Justice For Youth launched its first ever summer of service over the months of June and July. Two JFY teams—21 people—-traveled a combined total of 253,942 miles by air and another 8,514 miles by foot for ONE reason: to champion hope for youth at risk across Australia and London by raising awareness on the issue of human trafficking!
In London we had the opportunity to work with “Global Initiative To Fight Human Trafficking” sponsored by the United Nations. Working alongside Stop The Traffik, we gathered petitions and spoke withe hundreds of people each day who were drawn to our “UN Gift Box” displays that were strategically situated all over the city. One such display was in St Paul’s Cathedral, where Princess Diana and Prince Charles were married. We gathered thousands of petitions and our sense was that people were very open to hearing more about the subject of human trafficking and what can be done about it.
Joining our team in London was JFY Advocate Rosen, who traveled all the way from Asia to be with us. Rosen was born an orphan in Bulgaria, was adopted by an American couple at age 13, and has now dedicated his life to championing youth at risk and he world. At age 27 he has been to 38 countries. Next summer he wants to lead a team to Eastern Europe to raise awareness in Russia, Ukraine and Moldova. If you are interested, let us know HERE
This summer was, in many ways, a “trial balloon.” We wanted to see what would happen if we stepped out and took some teams on location for research, awareness and collaboration. We are happy to say “We did it!” And we want to do it again! See you next summer!