'Sweatshop' is a Norwegian Format, created by Norway's largest newspaper Aftenposten, that sends young
clothes lovers to experience life for sweatshop workers in Cambodia and
although it may have thrown out mixed opinions online, I absolutely loved it.
It's not our usual, pack your naughty teens off to a third world country and
let them see how lucky they really are, it's a wake up call to all of us and I
think it has the potential to branch out to other issues too.
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| Spending the night with Oudum - khmertimeskh.com |
What makes it even more brilliant is the fact that it exists
in 10min episodes online - I think Norwegians are grasping the future of
television quicker than the rest of us perhaps (even if it's not intended as such). We watch everything online now,
and don't want to dedicate hours of our dwindling spare time, watching a
depressing programme about how life is unfair. But in 10min stints, we find
ourselves wanting to watch on, wanting to click through to the next link. And I
don't think it's a format that couldn't just as easily return in Norway, but
also work here in the UK. It would work to pack normal everyday people off to
other cultures to learn, not what amazing sights the countries
have to offer (this isn't another Joanna Lumley special) but to see what life has
to offer for those whom live there. Ordinary people, meet ordinary people and
create some rather spectacular television.
Not only was the platform great, the content was too. It had
reasonable production value although, as contributor Ludwig shares, it was difficult
trying to get any sweatshop to allow them to film. With conditions exploiting a
lack of toilet facilities, lack of good food and with employees earning just $3
a day and working long hours - I wonder why!
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| sobadsogood.com |
But the team succeeded and what came out of that, was a
glimpse at what life might be like for the average working class Cambodian. We
follow our three young protagonists, Frida, Ludvig and Anniken as they stand
surrounded by overcrowded trucks delivering hundreds of workers to factories to
earn their living. With them, we meet Oudum who earns $130 a month and pays $30
of that for a small room in Phnom Penh and with water &
electricity, it often reaches up $50 a month. That's 17 days work and she works
7 days a week for between 11 & 13hours a day, except Sundays when she
works for 8 hours. Oudum is incredibly blunt about her situation, she does not cry, she does not falter. She is perhaps, the strongest woman our teens have ever met.
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| dressedandstripped.nl |
Ludvig is from Oslo, he seems like a normal laid back kind
of guy, who enjoys looking good. He is moved often by the struggle of those he
meets in Cambodia and seems more sympathetic to their plight than the girls. He
is a character with whom the viewer can really identify and he’s very likeable.
During their stay, the three Norwegians see protests for a
fair wage and are moved by the determination of the Cambodians to get up each
morning and go to work. Their main plight is just for their minimum wage to
increase from just £60 to £100 ($160) a month to feed their families. Ludvig
was moved by this so much that he decided to tattoo this sticker used in the
worker's protests, on his ankle...
Ludvig: His
passion to their cause really impressed me.
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| so-trendy.fr |
Frida is young and naïve but you can see she genuinely
cares about the lack of worker’s rights and is particularly moved by a lady who
tells her that her mother died of starvation when she was young. Although she is
moved by the situation of those she meets, she does not seem like the type of
person to act upon it.
The teens come
out with some pretty strong opinions off the back of this day spent listen to
the woes of activists and garment workers:
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| rifeoffame.com |
Frida: I had to
hold her hand to show how grateful I was to hear her story.
Anniken: When you
begin talking to a person you see she is just as valuable as you are… She is just
19 and she tells me that her mother died of starvation. What kind of life is
that? How must it be yo begin life like that? Her mother did not die because of
illness or because she was killed. She starved to death because they did not
have money for food.
Ludvig: I don’t
have words for it. It’s just so extremely unfair. And the truth is that we are
rich because they are poor
Frida: I am just put out by all this. I never imagined these
things were real.
Anniken: We will
influence people to care. That is our work now.
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| fr-fr.facebook.com |
However, I wondered for 17yr old fashion blogger Anniken,
will this change anything about her career in clothes? Will it truly be her
work now? She went to Cambodia having run one of the most successful blogs in
Norway, with 10,000 readers a day, and hadn't paid for any clothing for a year
as it was sent to her free. She was moved to tears in the programme and came to
some profound conclusions about their role in motivating change, but I wondered
if it would change the way she approached her blog... and indeed, her 81,000
Instagram followers - why not read her blog for yourself and see just how much
of an impact it really had:
http://annijor.blogg.no/
And it made
an impact on me. I, like so many others have an eye for a bargain, and now
again it does cross our mind that people work long hours on no pay to make them
for us. But you just don’t think that because you buy an item of clothing for
£5, that people die of starvation because they cannot afford food. It most
certainly made me think more about my love for bargains. I’d be interested to
see Frida, Ludvig and Anniken a year from now and see what differences the experience
really inspired in them too.
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| Oudum & Anniken |
The production was one of unexpected quality from my point of
view with some well-chosen, and well-timed changes in tone throughout with a
suitable soundtrack. Overall, I think I'm really going to look into taking a
similar format on myself. It has so much potential, not only to work well as a
format but also to act as aid to leverage change. Definitely can't wait to
start brainstorming this one.
Make sure you watch the series yourself, go on, it's
only 5 x 10mins of your life and might just change just a little part of it!
WATCH IT HERE:
