화장실이 고무대야... 열악한 이주 노동자들의 기숙사
The recent death of a Cambodian migrant worker in South Korea turned the spotlight to poor working conditions for these foreginers.
The woman lived in a room with no proper heating, ventilation, or even a bathroom.
Kim Yeon-seung zooms in on this issue.
“When you’re living here, is it worse during the winter or the summer?”
"Summers are tougher. There's a lot of work. It's also really cold in the winter. That's also tough."
Many migrant farm workers in South Korea dread the extremes of the country's climate.
Their dormitories, which are basically plastic-covered greenhouses, offer little protection against both the sweltering summer heat and the blistering winter cold.
"This whole place is an illegal temporary building that breaks several safety codes.
The walls are built out of vinyl and plastic and if you see in here,... this is built out of polystyrene foam and shipping containers."
During one of the coldest nights of 2020,... when temperatures plummeted to minus 18 degrees Celsius, a migrant farm worker died in a room that had no heating.
This has stoked anger among activists and brought public attention to the sub-standard living conditions of migrant workers in South Korea.
"There's an LPG gas cylinder just left out in the open, which could potentially be a fire hazard or even lead to a gas leak.
This room is used both as a kitchen and a shower room, but as you can see the ventilation is very poor in here and the place quickly filled up with smoke after cooking."
The room is damp... and thick with the smell of fungus and mold.
"Now if you see over here, this is their bathroom.
Three women in their 20s all use this bathroom.
It's basically just a rubber basin planted in the ground with a few wooden planks on top.
It's highly unsanitary and obviously there's no flushing."
Farm owners charge workers between 135 U.S. dollars to 270 dollars a month to live in such conditions.
Local pastor Kim Dal-seong runs a one-person support center for the nearly 25-thousand migrant workers in Pocheon.
He demands legal protection for the workers.
"A plastic porta-potty generally costs around 200 dollars. They didn't even bother to place a 200-dollar porta-potty here and gave workers a bathroom that you could only see in the 50s or 60s in South Korea."
But as migrants need their employer's permission to extend their visa or move to another workplace, many workers dare not voice their complaints.
Kim Yeon-seung, Arirang News.
#plastic_sheet #SouthKorea #bathroom
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2021-02-25, 22:00 (KST)
