The Children of the Coal Mines

Oh [Music] [Music] [Music] when I go down the coal mine there's not enough air and I have trouble breathing I feel like I'm living in another world the rat world it's pitch black darker than at night that's what it's light down the coal mine I'm happy to work here because we make good money we get paid based on output but of course it's very tough you have to bust your guts to meet ones coal quota as fast as possible so that you can get home and rest and get some sleep [Music] I work eight hours a day every day from Monday to Saturday they hire us children because we can squeeze along the narrow galleries in the mind and that's why the bosses are happy to have us dad it's almost four o'clock and so what can we stop now I'm very tired I make about $25 a week my father makes only 20 he makes less than I do because it's harder for him to dig and he produces less than I do terribly hot in the mine and I'm not very healthy I have high blood pressure and I have trouble breathing so I cannot work as fast as the others [Applause] so how I'm burning before coming here I was a farmer but it didn't pay enough I couldn't feed my family I have eight children even today I still cannot pay for their school fees we've always been poor so we have to put up with the dangerous work in order to survive force my son to go down the mine he can go back to the village to his mother if he wants to but he's the one who insists on working with me I would have preferred to go to school but as we've got no money I have to slave away here in fact there's no age limit for studying there's someone in my home village that I know it's a 80 year old woman who's just started going to elementary school so I tell myself I've plenty of time to study first I need to work hard in the coal mine and maybe one day I'll succeed [Music] here in the propagation the method of coal mining is primitive fathers have no qualms about sending their children to do very hard labor which can be devastating for their health this is highly irresponsible because the mines are and healthy and dangerous meanness to formally exploit Azul but it has done even in this play the polygamist of the children in the area work in the mind because their family is a destitute go to school in the morning and work in the mine in the afternoon some do it spontaneously because it's a family tradition others do it to help their needy parents they didn't really have a choice like young rhyme a hand raised [Music] [Music] [Music] we're spaced on line 19 yeah you Rea you I'm a widow with no income and so my son has to help me by working three hours a day in the mine except on Sunday his job is to unload the coal does not have to go down the mine all you do you have gone to ground you see I don't even know what they make him do up there it's true it is dangerous that's why I would prefer it if you didn't go this year and next year I'll send him to Bogota to do a safer job and it will also be better for his schooling not to have to go down the mine if I could afford it of course I would stop but here in Topanga there's nothing else we can do if you don't dig coal how are you going to pay for food for clothing and school we have to pay for the books school uniforms and school supplies no cardiac on the up or demean it every day I go down I risk my life I'm scared because I know many who did not make it back it's very dangerous here the mines are not well maintained or propped up nothing is safe and it may collapse on your head at any time we damage our health for just peanuts sometimes it makes me cry I'm so upset that sometimes I cry when you're down in the mind it's your lungs that really suffer you breathe the coal dust all the time we have two friends who died in the mine and their father had forced them to go down and part of the mine caved in and they died suffocated and since then we we don't want to work down there the accident really scared us but we're still forced to go and do the same job ready one day something should be done to stop this gambling with our lives 22 he and his Olivia Teresa talented American Columbia well there isn't Columbia Health and Safety regulation which forbids employing children under 18 and women unfortunately they're no mind police which can strictly enforce that law the coal producers are quite happy with the situation they take advantage of the chaotic state at the market and the fact that there are many small-scale unregistered coal producers to buy coal from at a low price of course these illegal practices shouldn't be tolerated but shutting all the mines would risk creating a social upheaval in the sector people here know Porter's Vegas Reverend government wants to enforce rules like the one which bars children from working in the coal mines but we don't really have a choice and if we don't work hard we run the risk of becoming delinquents stealing or killing to survive hurts us with these laws because young people could become tramps and forget what honest work is all about so for me I prefer to kill myself working hard and at least that way I'm in no danger of becoming a Gary gyro there's so much violence in Colombia that I think stopping children to do honest work would be a crime what about where you come from do children have to work down the mines - because here we all have to do it we live like moles and we never see the light of day I'd love to do something else but but what yeah there's only coal mining home we're exhausted I'm too tired to be able to study I'm far behind in my studies I haven't given up hope of succeeding one day I stand by a stoker at the hospital all are you know very nice I go to town to saga Moses I see pretty girls I would love to have a girlfriend like that but it's impossible because I'm just a little coal