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Every Cloud Has A Silver Lining!

Covid 19 has been with us for more than two years already. However, I have not heard any predictions over that period that have come true. It was a new phenomenon for most of us. In fact, for all of us when it is seen as a global plague. So, there is little wonder that no-one could foresee any outcomes accurately.

Nevertheless, we all know that there have been consequences to the pandemic. Most people will point to the negative aspects like sickness, death, lockdowns and job loss. Nevertheless, there have also been positive outcomes too.

Unforeseen Consequences of Covid

They are probably different depending on where you live and what you used to do for a living. I live in a small, remote mainly rice-farming village in northern Thailand, so I will tell you about that. Most working people here are farmers or farm labourers. It is a hard life with the long hours and lack of holidays that most farmers around the world are aware of.

Very few of the boys and none of the girls want to become farmers like their parents. University is a more realistic expectation now than ever before. However, otherwise the youth has been flocking to the tourist destinations for decades.

Improved Job Status

Many ended up as shop or factory workers. However, those who could handle it, and were pretty enough, often dabbled in the sex-tourism industry in the hope of meeting a ‘rich foreigner’, who would rescue them.

However, the constant flow of foreigners has dried up because of the Covid 19 restrictions on travel… You see, most ‘rich foreigners’ came from Europe or America. Consequently, the vast majority of the pretty girls in the tourist traps have lost their jobs. Most have had to return to their villages, where many of them have young children. This means that because of Covid 19, many children will enjoy the constant presence of their mother, which they would otherwise have missed out on.

This often means that the former bar girl (yes, and some boys) have to go back to school to learn a skill. This is great for their self-esteem and great for their children too, because it gives them a better role model.

Covid-19 Family Benefits

Covid 19 has given many sex workers, several hundred thousand of them, and their families a new chance, and that has to be a good thing.

You can read a series of books that I wrote about a sex-worker. She, Lek, also returned home to her daughter, family and village.

Click the link below. It has nothing to do with Covid-19 as I wrote it many years before the outbreak. However, the principle is the same.

BEHIND THE SMILE by Owen Jones.