00:00:29.797 --> 00:00:47.580
[music playing]

00:00:47.715 --> 00:00:52.319
Midstream, a muddy
estuary near a port,

00:00:52.454 --> 00:00:57.090
forgotten space, out
of sight, out of mind.

00:00:57.225 --> 00:01:01.562
Upstream, the hinterland,
a greedy continent.

00:01:01.696 --> 00:01:07.134
Downstream, other ports,
great harbor cities, oceans,

00:01:07.268 --> 00:01:11.238
100,000 invisible
ships, 1 and 1/2 million

00:01:11.372 --> 00:01:16.276
invisible seafarers, finding the
world together through trade.

00:01:16.410 --> 00:01:39.733
[gulls crying]

00:01:39.867 --> 00:01:42.602
Below the dike wall, a village.

00:01:42.736 --> 00:01:45.972
The dike protects the
village from the sea.

00:01:46.107 --> 00:02:04.557
But what protects the
village from the sea economy?

00:02:04.692 --> 00:02:06.927
The unlikely story
of a steel box

00:02:07.061 --> 00:02:10.097
that changed the
world trading system.

00:02:10.231 --> 00:02:12.599
Ships now resemble
floating warehouses,

00:02:12.734 --> 00:02:15.736
plying fixed routes
between producing countries

00:02:15.870 --> 00:02:17.838
and consuming countries.

00:02:17.972 --> 00:02:20.040
While factories
become ship-like,

00:02:20.174 --> 00:02:22.242
stealing away in
the dead of night,

00:02:22.377 --> 00:02:29.783
in search of cheaper labor.

00:02:29.917 --> 00:02:32.753
Does the anonymity of
the box turn the sea

00:02:32.888 --> 00:02:37.591
of exploit and adventure into
a lake of invisible drudgery?

00:02:37.726 --> 00:02:41.461
Does this box, the acme
of order, efficiency,

00:02:41.596 --> 00:02:45.865
and global progress, create
disorder and destruction

00:02:46.000 --> 00:02:53.206
and throw the world
out of balance?

00:02:53.341 --> 00:02:55.775
Until recently, it was easy
to believe that the world

00:02:55.910 --> 00:02:59.512
economy was running on
automatic, regulating itself

00:02:59.646 --> 00:03:02.982
with an invisible hand.

00:03:03.117 --> 00:03:05.819
Now we know that the global
trading system floats

00:03:05.954 --> 00:03:09.323
on a sea of credit and that
bankers can as comfortably bet

00:03:09.457 --> 00:03:21.568
on failure, as they
can on success.

00:03:21.702 --> 00:03:24.971
[rumbling aircraft]

00:03:25.106 --> 00:03:27.441
Once we've built the first
of these cargo ships,

00:03:27.575 --> 00:03:29.309
the ship owners will be
around us like flies.

00:03:29.444 --> 00:03:31.144
Well, what's the next step?

00:03:31.279 --> 00:03:32.779
We start building, of course.

00:03:32.913 --> 00:03:33.713
How many?

00:03:33.847 --> 00:03:34.380
I don't know.

00:03:34.514 --> 00:03:35.382
I think about five.

00:03:35.515 --> 00:03:36.350
Five.

00:03:36.484 --> 00:03:38.452
That make a difference
to the yard.

00:03:38.586 --> 00:03:40.387
Three dry martinis
please, steward.

00:03:40.521 --> 00:03:42.189
Who's giving us the contracts?

00:03:42.323 --> 00:03:43.990
We don't need any contracts.

00:03:44.125 --> 00:03:45.492
These ships will sail all right.

00:03:45.627 --> 00:03:47.427
And let someone else take
the risk of building them.

00:03:47.562 --> 00:03:49.263
My dear fellow, your
scheme is absolute madness.

00:03:49.397 --> 00:03:49.763
Look, there's a flotilla.

00:03:49.897 --> 00:03:55.402
[murmuring]

00:03:55.536 --> 00:03:58.138
Those is your answer,
thousands of tons

00:03:58.272 --> 00:04:00.707
of shipping laying idle.

00:04:00.842 --> 00:04:03.576
Those ships are idle
because they're uneconomic.

00:04:03.710 --> 00:04:04.611
They ought to be scraped.

00:04:04.746 --> 00:04:06.580
My dear fellow, you're
talking nonsense.

00:04:06.714 --> 00:04:08.582
Most of those ships are
less last five years old

00:04:08.716 --> 00:04:10.250
and yet they're rotting
at their ankles.

00:04:10.384 --> 00:04:11.551
Age has nothing to do with it.

00:04:11.685 --> 00:04:14.421
It's a question of design.

00:04:14.555 --> 00:04:17.357
Michael Powell shows us
a go-it-alone shipbuilder

00:04:17.492 --> 00:04:20.994
trying to save jobs in the
depths of the Great Depression.

00:04:21.128 --> 00:04:25.465
75 years later, we enter yet
another financial crisis.

00:04:25.600 --> 00:04:32.839
But who would think of
making such a film today?

00:04:32.973 --> 00:04:35.775
Of all the forgotten
spaces, the sea

00:04:35.909 --> 00:04:38.344
and its ancient
terribleness is the most

00:04:38.479 --> 00:04:42.649
forgotten, even though more than
9/10 of the world's commerce

00:04:42.783 --> 00:04:45.018
travels in this way.

00:04:45.152 --> 00:04:46.586
The sea is really
remembered only

00:04:46.721 --> 00:04:52.525
when maritime disaster strikes,
when the black tide rolls in.

00:04:52.660 --> 00:04:58.198
Some of the oil is recovered and
burned, polluting twice over.

00:04:58.332 --> 00:05:08.408
And then we forget again.

00:05:08.542 --> 00:05:14.314
[planes rumbling]

00:05:14.447 --> 00:05:38.471
[explosions]

00:05:38.606 --> 00:05:41.608
The sculptor Ossip Xadkine
installed his monument

00:05:41.743 --> 00:05:46.079
to the bombed city
of Rotterdam in 1951.

00:05:46.213 --> 00:05:48.915
The war had ended the
Great Depression, at a cost

00:05:49.050 --> 00:05:54.287
too horrific to be spoken of
in the language of accounting.

00:05:54.422 --> 00:05:56.490
Rising from the
ashes and rubble,

00:05:56.624 --> 00:05:59.526
the city became dynamic again.

00:05:59.660 --> 00:06:03.029
The art critic John Berger
walked around the sculpture.

00:06:03.163 --> 00:06:04.831
He wrote of its
agonized dialogue

00:06:04.965 --> 00:06:07.901
with the sky, that had
brought destruction,

00:06:08.035 --> 00:06:09.502
and the port, that promised.

00:06:09.636 --> 00:06:11.171
Reconstruction.

00:06:11.305 --> 00:06:14.140
Today, as if trapped
in a bell jar,

00:06:14.275 --> 00:06:23.650
the war lament bounces off
the walls of investment banks.

00:06:23.785 --> 00:06:26.053
Cargo containers were
an American invention

00:06:26.187 --> 00:06:30.623
of the mid-1950s, modeled on the
automatic and continuous flow

00:06:30.757 --> 00:06:33.126
of oil into tank ships.

00:06:33.260 --> 00:06:36.896
The box became a fundamental
physical unit of trade.

00:06:37.030 --> 00:06:41.167
In 2008, Rotterdam
handled almost 11 million,

00:06:41.302 --> 00:06:45.672
the busiest port in Europe,
but well behind those of Asia.

00:06:45.807 --> 00:06:47.874
The center of gravity
of the maritime world

00:06:48.008 --> 00:06:51.277
has shifted east.

00:06:51.412 --> 00:06:57.984
The boxes made cargo anonymous,
odorless, secretive, abstract.

00:06:58.118 --> 00:07:00.153
These elderly
Rotterdamers came of age

00:07:00.287 --> 00:07:04.024
in a world of
slings and pallets.

00:07:04.159 --> 00:07:06.893
The old warehouses are now
either demolished and replaced

00:07:07.028 --> 00:07:11.898
by high rises or converted into
expensive waterfront lofts.

00:07:12.032 --> 00:07:13.500
The working port
comes to resemble

00:07:13.634 --> 00:07:17.837
a child's game of blocks
or a gangster's suitcase

00:07:17.971 --> 00:07:26.346
full of dollars.

00:07:26.480 --> 00:07:29.683
As the old harbors are abandoned
to real estate speculators

00:07:29.817 --> 00:07:32.852
and tourists, the
Rotterdam port pushes ever

00:07:32.987 --> 00:07:36.956
outward into the North Sea,
sucking up the sandy seafloor

00:07:37.090 --> 00:07:40.059
and disgorging it into
hectares of new land,

00:07:40.194 --> 00:07:44.330
dedicated to the
moving of boxes.

00:07:44.465 --> 00:07:48.401
Despite being a metropolis in a
cooperative and unified Europe,

00:07:48.536 --> 00:07:50.637
Rotterdam struggles
to hold its advantage

00:07:50.771 --> 00:08:02.616
over the rival ports
of Hamburg and Antwerp.

00:08:02.750 --> 00:08:06.954
Containers did not come
to Rotterdam until 1966.

00:08:07.088 --> 00:08:08.956
They'd been accepted by
dockworkers on the North

00:08:09.090 --> 00:08:12.492
American West Coast a
good six years earlier.

00:08:12.626 --> 00:08:15.896
A powerful, but isolated
left-wing union,

00:08:16.030 --> 00:08:19.098
born in the bloody
confrontations of the 1930s,

00:08:19.233 --> 00:08:21.601
agreed reluctantly
to give control

00:08:21.736 --> 00:08:25.538
over technological
innovation to management.

00:08:25.673 --> 00:08:30.176
From that point on, management
held the keys to job control.

