Puppets

This is Nak, Nary and Chhan. The three children who appear in the Good Touch Bad Touch Puppets flipchart - a resource put together by three NGOs: Love146, Chab Dai and Resource Development International - which aims to teach children how to look after themselves and empower them to keep safe from sexual abuse.

In the flipchart story, Nak, Nary and Chhan are affected by abuse in different ways which, obviously, is very frightening for them. But in supporting each other, speaking up and phoning Child Helpline (a free 24hr telephone service available across Cambodia) they are able to get help.

The flipchart also teaches four important messages for children to learn off by heart:

- I am valuable and so are you.
- Safety is my right.
- My body belongs to me.
- I can get help.



So far Nak, Nary and Chhan's story has been heard by hundreds of children in provinces across Cambodia. And children in Nepal, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines will soon get to hear it too with the flipchart being translated into their languages.

So Nak, Nary and Chhan are doing an amazing thing in addressing an issue that, in Asia, as in many parts of the world, is huge but often kept hidden or hardly spoken about. And in telling their story, helping other children tell their story too.

Yesterday I hope they enjoyed seeing Cambodians eager to take the message out there when my colleague, Sophorn from Love146, and I facilitated a training day. And I hope they're excited at the prospect of Sophorn and I going to Nepal and Bangladesh in the next few months to train NGO workers and seeing their story have an effect there.

No guesses that I'm excited :-)