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On May 8, 1992, Taiwanese government passed the 《Employment Services Act》, allowing the introduction of industrial migrant workers. Until 2016, over 600 thousand migrant workers, including legal and illegal workers, from Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia and Philippines work in Taiwan. In other words, there is approximately one Southeast Asian migrant worker in every forty people living in Taiwan. However, the attitudes of general public toward these Southeast Asian are not friendly, demonstrating in their working environment, average salary and the use of public space.
This documentary mainly focuses on observing Southeast Asian migrant workers who attended “One-Forty Business School” in 2015 or participated in One-Forty activities. Through filming and editing this documentary, I would like to demonstrate current situation of migrant workers in Taiwan and their changes when they go back to Indonesia. This documentary also records the process of Taiwanese NPO workers effort in Southeast Asian migrant workers issue.
The first semester of One-Forty Business School started at July 12, 2015, and ended on September 20, 2015. On the last day of class, One-Forty, partnering with “Meet Taipei:Design”, held an event in Taipei Main Station. Combining the final presentation of One-Forty Business School and cultural exchange activities, this event gave five migrant workers a chance to share their life stories and rebuild their confidence. Furthermore, this event allowed Taiwanese to see the true color of Southeast Asian culture and people.
My previous experiences were filming behind the camera. However, this time, because of limitation of one-person shooting and needs for multiple angles, I was not objective anymore. Also, because of long period of observation, my opinion toward this issue was limited and overlooked some others perspectives. The community have diverse views, approval and disapproval, to different issues；therefore, during the filming process, many difficulties of implement needed to be overcome.
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