00:08:30.310 --> 00:08:33.680
By the late 1970s, containers
were the standard way

00:08:33.814 --> 00:08:36.149
of moving manufactured
goods between

00:08:36.283 --> 00:08:40.821
the capitalist economies.

00:08:40.955 --> 00:08:42.856
In the outer terminals
in Rotterdam,

00:08:42.990 --> 00:08:44.958
the physical human
labor that remains

00:08:45.093 --> 00:08:51.464
has become a literal
appendage to the machine.

00:08:51.598 --> 00:09:28.567
[music playing]

00:09:28.701 --> 00:09:47.720
[speaking dutch]

00:09:47.855 --> 00:09:51.057
Starting in the late 1980s,
Dutch terminal operators

00:09:51.192 --> 00:09:55.127
took container handling to
a new level of automation.

00:09:55.262 --> 00:09:58.798
Some of the new land
became intelligent.

00:09:58.933 --> 00:10:01.568
Robot vehicles are
guided by transponders

00:10:01.702 --> 00:10:11.277
embedded in the pavement.

00:10:11.411 --> 00:10:14.113
We speak of
labor-saving machines.

00:10:14.247 --> 00:10:17.817
And yet what is really
saved by automation?

00:10:17.952 --> 00:10:20.587
Automation does not guarantee
freedom from drudgery.

00:10:20.721 --> 00:10:29.429
It merely raises drudgery
to a higher power.

00:10:29.563 --> 00:10:31.330
The skilled workers
who remain work

00:10:31.465 --> 00:10:35.668
in isolation, lonely
aristocrats of labor.

00:10:35.802 --> 00:12:11.730
[speaking dutch]

00:12:11.864 --> 00:12:14.166
[children yelling]

00:12:14.301 --> 00:12:17.037
Youngsters from a
Montessori school,

00:12:17.171 --> 00:12:23.643
the free play of the
mind and the muscles,

00:12:23.777 --> 00:12:39.758
a spirited rehearsal for
the automatic future?

00:12:39.892 --> 00:12:56.642
[speaking dutch]

00:12:56.777 --> 00:13:00.246
There are three ways of
moving inland, by truck,

00:13:00.380 --> 00:13:05.919
by train, and the oldest
way, by river barge.

00:13:06.053 --> 00:13:08.187
Barges are the most
efficient and the least

00:13:08.321 --> 00:13:10.189
destructive of the environment.

00:13:10.323 --> 00:15:01.768
[speaking dutch]

00:15:01.902 --> 00:15:21.087
[music playing]

00:15:21.221 --> 00:15:29.628
The heart of Holland, the
garden of Eden, autumn.

00:15:29.763 --> 00:15:32.464
In prehistoric times,
it was most likely women

00:15:32.599 --> 00:15:35.668
who invented the first
baskets and slings,

00:15:35.802 --> 00:15:38.271
the first containers.

00:15:38.405 --> 00:15:40.607
Burdened with helpless
newborn infants,

00:15:40.741 --> 00:15:43.576
they sought to free their
hands to gather edible plants

00:15:43.710 --> 00:15:45.010
and seeds.

00:15:45.144 --> 00:15:56.823
[music playing]

00:15:56.957 --> 00:16:16.542
[train rumbling]

00:16:16.676 --> 00:16:21.547
[speaking polish]

00:16:21.682 --> 00:16:25.385
These Polish women cross half
a continent in search of work.

00:16:25.519 --> 00:16:27.987
They work for farmers who have
resisted the railroad that

00:16:28.121 --> 00:16:29.655
now cuts through
their land, and who

00:16:29.789 --> 00:16:35.127
rely on trucks to carry
their fruit to market.

00:16:35.261 --> 00:16:40.099
[train rumbling]

00:16:40.233 --> 00:16:57.082
[speaking polish]

00:16:57.216 --> 00:17:10.095
[cows mooing]

00:17:10.229 --> 00:17:29.515
[horn honking]

00:17:29.649 --> 00:20:38.103
[speaking dutch]

00:20:38.237 --> 00:21:51.543
[barking]

00:21:51.677 --> 00:22:20.606
[barking]

00:22:20.740 --> 00:22:50.803
[baaing]

00:22:50.937 --> 00:23:54.533
[music playing]

00:23:54.668 --> 00:23:58.037
Perhaps a local farmer's joke.

00:23:58.172 --> 00:24:01.373
Plagued by mammoth cost
overruns and now running at well

00:24:01.508 --> 00:24:04.176
below its mammoth
capacity, is the rail line

00:24:04.310 --> 00:24:10.515
extinct before its time?

00:24:10.649 --> 00:25:46.778
[speaking dutch]

00:25:46.912 --> 00:26:46.005
[horn]

00:26:46.139 --> 00:26:49.975
Between 1950 and 2010,
global shipping tonnage

00:26:50.110 --> 00:26:53.045
has increased at a rate nearly
three times that of world

00:26:53.179 --> 00:26:55.313
population growth.

00:26:55.448 --> 00:27:00.485
More and more stuff
travels the high seas.

00:27:00.620 --> 00:27:02.821
The crew knows
nothing of the cargo,

00:27:02.956 --> 00:27:07.059
but for refrigerated goods
which must be checked daily.

00:27:07.194 --> 00:27:10.095
Frozen cod returns to the
familiar waters of the North

00:27:10.230 --> 00:27:18.871
Atlantic, after a detour to
China for low-wage filleting.

00:27:19.005 --> 00:27:20.906
Second-hand
container cranes pass

00:27:21.041 --> 00:27:25.277
on the horizon, destined to
unload American military cargo

00:27:25.411 --> 00:27:34.987
in the Middle East.

00:27:35.121 --> 00:27:36.789
The first engineer
compares the ship

00:27:36.923 --> 00:27:39.291
to a powerful and
voracious bear,

00:27:39.425 --> 00:27:46.631
guzzling 5,000 gallons
of bunker fuel per day.

00:27:46.766 --> 00:27:50.803
Bunker oil is sulphurous,
tar-like in its viscosity,

00:27:50.937 --> 00:27:53.405
the cheapest and
dirtiest available.

00:27:53.540 --> 00:27:57.542
The very dregs of the refinery,
leaving a smokey, yellow smear

00:27:57.677 --> 00:28:04.182
on the horizon and
turning the ocean acidic.

00:28:04.316 --> 00:28:13.492
[speaking chinese]

00:28:13.626 --> 00:28:17.429
A pause in mid-ocean for
repairs, sometimes even

00:28:17.563 --> 00:28:28.340
a new ship breaks down.

00:28:28.474 --> 00:28:37.349
[beeping]

00:28:37.484 --> 00:28:43.655
Endless monitoring, checking,
looking for signs of trouble.

00:28:43.790 --> 00:28:50.162
The war against rust, washing,
chipping, painting, washing,

00:28:50.296 --> 00:29:03.775
chipping, painting.

00:29:03.910 --> 00:29:07.746
California has two great natural
harbors, the sheltered bays

00:29:07.880 --> 00:29:11.250
of San Francisco and San Diego.

00:29:11.384 --> 00:29:14.186
Los Angeles was a windswept
and barren outpost

00:29:14.321 --> 00:29:16.488
for the trade and leather
from the Spanish ranchos

00:29:16.622 --> 00:29:19.158
of the coastal plain.

00:29:19.292 --> 00:29:23.528
It was said in those days that
California shod the world.

00:29:23.663 --> 00:29:25.496
More of an anchorage
than a port,

00:29:25.631 --> 00:29:30.035
Los Angeles was despised by
seafarers for its remoteness.

00:29:30.170 --> 00:29:32.938
And yet it was Los Angeles,
and the adjoining port

00:29:33.072 --> 00:29:35.340
of Long Beach, that
became the biggest port

00:29:35.474 --> 00:29:38.076
complex in the Americas.

00:29:38.211 --> 00:29:41.747
Now 40% of the cargo
entering the United States

00:29:41.881 --> 00:29:44.850
passes through these harbors.

00:29:44.984 --> 00:29:47.018
In its distance from
the city center,

00:29:47.153 --> 00:29:50.555
this was the model for what
the port of Rotterdam became,

00:29:50.690 --> 00:29:55.127
for what most ports became
in the age of containers.

00:29:55.261 --> 00:29:59.031
Many Angelenos, accustomed to
taking the beach for granted,

00:29:59.165 --> 00:30:02.634
are unaware that the city even
has a port, even though it

00:30:02.768 --> 00:30:15.413
appears anonymously in
countless Hollywood films.

00:30:15.548 --> 00:30:18.016
In the maritime world,
people are often amused

00:30:18.151 --> 00:30:22.621
by the American obsession with
counter-terrorist security.

00:30:22.755 --> 00:30:25.757
Only 2% of containers
are inspected.

00:30:25.892 --> 00:30:30.228
More than that and the
system would grind to a halt.

00:30:30.362 --> 00:30:32.697
In congressional
hearings, politicians

00:30:32.832 --> 00:30:36.267
worry about the container
as a Trojan horse

00:30:36.402 --> 00:30:39.571
or perhaps a Pandora's box.

00:30:39.705 --> 00:30:50.482
[music playing]

00:30:50.616 --> 00:30:53.952
[screams]

00:30:54.086 --> 00:31:12.304
[explosions]

00:31:12.438 --> 00:31:18.810
[whirring]

00:31:18.945 --> 00:31:22.747
An engraved history of the
California working class,

00:31:22.882 --> 00:31:31.556
fishermen, dock workers,
cannery hands, migrants all.

00:31:31.690 --> 00:31:34.159
More recent graves
of young men, who

00:31:34.294 --> 00:31:36.595
fall out of a
shrinking working class

00:31:36.729 --> 00:31:42.400
and into a world
of guns and gangs.

00:31:42.534 --> 00:31:47.539
Graves tended by Samoans
from across the Pacific.

