners; it literally is the Thai pronunciation of “France.”)

Photo: Jennryn Wetzler

The girls went crazy when a foreigner would go by, grabbing them by the arms and chattering over them. (They also reportedly grabbed one of our own girls that way the night before.)

They also went crazy, although slightly less enthusiastic, when we started distributing our condoms. Durex’s chocolate flavoured ones were pretty popular, I have to say.

Upon receiving our pink boxes, some complained that the Thai-sized condoms were too small for their clientele. Fair enough… a quick look around the Soi and you would see that most of the men hanging around, talking to girls were all white men, or farang.

There were also two Japanese men at the end of the street, and they appeared to speak fluent Thai… and Japanese of course, but not English. They approached us curiously , and one of the guys shamelessly started chatting me up in Thai.

I was like… are you serious?!

I did not see any children that night, although one of us allegedly spotted a really young person with a farang along the beach.

One of the working girls also came up to us. She introduced herself to us as Ohn, or at least that’s how I think it would be spelt. She was wildly friendly, looked a little tired, but kept a smile on her face.

There was a clear language barrier, but I held her hand, looked her in the eyes, and wished her all the best in life. She gripped my hand back, laughed loudly, and flamboyantly gave me air kisses. This was her life and she was living it; she left no room for sorry feelings, dare I feel that way. Again, this was a “normal” that I was not used to.

Photo: Nicole Adenauer

Perhaps the hardest part of the night for our group was the Ping Pong Show. This is us just before we went in.

Everything you’ve heard about what goes on in these shows…. is true.

Now I think having been a Cinema Studies major, I’ve unconsciously developed all sorts of coping mechanisms with shocking images. Either that, or having heard about what goes on in Ping Pong Shows and being shocked then, actually seeing it with my own eyes left me with an interesting state of heaviness, but I was nowhere near disturbed or upset as the other girls.

During the performances, I kept looking to see if at some point the girls would present themselves in the carnivalesque air of fun present at the Moulin Rouge, but none of them offered even so much as a smile.

“I’ve seen what they do, and the girls didn’t look happy,” one of the girls said at the end of the night.

It couldn’t be described as entertainment, when sometimes it was almost painful to watch.

I’ve yet to make sense of how I feel about this industry, when “normal” there is really something else; where dignity has been exchanged for money.

But if the choice in this different realm of normal was between poverty and public vaginal display, would we really prefer the former?

I have no answers.