Blood, Sweat & Takeaways

Last night husband and I watched an episode of the documentary 'Blood, Sweat & Takeaways'. The first part of the episode was about how rice is planted and harvested in Thailand. The second part is about how immigrant workers from the rural areas work in chicken processing factories and fish processing shops in Bangkok. This episode also showed how young girls have no choice but to work as prostitutes in Bangkok in order to support their families.

Here is the synopsis for the documentary:

'Most of us don't know where our food comes from, how it's made and at what cost. We don't know about the appalling conditions that many workers endure to produce it cheaply, the long hours and low rates of pay they offer and the damaging effects on the communities and environment where the foods are produced.

In Blood, Sweat and Takeaways, six young fast food junkies (from UK) will embark on a grueling month-long journey into a world they know nothing about, to discover the tough truth behind their fast food fixes.

During this immersive shock therapy, they'll have to work at every stage of the production process. Only by growing, rearing, harvesting, processing, preparing and cooking the foods will they truly discover what goes into getting it onto their plate and into their gob.

They'll also have to live and toil alongside the poorly paid workers, carrying out the most grim, physical, bloody tasks, living in appalling conditions and trying to survive on the wages. In taking on this challenge, the participants will also witness the effects these operations have on the local environment and culture.

Each episode will focus on a different food that's at the heart of many of our favourite processed and take-away meals: tuna (Indonesia), prawns (Indonesia), rice (Thailand) and chicken (Thailand) .'

Since husband is from Cambodia, he shared his experience about witnessing poverty among rice farmers and fishing villages when he was growing up. Due to the extreme low literacy level in rural areas, they do not have access to knowledge and technology to make rice fields more productive. Fishermen also only have canoes and small fishing boats to cast nets in the open sea. These both type of jobs are labor intensive and yield small harvests.

I feel so fortunate that my parents worked hard to give my sibling and I a good standard of living. I also feel blessed to grow up in Singapore during the era when public school was made available and afforable to most children.

Allah SWT willing I hope that I can teach daughter to appreciate where food comes from, and that we should count every little blessings that Allah SWT give us.