00:31:47.673 --> 00:32:11.530
[music playing]

00:32:11.664 --> 00:32:56.441
[bird calls]

00:32:56.575 --> 00:32:59.911
The first film of
Josef von Sternberg,

00:33:00.046 --> 00:33:04.249
shot on Terminal Island,
across from San Pedro.

00:33:04.384 --> 00:33:06.818
The best of the
countless films made here

00:33:06.952 --> 00:33:08.453
because it took the
making of the port

00:33:08.588 --> 00:33:12.157
seriously, and not as
something given, mere salty

00:33:12.291 --> 00:33:16.395
atmosphere for dramatic deeds.

00:33:16.529 --> 00:33:18.931
An unusual and prescient
film for the boom

00:33:19.065 --> 00:33:21.633
years in the 1920s.

00:33:21.767 --> 00:33:27.038
Poor people decide to
fight their oppressors.

00:33:27.172 --> 00:33:48.827
[music playing]

00:33:48.961 --> 00:34:11.116
[radio - singing]

00:34:11.250 --> 00:34:13.084
People that love to drive.

00:34:13.219 --> 00:34:15.420
And they are people, they
don't know how to drive.

00:34:15.555 --> 00:34:17.722
Especially their drivers,
they don't work mostly.

00:34:17.856 --> 00:34:20.559
And they never
worked out of state.

00:34:20.693 --> 00:34:23.995
If they never like-- if
they don't like to drive,

00:34:24.130 --> 00:34:25.730
they're not going to like it.

00:34:25.864 --> 00:34:27.732
Driving is something
that is-- I think

00:34:27.866 --> 00:34:30.535
it's something in
yourself already.

00:34:30.669 --> 00:34:32.871
It's something that
you want to really do.

00:34:33.005 --> 00:34:35.540
Something that you enjoy doing.

00:34:35.674 --> 00:34:37.876
Because for me,
driving is enjoying.

00:34:38.010 --> 00:34:39.043
I enjoy driving.

00:34:39.177 --> 00:34:40.712
I love driving.

00:34:40.847 --> 00:34:45.250
But usually a lot of drivers,
they drive a lot of hours.

00:34:45.384 --> 00:34:48.853
See, it depends how many
hours you drive a day.

00:34:48.988 --> 00:34:52.724
That's how you feel,
if you love to drive.

00:34:52.858 --> 00:34:58.730
But a good 10
hours, it's not bad.

00:34:58.864 --> 00:35:00.999
What about the waiting?

00:35:01.133 --> 00:35:04.135
When you wait, you
get a lot of stress.

00:35:04.269 --> 00:35:05.670
Waiting is bad.

00:35:05.804 --> 00:35:08.907
Especially, if you want
to make a living, you're

00:35:09.041 --> 00:35:12.944
trying to make some
money, when you wait,

00:35:13.078 --> 00:35:15.113
you're not making any money.

00:35:15.247 --> 00:35:16.548
Drivers, they want to move.

00:35:16.683 --> 00:35:20.384
They want to go back and
forth, bringing the containers

00:35:20.519 --> 00:35:22.087
from one side to another one.

00:35:22.221 --> 00:35:23.821
That way they can
make some money.

00:35:23.956 --> 00:35:27.625
But the harbors takes
so long that you

00:35:27.759 --> 00:35:30.295
can be able to take only
one container or two.

00:35:30.429 --> 00:35:32.463
By the end the day,
you're very tired.

00:35:32.597 --> 00:35:35.266
It's stressful.

00:35:35.401 --> 00:35:37.469
You know somewhere I can
park that thing for tonight?

00:35:37.603 --> 00:35:40.371
I got to wait until tomorrow
to get that load off.

00:35:40.505 --> 00:35:41.573
Yeah.

00:35:41.708 --> 00:35:43.875
There's a place over here
by Anaheim, in San Jose.

00:35:44.009 --> 00:35:44.776
OK.

00:35:44.910 --> 00:35:46.878
It's a diner and a hotel.

00:35:47.012 --> 00:35:47.712
OK.

00:35:47.846 --> 00:35:48.947
You can park your car behind it.

00:35:49.081 --> 00:35:50.115
Do you own-- what do you do?

00:35:50.249 --> 00:35:51.516
Are you owner/operator?

00:35:51.650 --> 00:35:52.650
I'm owner/operator, yes.

00:35:52.784 --> 00:35:54.619
Do they pay you guys by
the load or something?

00:35:54.753 --> 00:35:56.821
They pay us by the
load right now.

00:35:56.955 --> 00:35:59.057
But how much do
you guys get paid?

00:35:59.191 --> 00:36:01.392
I get paid $20.50 an hour.

00:36:01.526 --> 00:36:02.494
That's really good.

00:36:02.628 --> 00:36:04.896
But I've been there--
I've been 13 years.

00:36:05.030 --> 00:36:07.165
But what he's doing is
they're hiring people

00:36:07.299 --> 00:36:10.902
to make $10, $11 an
hour, with no experience.

00:36:11.036 --> 00:36:13.238
But you get what you pay for.

00:36:13.372 --> 00:36:16.574
They don't know how to get
in and out of rail yards

00:36:16.708 --> 00:36:19.577
or what they're doing.

00:36:19.711 --> 00:36:21.679
But-- I don't know.

00:36:21.813 --> 00:36:23.715
He's trying to go away
from paying by the hour

00:36:23.849 --> 00:36:27.085
too, trying to pay by the load

00:36:27.219 --> 00:36:29.988
Not everything can be automated.

00:36:30.122 --> 00:36:31.723
As the truckers
wait for work, we

00:36:31.858 --> 00:36:36.460
discover old-fashioned
exploitation with a new twist.

00:36:36.595 --> 00:36:38.129
Force workers to
own and maintain

00:36:38.264 --> 00:36:42.100
their own means of
production, pay by the piece,

00:36:42.234 --> 00:36:46.004
and pretend that they are
independent businessmen.

00:36:46.138 --> 00:36:48.339
There's all kinds of
trucking companies.

00:36:48.474 --> 00:36:51.075
Sometimes all you need is a
fax machine and the ability

00:36:51.210 --> 00:36:54.779
to speak English and ta-dah,
you're a trucking company.

00:36:54.913 --> 00:36:57.015
That means you can't give
your workers anything

00:36:57.149 --> 00:37:00.085
that a true business and
a responsible business

00:37:00.219 --> 00:37:02.053
should be giving their workers.

00:37:02.187 --> 00:37:04.322
Essentially what you're
doing is you hire these guys,

00:37:04.457 --> 00:37:06.490
you contract these
guys to run loads,

00:37:06.625 --> 00:37:08.493
and you make money off of them.

00:37:08.628 --> 00:37:10.428
Oftentimes, Latino--
the Latino labor force

00:37:10.563 --> 00:37:14.833
is seen in this country as
just a pair of arms and nothing

00:37:14.967 --> 00:37:15.967
attached to that.

00:37:16.101 --> 00:37:18.536
Those pair of arms were
just part of that labor.

00:37:18.670 --> 00:37:19.805
They're exploited.

00:37:19.939 --> 00:37:22.039
They're very vulnerable to
exploitation, specifically

00:37:22.174 --> 00:37:24.408
because they don't have access
to the English language,

00:37:24.542 --> 00:38:11.789
[speaking spanish]

00:38:11.923 --> 00:38:13.925
What are you guys
planning to do?

00:38:14.059 --> 00:38:17.228
Well, right now we're
talking with the union.

00:38:17.363 --> 00:38:19.230
And the union is trying
to organize the drivers

00:38:19.365 --> 00:38:22.166
because two months
ago, three months ago,

00:38:22.301 --> 00:38:25.303
we have two big
accidents in the port,

00:38:25.437 --> 00:38:27.905
which is not something rare.

00:38:28.040 --> 00:38:32.577
There's a lot of risk that
we take inside the port.

00:38:32.712 --> 00:38:36.514
One of the unloading guys
dropped one of the containers

00:38:36.648 --> 00:38:37.549
on top of the truck.

00:38:37.683 --> 00:38:41.085
And the driver
was badly damaged.

00:38:41.220 --> 00:38:43.354
He's actually totally, totally--

00:38:43.488 --> 00:38:44.322
He was killed, huh?

00:38:44.455 --> 00:38:45.423
[spanish]

00:38:45.558 --> 00:38:47.926
One of the guys can
move, not even his head.

00:38:48.060 --> 00:38:49.193
That's one of the guys.

00:38:49.328 --> 00:38:53.798
The other guy got crushed
between two-- two of the--

00:38:53.932 --> 00:38:54.465
Two chassis.

00:38:54.599 --> 00:38:55.133
Two of the chassis.

00:38:55.267 --> 00:38:56.334
That's what I heard.

00:38:56.468 --> 00:38:58.803
He got crushed and he got
killed right in there.

00:38:58.937 --> 00:39:01.839
So what the drivers
are trying to look for

00:39:01.973 --> 00:39:04.108
is some secureness
inside the port.

00:39:04.243 --> 00:39:06.278
Actually, one of the
drivers, the one got killed,

00:39:06.412 --> 00:39:07.879
he was unionized.

00:39:08.013 --> 00:39:09.013
He was on the union.

00:39:09.147 --> 00:39:14.485
And he got, I believe,
$250,000 for his family.

00:39:14.620 --> 00:39:18.322
And the other guy, who was
not in the union, got nothing.

00:39:18.456 --> 00:39:19.157
Got nothing.

00:39:19.291 --> 00:39:20.558
And he is still in the hospital.

00:39:20.692 --> 00:39:21.259
He can't work.

00:39:21.393 --> 00:39:21.926
He can't do anything.

00:39:22.060 --> 00:39:23.327
He can barely talk.

00:39:23.462 --> 00:39:25.563
Oh, but that's because he's
an independent contractor.

00:39:25.697 --> 00:39:26.697
He is an independent contractor.

00:39:26.831 --> 00:39:27.899
He is an independent contractor.

