Courtesy of Diana Mao

On a recent trip to Cambodia, Diana Mao and Alissa Moore met a mentally handicapped girl. At the age of eight, she was a sex trafficking victim who had escaped to a rehabilitation home. According to the director of the home, her mental disability was likely a result of the abuse she had suffered at the various brothels for which she’d been forced to work. Mao, 27, and Moore, 24, who had been working to start a nonprofit to fight sex trafficking, decided to name their project after her: Nomi Network. To keep her anonymous, they changed the spelling of the name, making it a play on the phrase “know me.” “We want people to know her, know her story, know her success,” said Mao.

The network, which started in 2007, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to “bridging the private, public and nonprofit sectors through enterprise and education to end human trafficking.” They employ former Cambodian sex workers to design goods that are then sold in the United States. The women are paid, and the women develop profitable skills for themselves. One such product is a tote bag that is inscribed with the words, “Buy her bag, not her body.” “We really care about the women and their development,” said Mao. “We don’t want it to end at just a job. We want them to have a career and go back to their families if they want to.” The goal is to provide these women with a living wage, health benefits, childcare and insurance.

The two founders were brought together based on their shared passion for public service and human rights. Mao studied economics at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service, and her active membership in a Christian fellowship led her to an interest in “what was going on globally in terms of social justice and poverty.” A trip to Egypt led her to reevaluate how lucky she had been her whole life. One notable memory was a village where “children danced around with open syringes, piles of trash, no shoes, and flies everywhere. I saw how good I really had it,” she said.

Moore, who studied at Skidmore, had attempted to begin an outreach chapter in college to fight sex trafficking in Southeast Asia. “I had the early experience of being interested in the topic but I didn’t really know how to address the need,” she said. When she heard Mao was working with her church to fight sex trafficking, Moore jumped onboard. “My degree was in theater and American studies,” she said. “So this was very appealing to me. I got a chance to stretch certain muscles that I didn’t really use before.”

Numbers like these sadly suggest there’s no end in sight for the endless victims of this underground trade. “There are times I am discouraged because I feel that 27 million slaves is overwhelming,” said Mao, “However, I am always reminded of Nomi, the reason we started Nomi Network. If we could help even one girl, then it is worth it.”

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