miner it's not a chance with these girls when I'm digging down the mine I dream about them [Music] gasps ooh this beetle [Music] for a sixteen-year-old girl like me mine is not a life we have to sacrifice our youth in order to survive risky I really wish that fathers would not have to force their children to work in the galleries because it's not human values nini escape I'm Elijah but here there are too many starving youngsters who cried is this hardship the government doesn't give a damn they don't realize how much suffering is going on here I really wish somebody would start caring about us it's only thanks to God if we survive because around here everybody has to work that is if we yeah the only thing missing my husband left me with nothing when the children were very small he didn't even leave me a picture or just a few pesos that's why I have to make my own children work the poor kids have not even been to primary school soon to let children there down the mines like this animals we can't even stand up straight we have to stay bent over makes it even harder as we suffer from cramps and legs the Colson's very hard it's very difficult to get the coal out coal mine is not a place for a woman like me it's too difficult ragged then iron less than a man because of course and it produce as much it is like being a slave here Rosita how much did you manage to dig out today a quarter of a ton was the gallery safe more or less how much did you do a quarter of a ton as well not break up the coal yeah man I can record a pirate this is you've got to do its turn your money Oh Sheila Vaden said him I know that he sent you premature God looks after us I would come back tomorrow like the sign of a cross and go down se lo que no it's my love it my gallery is lower because of the coal seam here you have to kneel today it is very hard for these poor women and the other minds don't want them they have to feed their children somehow gonna be nice to these people I feel like I really need to look after [Music] [Music] me walking down the mine deforms my body look at my legs and my arms they look like a man's lot of girls you must be sad I mean lucky I don't like seeing my profile becoming like that and my lungs are clogged with coal dust and I can't breathe anymore so then I have to go up for some air [Applause] we have no healthcare to help us nothing doesn't give a damn we are not [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] it is capability you are season is y we set up this cooperative to provide the children in the area with another option here we have two types of activities cold sculpting and sewing children make pre-columbian figurines paperweights and other gadgets and then the figurines I sold off to tourists cooperative keeps 20% of the selling price for this administrative costs kids get so for example for this figurine a child will make about a dollar for a half day's work which is less than half the country's minimum wage only a minority of the region's children work here many any come to the workshop for a short time because they don't make any money during their training period whereas in the mind they get paid the same day [Music] I myself had to push the Barrow when I was 11 and sometimes I cried I was so exhausted and so firstly we worked from 6:00 in the morning till 5:00 in the afternoon conditions really are inhuman unacceptable for children that's why I struggle to keep our cooperative going [Applause] [Applause] her mother is Rosa chaparro their story makes me very sad begged her several times to stop digging down the mines but this poor woman doesn't have enough money to feed her poor children and she keeps working herself much too hard and tomorrow what will happen to them gasping sorry Leslie you say Korea agrees to be on dope arrow my club the Ramones started then to pass a test blick algo el estudio when me too I work in the mind but I'm lucky because I go to school in the morning so that later I will have a professional career I spit all their lives in Yongsan Yami got Molina I tried to help my best friend milena by giving her private lessons so that she can catch up Nobuko commence in America a little I learned from Martha will always be useful because in this area you have to work like slaves and the mind if you don't go to school you ma'am you got me see how you and all your kiddos Jalisco thanks my best friend I hope to get out one day but will I really be able to nothing mama you're possibly that there's a good history and but those that bow up as they see in their podcast oh it's the weekend after we get our pay I go home to my village to see if things are okay with my family my mother my little brothers and sisters it's important to be concerned about your close relatives and they work far away from them and I miss them the last time I played football this kind of life was fun when I was a kid today I would feel a bit ashamed to be like a child again I see quite a scale yatra hard it's been about five years that I've been slaving away in the mines and it's too late to want to live like a kid of my own age I'm too used to having to work so staying home idle without earning a living is not my thing I'm better off staying and working at the mine there at least I feel ok so before I go down into the mine I always cross myself ground I feel protected by God the Virgin Mary

Channel: Best Documentary

Views: 59,112

Rating: 4.7894735 out of 5

Keywords: coal mines underground, coal mines, documentary, english, documentary 2019, documentary national geographic, coal mining, children documentary, colombia documentary, documentary now, children, workers, hard work, hard life, columbian, columbia, documentaries

Id: TxzOl7lDhqo

Length: 26min 42sec (1602 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 05 2019