00:39:28.033 --> 00:39:29.066
Right.

00:39:29.201 --> 00:39:30.768
The other driver was
already in a [inaudible].

00:39:30.902 --> 00:39:31.302
Right.

00:39:31.436 --> 00:39:32.070
The other--

00:39:32.204 --> 00:39:32.670
The guy's a union already.

00:39:32.804 --> 00:39:33.538
Right.

00:39:33.672 --> 00:39:34.839
The other driver
was an employee.

00:39:34.973 --> 00:39:35.706
He was an employee.

00:39:35.840 --> 00:39:37.108
And he was in the union.

00:39:37.242 --> 00:39:38.643
And the other guy
is not an employee.

00:39:38.778 --> 00:39:41.379
The owner/operators
can be union.

00:39:41.513 --> 00:39:44.883
We have one of the
most polluted areas.

00:39:45.016 --> 00:39:45.816
We breathe.

00:39:45.951 --> 00:39:47.418
If you go outside
of this office,

00:39:47.553 --> 00:39:49.420
and you're there for
at least half an hour,

00:39:49.555 --> 00:39:52.823
you'll be sneezing later on
this afternoon, coughing.

00:39:52.958 --> 00:39:55.226
You can smell the
pollution in the air.

00:39:55.360 --> 00:39:56.060
You can see it.

00:39:56.194 --> 00:39:58.730
You can see it on your cars.

00:39:58.864 --> 00:40:02.266
One in eight children
in this area has asthma.

00:40:02.401 --> 00:40:05.936
Los Angeles adopted
the sustainable version

00:40:06.071 --> 00:40:07.905
of the Clean Trucks
program, the LA port,

00:40:08.039 --> 00:40:09.507
where you would
use clean trucks.

00:40:09.642 --> 00:40:13.544
And companies would have
to hire the guys directly,

00:40:13.679 --> 00:40:17.181
so that the companies would also
own and maintain the trucks.

00:40:17.316 --> 00:40:19.150
That's the only
way we can ensure

00:40:19.285 --> 00:40:22.453
that today's clean trucks are
also tomorrow's clean trucks.

00:40:22.588 --> 00:40:25.456
We have a temporary injunction
on that Clean Trucks program

00:40:25.591 --> 00:40:28.926
because companies, the industry,
is fighting tooth and nail.

00:40:29.060 --> 00:40:30.395
There's no way they
want to give up

00:40:30.529 --> 00:40:32.263
that profit that
they've been making.

00:40:32.397 --> 00:40:34.332
They've been making an
exorbitant amount of profit

00:40:34.466 --> 00:40:37.168
on the workers' backs, on
the backs of our communities.

00:40:37.302 --> 00:40:40.471
And they're not giving
it up easily at all.

00:40:40.605 --> 00:41:02.093
[music - singing]

00:41:02.227 --> 00:41:04.328
The old waterfronts
of other ports

00:41:04.463 --> 00:41:06.464
are taken over by
middle-class tourism

00:41:06.598 --> 00:41:09.133
and upper-class housing.

00:41:09.267 --> 00:41:11.135
But the ports of
Southern California

00:41:11.269 --> 00:41:14.939
are ruled by the
sheer volume of cargo.

00:41:15.073 --> 00:41:17.408
The Walt Disney Company
planned, but failed

00:41:17.543 --> 00:41:19.076
to build, a
harbor-front amusement

00:41:19.211 --> 00:41:22.346
park in the adjoining
port of Long Beach.

00:41:22.481 --> 00:41:24.716
The steamship companies
had no interest

00:41:24.850 --> 00:41:27.285
in tourist traffic getting
in the way of the trucks

00:41:27.419 --> 00:41:29.086
carrying containers.

00:41:29.221 --> 00:41:31.522
So there are still
some small havens

00:41:31.657 --> 00:41:46.804
for immigrant
families on Sunday.

00:41:46.938 --> 00:41:50.508
[bird cries]

00:41:50.642 --> 00:41:53.478
I believe that as we sit
here today, right behind us

00:41:53.612 --> 00:41:55.914
is the Silk Road of
the Third Millennium

00:41:56.048 --> 00:41:58.916
because California is the
gateway to the Pacific Rim

00:41:59.050 --> 00:42:00.785
and Latin America.

00:42:00.920 --> 00:42:03.454
And our being here today also
is a further demonstration

00:42:03.589 --> 00:42:07.291
that we're standing up to what
took place on September 11.

00:42:07.426 --> 00:42:09.560
We're not looking inward,
we're looking outward.

00:42:09.695 --> 00:42:13.664
And it's a very, very
important thing for us to do.

00:42:13.799 --> 00:42:15.667
And our presence here
demonstrates that we are--

00:42:15.801 --> 00:42:18.269
Like all mega-projects,
this one was

00:42:18.404 --> 00:42:24.375
sold with the false promise of
jobs, 700,000 for the region.

00:42:24.509 --> 00:42:26.143
[train whistle]

00:42:26.278 --> 00:42:27.946
The boosters of the
Alameda Corridor

00:42:28.080 --> 00:42:31.049
also promised to remove
trucks from the highway,

00:42:31.183 --> 00:42:34.185
deliberately neglecting to
mention that most trucks move

00:42:34.320 --> 00:42:38.856
local freight and trains move
things over long distance.

00:42:38.990 --> 00:42:43.862
[train whistle]

00:42:43.996 --> 00:42:46.898
The opening ceremony
had a funereal quality,

00:42:47.032 --> 00:42:53.504
as if parading the coffins
in the war to come.

00:42:53.638 --> 00:43:05.683
[train whistle]

00:43:05.818 --> 00:43:09.053
After the attacks of
September 11, 2001,

00:43:09.188 --> 00:43:12.723
the president urged
Americans to keep shopping,

00:43:12.858 --> 00:43:15.826
stoking the engine of the
debt-driven economy, that ships

00:43:15.961 --> 00:43:21.432
out only one full container for
everything two that come in.

00:43:21.566 --> 00:43:23.701
First among
containerized exports

00:43:23.836 --> 00:43:27.138
from the Port of Los
Angeles is waste paper,

00:43:27.273 --> 00:43:43.721
headed for recycling factories
in the developing world.

00:43:43.855 --> 00:43:46.224
[bird cries]

00:43:46.358 --> 00:44:02.106
[train rumbling]

00:44:02.240 --> 00:44:06.210
Official unemployment
has passed 12%.

00:44:06.344 --> 00:44:09.547
Independent statisticians
argue that the real rate

00:44:09.681 --> 00:44:13.017
is nearly double that.

00:44:13.152 --> 00:44:16.221
If California were a
country, it would fall easily

00:44:16.355 --> 00:44:19.624
within the top seven or
eight economies in the world.

00:44:19.758 --> 00:44:26.998
And yet the state itself
is going bankrupt.

00:44:27.132 --> 00:44:29.700
Between the tracks of
two competing railroads,

00:44:29.835 --> 00:44:33.103
another forgotten space,
a bargain basement,

00:44:33.238 --> 00:44:36.574
a 21st century
version of a poorhouse

00:44:36.708 --> 00:44:39.643
in a society that
specializes in prisons.

00:44:39.778 --> 00:44:43.013
You're not authorized to
come inside the property.

00:44:43.147 --> 00:44:45.449
If you come on the property--

00:44:45.584 --> 00:44:48.319
The sidewalk is not
private property.

00:44:48.453 --> 00:44:48.886
We're OK.

00:44:49.020 --> 00:44:49.654
No, it's not.

00:44:49.788 --> 00:44:50.688
But he stepped over here--

00:44:50.821 --> 00:44:51.355
Right.

00:44:51.489 --> 00:44:52.056
Well, now we're on--

00:44:52.190 --> 00:44:52.623
It's private property.

00:44:52.757 --> 00:44:53.257
We understand.

00:44:53.391 --> 00:44:54.224
We're off it now.

00:44:54.359 --> 00:44:54.992
You're on the
sidewalk just fine.

00:44:55.126 --> 00:44:55.760
OK.

00:44:55.894 --> 00:44:56.593
This is private property.

00:44:56.727 --> 00:44:58.062
OK.

00:44:58.196 --> 00:44:58.862
I drove over there.

00:44:58.996 --> 00:45:01.232
You had to go over there.

00:45:01.366 --> 00:45:02.232
Yes.

00:45:02.367 --> 00:45:03.668
When I left over
there, you guys came--

00:45:03.802 --> 00:45:05.035
It's possible the sound
man didn't understand.

00:45:05.169 --> 00:45:05.870
Well, they understand now.

00:45:06.004 --> 00:45:07.037
Because they're from Austria.

00:45:07.171 --> 00:45:08.239
So we're [inaudible].

00:45:08.374 --> 00:45:11.041
I have family from Austria,
my husband's family

00:45:11.175 --> 00:45:12.377
migrated from Austria.

00:45:12.510 --> 00:45:14.579
Very good.

00:45:14.713 --> 00:45:15.913
You have a nice day.

00:45:16.047 --> 00:45:20.418
Stay off the property please.

00:45:20.552 --> 00:45:22.987
And so it goes.

00:45:23.122 --> 00:45:26.690
The homeless are watched over
by minimum wage guards, employed

00:45:26.825 --> 00:45:30.028
by a Swedish multinational,
guards who may only

00:45:30.162 --> 00:45:34.465
be one step away from
homelessness themselves.

00:45:34.599 --> 00:45:52.583
[music - singing]

00:45:52.717 --> 00:45:56.220
Most of these people, their
lives-- I hate to say it.

00:45:56.354 --> 00:45:57.488
Maybe I am too.

00:45:57.622 --> 00:45:59.590
They're like lost.

00:45:59.724 --> 00:46:01.358
They don't have any direction.

00:46:01.493 --> 00:46:04.462
They have no place else
to go but right here.

