One Day, Six Villages

Wow, I’m exhausted and wet, we all are. We hit the road going south today and got far enough out of Kunming to find villages that are not being torn down. We went to six different villages and went to the local government building with cameras and all and asked the question, “Do you know of any poor kids in your area?” Two of the village government workers led us to two tragic stories that I’m sure will both make their way into the documentary. The map below shows where we were. Anywhere you see the word “Cun” indicates there is a village there, and we were probably there too. Tomorrow we head into the mountains for some more adventure. I’ll put up a video of one of the kids we found tomorrow. Good night or good morning wherever you are reading this from…

Roger

Rain is good, just not right now please

It’s really good to get rain in our area, especially after one of the worst droughts in Yunnan history, but we really need a break from it for filming.

Hope-Mobile Has A Flat

Today was a really rainy day. We went to a village on the edge of town that was like a ghost town. Every building had been marked to be demolished and most of the residents had already moved out. We found a family with a few kids that lived inside one of the houses but they wouldn’t let us come in to talk with them. A huge rat came running out of their house and scared Irene half to death. That made for a good laugh.

Then we had a meeting and great interview with the principal of a school for kids that are not allowed to go to regular school because they have no Kunming ID Card (most 0f them are migrant workers’ kids). During his interview it started raining and basically rained us out for the rest of the day.

Oh yeah, and this morning we had a flat… (sabotage)

better days ahead…

Take a good look at this face…

Is this the face that will raise up a new generation of Chinese that will search out and find those kids in need and proactively help them. Have we found the subject of the documentary in this young boy? We shall see… Keep us in mind as we find kids in need. It is our responsibility to bring them hope.

Dude, where are all the boys?

Last night and today we have been visiting villages within the city that are mostly occupied by trash pickers. These are families that literally dig through the trash cans of the city everyday looking for materials they can sell. In doing this we have discovered a huge problem.

Last night we came across a family who had 6 girls and they lived in 1 small room. That’s grandma, grandpa, mom, dad and 6 girls in a room about the size of my bedroom in America. I can’t even begin to describe the situation they were living in (we filmed it and interviewed them). The lady and her husband have basically put themselves in this situation all because they want a son. Their first child was a boy but he was stolen as a baby (another huge problem in poor parts of China).

The kids all go to school but this generational poverty is very hard to break. This morning in another area we met the same situation and heard of countless other stories of the same vein. Families with too many kids (all girls) putting them deeper and deeper into poverty.

How do you change something like that?