00:46:04.596 --> 00:46:05.696
Well, I do.

00:46:05.831 --> 00:46:11.836
I just can't get the-- I
just can't get the-- oh,

00:46:11.970 --> 00:46:15.473
what word do I want
to use right now?

00:46:15.607 --> 00:46:16.641
God, not motivation.

00:46:16.775 --> 00:46:18.543
I got plenty of motivation.

00:46:18.677 --> 00:46:20.244
I don't know.

00:46:20.379 --> 00:46:23.414
I just can't get out of here
as of yet because of funds.

00:46:23.548 --> 00:46:26.250
Funds is what my main
thing is right now.

00:46:26.384 --> 00:46:30.588
Yeah.

00:46:30.722 --> 00:46:32.256
[laughter]

00:46:32.390 --> 00:46:33.891
He's a really good guy.

00:46:34.026 --> 00:46:38.228
Him and his brother
both live out here.

00:46:38.363 --> 00:46:42.700
But-- I don't-- it's
just-- I don't know.

00:46:42.834 --> 00:46:45.202
I don't know how to
really explain it.

00:46:45.336 --> 00:46:47.905
It's a different lifestyle.

00:46:48.040 --> 00:46:49.974
I mean like for
either one of you

00:46:50.108 --> 00:46:53.010
to come out here and
live for say a month,

00:46:53.144 --> 00:46:54.712
it'd be rough on you.

00:46:54.846 --> 00:46:57.047
Straight up, it would be.

00:46:57.181 --> 00:46:58.416
No bullshit behind it.

00:46:58.550 --> 00:46:59.884
It would be rough.

00:47:00.018 --> 00:47:04.288
It's like every night,
I-- you lay down.

00:47:04.422 --> 00:47:07.224
[mutters] You got to
get up tomorrow morning

00:47:07.358 --> 00:47:10.628
and go through it again.

00:47:10.762 --> 00:47:11.629
Whatever.

00:47:11.763 --> 00:47:12.696
Some days are good days.

00:47:12.830 --> 00:47:13.831
Yeah.

00:47:13.965 --> 00:47:17.434
I've had a lot of fun
out here, a lot of fun.

00:47:17.569 --> 00:47:20.504
But other days are
just like, god damn it.

00:47:20.638 --> 00:47:22.606
The train tracks
are right there.

00:47:22.741 --> 00:47:23.974
And people have
done it out here.

00:47:24.108 --> 00:47:25.375
There's been two of them.

00:47:25.510 --> 00:47:27.278
Ah, go ahead and kiss a
train when it goes by.

00:47:27.412 --> 00:47:31.682
It'll take your ass out.

00:47:31.816 --> 00:47:34.952
Well, my mom is
getting ready to roll.

00:47:35.087 --> 00:47:38.422
And the day she rolls,
that's the day I roll.

00:47:38.556 --> 00:47:39.723
That's the day I'm out of here.

00:47:39.857 --> 00:47:41.092
Yeah.

00:47:41.226 --> 00:47:42.827
Because that's when
my money comes in.

00:47:42.961 --> 00:47:44.762
Nah, I'm just going
to buy a trailer.

00:47:44.896 --> 00:47:48.298
And my ex-wife already has
it picked out at the river.

00:47:48.433 --> 00:47:50.434
I already saw a picture of it.

00:47:50.568 --> 00:47:51.535
Nice trailer for me.

00:47:51.669 --> 00:47:54.539
Hey, it's better than
that god damn tent.

00:47:54.672 --> 00:47:55.906
Like, hey.

00:47:56.040 --> 00:47:57.808
There it is.

00:47:57.943 --> 00:48:00.310
I can fish right off my patio.

00:48:00.445 --> 00:48:01.645
That's a nice place to live.

00:48:01.780 --> 00:48:02.980
You can live right on the water.

00:48:03.115 --> 00:48:05.416
I don't care where you
live, if you live on water,

00:48:05.551 --> 00:48:07.751
you're living pretty good
as far as I'm concerned.

00:48:07.885 --> 00:48:09.119
Yeah.

00:48:09.254 --> 00:48:10.754
I'm going to buy another boat
and just fish my life away.

00:48:10.889 --> 00:48:16.894
Fish and drink my live away,
that's all I want to do.

00:48:17.028 --> 00:48:18.762
I just felt that
there wasn't anything

00:48:18.897 --> 00:48:26.704
for what the majority of us
are out here, middle-aged men.

00:48:26.838 --> 00:48:31.375
There were no starting
programs-- nothing--

00:48:31.509 --> 00:48:38.081
like if I were to
find a good job.

00:48:38.215 --> 00:48:41.385
How could I eat, bathe?

00:48:41.519 --> 00:48:43.053
Would I sleep in
my sleeping bag,

00:48:43.188 --> 00:48:47.658
next to the place I work at
until I got my first paycheck?

00:48:47.792 --> 00:48:48.725
And then what?

00:48:48.859 --> 00:48:49.993
A motel?

00:48:50.127 --> 00:48:51.795
That's expensive.

00:48:51.930 --> 00:48:54.065
And supposedly
they're rehabilitating

00:48:54.199 --> 00:48:56.000
some old apartment
buildings or whatnot.

00:48:56.134 --> 00:48:58.936
And it's for women and children.

00:48:59.070 --> 00:49:01.772
There were no homeless
women and children out here.

00:49:01.906 --> 00:49:04.442
I think now it's
happening because

00:49:04.576 --> 00:49:08.445
of the foreclosures on
people's homes and whatnot.

00:49:08.579 --> 00:49:12.816
But at the onset of
this, there weren't.

00:49:12.951 --> 00:49:17.521
Supposedly money came that was
supposed to be for the homeless

00:49:17.655 --> 00:49:20.491
here, some $3 million
or something like that.

00:49:20.626 --> 00:49:22.927
And then more and more came
from the federal government.

00:49:23.061 --> 00:49:25.629
And there are no
programs like that.

00:49:25.763 --> 00:49:31.135
They come and they give
toilet paper and bread.

00:49:31.269 --> 00:49:36.841
And they raffle--
raffle-- for the ticket.

00:49:36.975 --> 00:49:38.209
That if you're
that lucky ticket,

00:49:38.343 --> 00:49:41.145
you get a motel
room for three days.

00:49:41.279 --> 00:49:42.913
And you can only do
it one time a year.

00:49:43.048 --> 00:49:44.715
Like if you win
the raffle again,

00:49:44.849 --> 00:49:46.483
you have to turn it
over to somebody else.

00:49:46.617 --> 00:49:47.217
You don't have it.

00:49:47.351 --> 00:49:49.654
I mean what does that do?

00:49:49.787 --> 00:49:52.156
Nothing.

00:49:52.290 --> 00:49:56.660
Some people here, it's become
at least a way of life for them.

00:49:56.794 --> 00:50:00.831
Or they're just reprobates.

00:50:00.965 --> 00:50:04.302
The definition of the word--
they don't want to get ahead.

00:50:04.436 --> 00:50:08.839
And they're satisfied
with the way things are.

00:50:08.972 --> 00:50:12.209
I'm not.

00:50:12.344 --> 00:50:14.211
I don't want to be
like this any longer.

00:50:14.345 --> 00:50:17.714
I've been like this for years.

00:50:17.849 --> 00:50:22.686
This is like a slap in my
face for me and my friends.

00:50:22.820 --> 00:50:25.189
I'm not on drugs.

00:50:25.322 --> 00:50:26.690
I'm not.

00:50:26.824 --> 00:50:28.992
I have these, my dolls
that I picked up.

00:50:29.127 --> 00:50:33.297
So you don't think I'm mentally
ill or anything like that.

00:50:33.431 --> 00:50:34.498
I picked these up.

00:50:34.633 --> 00:50:37.568
I have a tent full of
stuffed animals and dolls.

00:50:37.703 --> 00:50:42.439
This is the only thing that I
have to hold on to and for me

00:50:42.573 --> 00:50:45.709
to remember my children.

00:50:45.843 --> 00:50:46.744
I lost a lot.

00:50:46.878 --> 00:50:47.778
And I'm homeless.

00:50:47.912 --> 00:50:50.413
And I haven't seen
my children since.

00:50:50.548 --> 00:50:53.317
I was unable to
attend court because I

00:50:53.451 --> 00:50:55.286
had no transportation.

00:50:55.420 --> 00:50:58.121
And the court was way
in San Bernardino.

00:50:58.255 --> 00:51:00.724
I'm way in Ontario.

00:51:00.858 --> 00:51:07.097
And I lost all of my children.

00:51:07.232 --> 00:51:08.732
And I haven't seen
my children since.

00:51:08.866 --> 00:51:11.735
And this has been 2003.

00:51:11.869 --> 00:51:14.772
And here it is 2009.

00:51:14.906 --> 00:51:19.643
So I lost a lot.

00:51:19.777 --> 00:51:21.412
I'm trying-- I'm tired.

00:51:21.546 --> 00:51:26.684
I'm trying to figure
out am I going ever

00:51:26.819 --> 00:51:30.354
get the chance to be a
mother again with my children

00:51:30.488 --> 00:51:32.790
that I already have?

00:51:32.924 --> 00:51:34.291
I don't have my children.

00:51:34.425 --> 00:51:38.062
I'm over here in the dirt.

00:51:38.196 --> 00:51:42.966
Getting darker and
darker and darker.

00:51:43.101 --> 00:51:48.238
And my wig is because my
hair comes out, mysteriously.

00:51:48.372 --> 00:51:51.742
And my hair comes out.

00:51:51.876 --> 00:51:53.944
And it wasn't like
that at first.

00:51:54.078 --> 00:51:57.348
But when I get over here and
I take my hair out to wash it

00:51:57.482 --> 00:52:02.819
and stuff, it's
coming out in patches.

00:52:02.954 --> 00:52:08.525
Like someone is shaving my
hair off, that type of stuff.

00:52:08.659 --> 00:52:11.395
And I've gotten
overweight to where--

00:52:11.530 --> 00:52:15.665
and I'm just starting to handle
my weight in the hot sun.

00:52:15.800 --> 00:52:20.237
I can barely walk
across to the corner

00:52:20.372 --> 00:52:24.374
without getting hot
and having hot flashes.

00:52:24.509 --> 00:52:27.845
So I'm learning how to deal
with my weight and my situation

00:52:27.979 --> 00:52:30.313
at the same time.

00:52:30.447 --> 00:52:35.285
[train whistle]

00:52:35.419 --> 00:52:59.142
[plane engine rumbling]

00:52:59.277 --> 00:53:14.558
1, 2, 3, 4, 5-- 13, 14, 15, 16,
17, 18-- 27, 28, 29, 30, 31,

00:53:14.693 --> 00:53:27.571
32, 33, 34-- 41, 42, 43, 44,
45, 46, 47, 48, 49-- 54, 55, 56,

00:53:27.706 --> 00:53:35.045
57, 58, 59-- 81, 82,
83, 84, want 85--

00:53:35.179 --> 00:53:39.049
Involuntary human idleness,
rising unemployment,

00:53:39.183 --> 00:53:41.952
goes along with the
idleness of machines.

00:53:42.086 --> 00:53:44.722
A long line of
locomotives awaits

00:53:44.856 --> 00:53:49.559
the stimulus, the recovery,
the upswing of markets,

00:53:49.693 --> 00:53:51.962
the return of
consumer confidence,

00:53:52.097 --> 00:53:57.034
the relaxation of credit, the
correction of the correction,

00:53:57.168 --> 00:54:00.104
the reinflation of the bubble.

00:54:00.238 --> 00:54:04.140
126, 127, 128, 129.

00:54:04.274 --> 00:54:09.980
Wow.

00:54:10.114 --> 00:54:14.919
[birds calling]

00:54:15.052 --> 00:54:15.919
[music]

00:54:16.053 --> 00:55:07.937
[non-english singing]

00:55:08.072 --> 00:55:11.141
The ship never sails
anywhere near North America.

00:55:11.275 --> 00:55:13.344
And yet the Korean
and Indonesian crew

00:55:13.478 --> 00:55:16.547
eats rice from California.

00:55:16.681 --> 00:55:19.783
California rice is richly
subsidized and floods

00:55:19.917 --> 00:55:21.352
the world market.

00:55:21.486 --> 00:55:49.379
Korean rice farmers go bankrupt.

00:55:49.513 --> 00:55:57.421
[non-english speech]

00:55:57.555 --> 00:56:00.324
The ship is carrying fewer
containers than usual.

00:56:00.458 --> 00:56:02.926
Cargo is down by a third.

00:56:03.061 --> 00:56:16.840
The stern deck is opened up
to the sky and the winter sun.

00:56:16.975 --> 00:56:20.844
Where there are mirrors, there
must once have been smoke.

00:56:20.978 --> 00:56:23.313
Hong Kong was once
a city of industry,

00:56:23.448 --> 00:56:27.885
as well as transport, producing
cheap goods for export.

00:56:28.019 --> 00:56:31.755
Now, it is a financial center,
with an uncertain future.

00:56:31.890 --> 00:56:36.259
To the north, Shanghai
grows by leaps and bounds.

00:56:36.394 --> 00:56:39.229
And shippers increasingly
prefer the new harbors

00:56:39.363 --> 00:56:43.333
of the Pearl River Delta.

00:56:43.467 --> 00:56:45.836
[beeping]

00:56:45.970 --> 00:57:00.284
[ship horn]

00:57:00.418 --> 00:57:02.586
The crisis deepens.

00:57:02.720 --> 00:57:05.255
Ships are again laid
up by the hundreds,

00:57:05.389 --> 00:57:07.424
manned by skeleton
crews, or sent

00:57:07.558 --> 00:57:10.994
to the scrap yards of
Bangladesh before their time.

00:57:11.128 --> 00:57:13.964
10% of the world fleet is idle.

00:57:14.099 --> 00:57:18.902
Shipyards are again in trouble,
as orders for new ships dry up.

00:57:19.036 --> 00:57:21.271
Riding high in the
water, this ship

00:57:21.405 --> 00:57:35.018
carries only empties,
with nowhere to go.

00:57:35.152 --> 00:57:37.855
From centuries of river
trading the Chinese

00:57:37.989 --> 00:57:40.958
have learned to create
floating archipelagos of ships

00:57:41.091 --> 00:57:43.694
and barges.

00:57:43.828 --> 00:57:46.029
The ship is not an
isolated thing, but

00:57:46.163 --> 00:57:57.040
a unit in a makeshift ensemble.

00:57:57.175 --> 00:58:01.477
Behind it all, is back-breaking
toil and dockworkers' casual

00:58:01.611 --> 00:58:05.082
physical feats.

00:58:05.217 --> 00:58:09.052
The link between the ship
and dock and city streets

00:58:09.187 --> 00:58:12.889
is seen in the street porters
of the Hong Kong of the 1960s,

00:58:13.023 --> 00:58:16.760
photographed by
Ed van der Elsken;

00:58:16.895 --> 00:58:34.177
the physical definition of work,
moving a mass, over a distance.

00:58:34.311 --> 00:58:43.520
[music playing]

00:58:43.654 --> 00:58:45.221
What is the training
for work in the Hong

00:58:45.356 --> 00:58:48.826
Kong of the 21st
century, when industry

00:58:48.960 --> 00:58:53.163
has fled across the
border to China proper?

00:58:53.297 --> 00:58:55.932
The sea is a great
instrument for testing,

00:58:56.066 --> 00:58:59.169
for trials and tribulations.

00:58:59.303 --> 00:59:26.562
[music playing]

00:59:26.696 --> 01:00:29.893
[speaking chinese]

01:00:30.028 --> 01:00:35.131
We started in 1946,
straight after World War II.

01:00:35.265 --> 01:00:38.735
The idea being to take
urchins and orphans

01:00:38.870 --> 01:00:41.905
off the streets of Hong Kong.

01:00:42.040 --> 01:00:44.875
The group that
started it was a group

01:00:45.009 --> 01:00:49.712
that involved the church,
local businessmen, lawyers,

01:00:49.846 --> 01:00:51.214
et cetera.

01:00:51.348 --> 01:00:56.486
And then over the
next 10 years, it

01:00:56.620 --> 01:00:59.122
became-- it went from
just a school that

01:00:59.256 --> 01:01:02.926
was involved with
disadvantaged kids,

01:01:03.061 --> 01:01:06.262
to then giving kids
some purpose in life.

01:01:06.397 --> 01:01:09.499
It ran parallel to the
development of the shipping

01:01:09.633 --> 01:01:12.903
industry in Hong Kong,
hence [inaudible].

01:01:13.037 --> 01:01:16.206
And in 2001, changed,
due to government policy,

01:01:16.340 --> 01:01:18.975
to a mainstream
secondary school.

01:01:19.110 --> 01:01:21.945
And this time, we were able
to have a work experience

01:01:22.080 --> 01:01:25.248
program for them in the final
years of secondary school.

01:01:25.382 --> 01:01:29.019
And about 95% of
our boys graduate

01:01:29.153 --> 01:01:33.390
with jobs in a hospitality
industry or jobs

01:01:33.525 --> 01:01:37.160
allied to what could recently
be called the maritime industry.

01:01:37.295 --> 01:01:40.663
One of the reasons that Hong
Kong workers dropped out

01:01:40.798 --> 01:01:46.469
of the industry was because
they were overpriced.

01:01:46.604 --> 01:01:48.605
You could get cheaper
labor in the Philippines,

01:01:48.739 --> 01:01:54.678
in Bangladesh,
India, wherever else.

01:01:54.812 --> 01:01:56.446
In the old days,
if you went to sea,

01:01:56.580 --> 01:01:59.449
you went to sea for
three months, six months.

01:01:59.583 --> 01:02:01.818
Kids these days don't
want to do that.

01:02:01.953 --> 01:02:06.123
Home is far too comfortable,
no matter how humble it may be.

01:02:06.257 --> 01:02:10.394
And so this rise of things
like the ferry services,

01:02:10.528 --> 01:02:16.900
the coastal trading services in
China, have the potential to,

01:02:17.034 --> 01:02:21.738
once again, offer acceptable--
acceptable in the mind

01:02:21.872 --> 01:02:24.374
of the kids-- job opportunities.

01:02:24.508 --> 01:02:43.860
[speaking chinese]

01:02:43.995 --> 01:02:48.999
We've had boys, for example,
placed at top hotels

01:02:49.133 --> 01:02:51.868
and been offered
employment solely

01:02:52.003 --> 01:02:56.072
because the boys
are disciplined.

01:02:56.207 --> 01:02:59.443
And that, of course, is part
of this idea of the drill,

01:02:59.577 --> 01:03:03.180
and the ceremonial parade
too, which develops supposedly

01:03:03.314 --> 01:03:06.016
a sense of both self
and corporate discipline

01:03:06.150 --> 01:03:09.452
in the boys so that they
learn right from wrong.

01:03:09.586 --> 01:03:11.888
They know how to
act, how to do it.

01:03:12.023 --> 01:03:15.358
And the funny thing
is, it actually works.

01:03:15.492 --> 01:03:17.460
Go!

01:03:17.594 --> 01:03:21.931
[speaking chinese]

01:03:22.065 --> 01:04:28.497
[music playing]

01:04:28.632 --> 01:04:31.434
Hong Kong is a vertical
city, offering deep draft

01:04:31.568 --> 01:04:33.502
for ocean-going vessels.

01:04:33.637 --> 01:04:36.239
But for that very reason,
providing little space

01:04:36.374 --> 01:04:39.942
for the storage and
handling of containers.

01:04:40.077 --> 01:04:43.380
The solution takes a page from
the architectural fantasies

01:04:43.514 --> 01:04:48.184
of Piranesi, great spiral
towers of transport,

01:04:48.318 --> 01:04:52.021
14 kilometers of vertical coil.

01:04:52.155 --> 01:05:14.911
[rumbling]

01:05:15.045 --> 01:05:17.546
The essential
objective with APL was

01:05:17.681 --> 01:05:20.950
to provide a smooth and
efficient logistics center.

01:05:21.085 --> 01:05:22.752
"Logistics" was a new
word at that time.

01:05:22.886 --> 01:05:25.121
Essentially, what we tried
to do is make every floor

01:05:25.255 --> 01:05:26.990
a ground floor.

01:05:27.124 --> 01:05:29.960
To do that, I had to
design a huge ramp, which

01:05:30.094 --> 01:05:31.260
was extremely expensive.

01:05:31.394 --> 01:05:32.228
But it works.

01:05:32.362 --> 01:05:34.664
I put two lanes up.

01:05:34.798 --> 01:05:36.266
I had to check
with the Hong Kong

01:05:36.400 --> 01:05:37.900
government and local
traffic conditions

01:05:38.035 --> 01:05:42.438
to ensure that the gradient was
enough for the worst container

01:05:42.572 --> 01:05:43.873
to get up, the
heaviest container.

01:05:44.008 --> 01:05:45.942
The vehicles would
drive up to the roof.

01:05:46.076 --> 01:05:47.376
Allotted space was available.

01:05:47.511 --> 01:05:49.346
Then they would be
assigned to go down.

01:05:49.480 --> 01:05:51.547
That way, there was
never any traffic jams.

01:05:51.682 --> 01:05:53.116
The building was
quite successful.

01:05:53.250 --> 01:05:55.551
It's the largest industrial
building in the world.

01:05:55.686 --> 01:05:59.289
And it's around 1
million square meters.

01:05:59.423 --> 01:06:03.059
So we never took ecological
aspects of the diesel fuel.

01:06:03.194 --> 01:06:05.995
But the fact is, instead of
them driving through the city,

01:06:06.130 --> 01:06:08.231
in Quiantang, or in
other residential areas,

01:06:08.366 --> 01:06:11.201
to go to the local factories
and the local warehouses,

01:06:11.335 --> 01:06:13.036
the diesel fuel is
basically by the quart.

01:06:13.170 --> 01:06:14.871
And hopefully, a little bit
of wind can dissipate it.

01:06:15.005 --> 01:06:16.406
But it was never
really looked at.

01:06:16.541 --> 01:06:20.543
We did hear that people
have breathing problems.

01:06:20.677 --> 01:06:22.378
That's interesting.

01:06:22.513 --> 01:06:25.115
At the beginning, we took a look
at putting in is ventilation.

01:06:25.249 --> 01:06:26.783
You needed that
because it's enclosed,

01:06:26.917 --> 01:06:27.984
with the vehicles in there.

01:06:28.118 --> 01:06:29.385
And they would
have to become more

01:06:29.519 --> 01:06:30.753
sophisticated in doing that.

01:06:30.888 --> 01:06:32.689
But basically, you'd
have to suck out

01:06:32.823 --> 01:06:34.023
the air within the terminal.

01:06:34.158 --> 01:06:36.392
And put an envelope around
it and blow it outside.

01:06:36.526 --> 01:06:37.861
And hopefully, it
gets dissipated

01:06:37.995 --> 01:06:38.895
over the harbor and that.

01:06:39.029 --> 01:06:41.064
But that's an interesting point.

01:06:41.198 --> 01:06:57.146
I thought they did
put in ventilation.

01:06:57.281 --> 01:07:02.986
The container itself has made
it possible to ship increased

01:07:03.120 --> 01:07:06.756
volumes and access
these markets.

01:07:06.890 --> 01:07:13.363
It has helped consumers
being able to purchase things

01:07:13.497 --> 01:07:15.831
that they would not have
been able to buy before.

01:07:15.966 --> 01:07:19.535
And because the ability to
be able to ship these goods

01:07:19.669 --> 01:07:23.873
has made it possible to
produce large volumes.

01:07:24.007 --> 01:07:26.176
And the production
of these huge volumes

01:07:26.310 --> 01:07:32.815
has brought down the prices.

01:07:32.950 --> 01:07:35.752
What we basically have
done with containerization

01:07:35.886 --> 01:07:38.654
is allowed Asia to
begin production

01:07:38.789 --> 01:07:40.556
of the goods that
were made locally.

01:07:40.690 --> 01:07:44.160
And as the people gained
wealth, they themselves

01:07:44.294 --> 01:07:45.795
became more affluent.

01:07:45.929 --> 01:07:47.963
And then, they,
themselves, started

01:07:48.098 --> 01:07:50.467
wanting cars and everything
else, like the Americans then.

01:07:50.601 --> 01:08:01.511
So a lot of the production
is being shifted.

01:08:01.646 --> 01:08:04.614
The Hong Kong Seamen's Union has
a militant history, going back

01:08:04.748 --> 01:08:06.716
to the 1920s.

01:08:06.850 --> 01:08:09.251
Today, the union
tends to retirees

01:08:09.385 --> 01:08:14.324
and the widows of seafarers.

01:08:14.458 --> 01:08:16.559
The elderly seafaring
community reunites

01:08:16.693 --> 01:08:19.362
for lessons in Cantonese opera.

01:08:19.496 --> 01:09:16.986
[singing - cantonese]

01:09:17.120 --> 01:09:29.432
A former seafarer tends to
the union's guest house.

01:09:29.567 --> 01:09:32.067
Seaport cities have
rituals of hospitality

01:09:32.202 --> 01:09:40.075
that go back to the Christian
socialists of the 19th century.

01:09:40.209 --> 01:09:40.610
Hello.

01:09:40.744 --> 01:09:41.577
How are you?

01:09:41.711 --> 01:09:44.580
I have a paper for you.

01:09:44.714 --> 01:09:45.581
OK.

01:09:45.715 --> 01:09:47.583
All right.

01:09:47.717 --> 01:10:04.066
[music playing]

01:10:04.200 --> 01:10:05.134
Hi.

01:10:05.269 --> 01:10:07.537
I'm just going to leave
the paper for you.

01:10:07.670 --> 01:10:08.038
OK.

01:10:08.171 --> 01:10:09.405
Thank you.

01:10:09.539 --> 01:10:12.541
Who is the guy staying here?

01:10:12.675 --> 01:10:15.411
He joined another ship.

01:10:15.546 --> 01:10:20.750
I only four months and
16 days, I stay there.

01:10:20.884 --> 01:10:22.184
And then I transfer other ship.

01:10:22.318 --> 01:10:23.119
Ah, yes.

01:10:23.253 --> 01:10:25.121
But my contract
is container ship.

01:10:25.255 --> 01:10:27.089
Right, right, right.

01:10:27.223 --> 01:10:27.657
OK.

01:10:27.791 --> 01:10:28.324
Thank you, sir.

01:10:28.458 --> 01:10:28.825
I'll see you later.

01:10:28.959 --> 01:10:35.531
Yep.

01:10:35.665 --> 01:10:38.868
This is a double here.

01:10:39.002 --> 01:10:41.237
This is a double room.

01:10:41.371 --> 01:10:43.839
These are the rooms which
are the most popular.

01:10:43.974 --> 01:10:45.975
I'm not saying the most
popular with seafarers.

01:10:46.109 --> 01:10:47.543
But the most popular
with the shipping

01:10:47.678 --> 01:10:50.246
companies because they're
quite reasonably priced.

01:10:50.380 --> 01:10:52.348
And you can put two people in.

01:10:52.483 --> 01:10:55.551
And if you only want a room
for one night, most seafarers,

01:10:55.686 --> 01:10:58.321
as long as they get a good
breakfast-- and the breakfast,

01:10:58.455 --> 01:11:01.824
they go to all the buffet
lunch-- they're quite happy.

01:11:01.958 --> 01:11:03.593
And most of the seafarers'
love coming here

01:11:03.727 --> 01:11:05.327
for the-- if they're
joining the ship.

01:11:05.462 --> 01:11:08.131
Because they usually have the
buffet lunch and the buffet

01:11:08.265 --> 01:11:09.965
diner before they
join the vessel.

01:11:10.100 --> 01:11:12.935
And that means that they get--
if you've been coming out

01:11:13.069 --> 01:11:14.804
of the Philippines, the
last couple of weeks,

01:11:14.938 --> 01:11:17.740
you wouldn't have
eaten that much.

01:11:17.874 --> 01:11:19.074
And your cash is short.

01:11:19.209 --> 01:11:21.844
You don't have any cash usually
when you join the vessel.

01:11:21.979 --> 01:11:24.747
And you sort of eat up as if
you haven't eaten for a week.

01:11:24.881 --> 01:11:26.548
So they're very
happy to come here.

01:11:26.683 --> 01:11:28.217
The accommodation is basic.

01:11:28.352 --> 01:11:32.021
But everything else, I think
they're very happy with.

01:11:32.155 --> 01:11:33.790
There's a seafarers port.

01:11:33.924 --> 01:11:37.326
And all this wealth that you see
around you, and in Hong Kong,

01:11:37.461 --> 01:11:41.096
was built up on the
hard work of seafarers,

01:11:41.231 --> 01:11:44.333
who made a lot of money for
the ship owners, who really are

01:11:44.468 --> 01:11:49.572
the founders of all these
hotels and shopping malls

01:11:49.706 --> 01:11:51.808
that you see.

01:11:51.941 --> 01:11:52.975
Here we are.

01:11:53.109 --> 01:11:58.248
This is the computer
world of non-communication

01:11:58.382 --> 01:11:59.382
between each other.

01:11:59.516 --> 01:12:02.385
But communication with
other ships, or family,

01:12:02.519 --> 01:12:03.819
friends in China, or whatever.

01:12:03.953 --> 01:12:05.488
These are all croupiers.

01:12:05.622 --> 01:12:08.157
Or most of them are croupiers.

01:12:08.291 --> 01:12:10.192
Because they have a day off.

01:12:10.327 --> 01:12:12.161
And then they have to go
back on board the ship

01:12:12.295 --> 01:12:14.130
to go out tonight.

01:12:14.264 --> 01:12:15.531
They're on the casino ships.

01:12:15.665 --> 01:12:16.099
Yeah.

01:12:16.233 --> 01:12:17.700
That's right.

01:12:17.834 --> 01:12:18.701
All Star Cruises?

01:12:18.835 --> 01:12:19.368
No.

01:12:19.502 --> 01:12:20.403
Some.

01:12:20.537 --> 01:12:21.604
Are you all All Star Cruises?

01:12:21.738 --> 01:12:22.237
Yes.

01:12:22.371 --> 01:12:22.738
Yes.

01:12:22.872 --> 01:12:27.910
All right.

01:12:28.044 --> 01:12:29.211
They are seafarers.

01:12:29.346 --> 01:12:31.814
But they're not in that sort
of true sense of the word.

01:12:31.949 --> 01:12:35.584
But then, they are floating
from A to B-- or floating,

01:12:35.718 --> 01:12:36.686
not from A to B actually.

01:12:36.820 --> 01:12:38.754
Just floating out into
international waters

01:12:38.888 --> 01:12:40.722
and coming back
in, in the morning.

01:12:40.857 --> 01:12:42.625
But what's amazingly,
they tell me

01:12:42.760 --> 01:12:46.228
they see the same people
every night on the ship.

01:12:46.362 --> 01:12:47.563
Hundreds.

01:12:47.698 --> 01:12:54.236
It's just incredible that
they've got the money to spend.

01:12:54.371 --> 01:12:56.939
But it's nice to provide
somewhere for them

01:12:57.073 --> 01:12:58.340
to hang about.

01:12:58.475 --> 01:13:00.276
Otherwise, they've be drifting
around from one internet cafe

01:13:00.410 --> 01:13:02.144
to another or just
sitting around.

01:13:02.279 --> 01:13:04.613
And it gets them off their
ship, where they're probably

01:13:04.747 --> 01:13:08.251
in two to a cabin or three.

01:13:08.385 --> 01:13:11.186
I love Hong Kong!

01:13:11.320 --> 01:13:21.464
[cheer]

01:13:21.598 --> 01:13:23.700
Ocean shipping was
the first industry

01:13:23.834 --> 01:13:25.768
to be globalized, in
a deliberate effort

01:13:25.902 --> 01:13:28.537
to say the lowest
possible wages.

01:13:28.672 --> 01:13:32.141
This was because of yet another
post-war maritime invention

01:13:32.275 --> 01:13:35.044
of the Americans, the
flag of convenience,

01:13:35.178 --> 01:13:37.713
which allows ships owned
in the rich countries

01:13:37.848 --> 01:13:43.118
to register in poor countries,
like Liberia and Panama.

01:13:43.253 --> 01:13:46.589
This legal loophole makes
it possible to hire cheaper

01:13:46.723 --> 01:13:50.693
foreign crews and avoid
safety rules and regulations.

01:13:50.828 --> 01:13:54.897
Taken together, the flag of
convenience and the container,

01:13:55.031 --> 01:13:58.968
take us back to a world
of relentless toil,

01:13:59.102 --> 01:14:02.238
interrupted only briefly.

01:14:02.372 --> 01:14:13.549
[rumbling]

01:14:13.684 --> 01:14:16.585
It is Filipinos who are
the globalized world's

01:14:16.719 --> 01:14:18.554
most itinerant workers.

01:14:18.688 --> 01:14:20.389
Young men go to sea.

01:14:20.524 --> 01:14:23.192
And women, many
young and some older,

01:14:23.326 --> 01:14:26.295
are domestics in the
cities of the rich.

01:14:26.429 --> 01:14:28.997
Every Sunday, scores
of thousands of maids,

01:14:29.132 --> 01:14:31.734
who work in isolation
throughout the week,

01:14:31.869 --> 01:14:34.971
gather in Hong Kong Central,
turning the vacant space

01:14:35.105 --> 01:14:40.042
beneath the banks into picnic
ground, hair salon, church,

01:14:40.176 --> 01:16:12.268
school, dance hall,
political forum.

01:16:12.402 --> 01:16:25.714
[music playing]

01:16:25.848 --> 01:16:36.692
[speaking filipino]

01:16:36.827 --> 01:16:41.663
Maids and seafarers
meet, a brief encounter,

01:16:41.798 --> 01:16:46.702
isolated in the house, lonely
aboard the ship, far from home,

01:16:46.836 --> 01:16:49.472
cleaning all the time.

01:16:49.606 --> 01:16:57.346
[speaking filipino]

01:16:57.480 --> 01:17:11.093
[music playing]

01:17:11.227 --> 01:17:26.942
[music - "new york, new york"]

01:17:27.077 --> 01:17:30.346
Here in Shenzhen, the
cosmopolitan boom city just

01:17:30.480 --> 01:17:32.548
across the border
from Hong Kong,

01:17:32.682 --> 01:17:35.985
industrial migrants can
dream of impossible travels,

01:17:36.119 --> 01:17:38.955
as if they were as mobile
as the goods they produce.

01:17:39.089 --> 01:17:42.725
Holland, known as the
country of windmills,

01:17:42.859 --> 01:17:46.662
is also famous throughout
the world for its flowers.

01:17:46.796 --> 01:17:50.599
The windmills and tulips
create the beautiful studies

01:17:50.734 --> 01:17:59.508
of rustic simplicity, yet
full of figure and vitality.

01:17:59.642 --> 01:18:01.944
China never had
a maritime world.

01:18:02.079 --> 01:18:05.648
It's always been a continental
society, a continental culture,

01:18:05.782 --> 01:18:09.585
interested primarily in
what's going on inland.

01:18:09.719 --> 01:18:15.257
The sea was always a
small, peripheral activity,

01:18:15.391 --> 01:18:17.526
of no fundamental importance.

01:18:17.660 --> 01:18:20.395
And it's only recently
that has changed.

01:18:20.530 --> 01:18:22.598
It does depend now on
the maritime world,

01:18:22.732 --> 01:18:24.533
on maritime trade, on
trade with elsewhere,

01:18:24.667 --> 01:18:26.502
in a way that it
never did in the past.

01:18:26.636 --> 01:18:28.737
And that has changed,
and is changing,

01:18:28.872 --> 01:19:44.179
how people perceive
the sea, but slowly.

01:19:44.313 --> 01:20:01.663
[beeping]

01:20:01.798 --> 01:20:05.133
The synergy of logistics,
transportation, the container,

01:20:05.267 --> 01:20:09.638
and the very large
pool of people

01:20:09.772 --> 01:20:14.143
who readily are prepared to
change their lives dramatically

01:20:14.277 --> 01:20:19.849
by migrating to areas where
they have no family, no friends,

01:20:19.983 --> 01:20:24.720
and to be prepared
to work for 12,

01:20:24.854 --> 01:20:33.929
14, 15 hours without
complaining, with the only idea

01:20:34.064 --> 01:20:37.066
in mind to make a better
tomorrow for themselves

01:20:37.200 --> 01:20:40.202
and for their
families or children,

01:20:40.337 --> 01:20:54.083
has made it possible to develop
China in the way that it has.

01:20:54.217 --> 01:20:57.485
60% of China's exports
to the United States

01:20:57.620 --> 01:21:01.023
are produced by American-owned
multinational companies.

01:21:01.157 --> 01:21:05.627
This factory is Chinese owned.

01:21:05.762 --> 01:21:08.664
The factory's products appear
on the American market,

01:21:08.798 --> 01:21:10.899
with familiar brand names.

01:21:11.034 --> 01:21:14.736
Its largest retail customer
is Walmart, the third biggest

01:21:14.871 --> 01:21:25.547
company in the world and the
biggest importer into the US.

01:21:25.681 --> 01:21:28.583
Walmart pays the
lowest possible wages,

01:21:28.718 --> 01:21:31.387
demands deep discounts
from its suppliers,

01:21:31.521 --> 01:21:47.503
and sells to the bottom ranks
of the American working class.

01:21:47.637 --> 01:21:59.414
[rumbling]

01:21:59.548 --> 01:22:20.235
[speaking chinese]

01:22:20.370 --> 01:22:23.572
If we think of plastics
and imagine light industry,

01:22:23.706 --> 01:22:25.608
we forget the metallic
heaviness and precision

01:22:25.742 --> 01:22:32.047
of injection molds, which must
themselves be manufactured.

01:22:32.181 --> 01:23:24.232
[rumbling]

01:23:24.366 --> 01:23:26.334
[beeping]

01:23:26.468 --> 01:23:28.804
[speaking chinese]

01:23:28.938 --> 01:23:31.440
American and European
corporate lobbyists

01:23:31.575 --> 01:23:35.411
fought hard and en masse against
a new Chinese labor law, that

01:23:35.545 --> 01:23:37.613
cracked open the door
to collective bargaining

01:23:37.747 --> 01:23:39.948
and higher wages.

01:23:40.083 --> 01:23:43.385
China's foreign partners
would like the low wage utopia

01:23:43.519 --> 01:23:47.857
to last forever.

01:23:47.990 --> 01:24:34.469
[rumbling]

01:24:34.603 --> 01:24:38.373
[pounding]

01:24:38.507 --> 01:24:41.110
All this for a morning coffee?

01:24:41.244 --> 01:24:42.778
The day's first
drink can still be

01:24:42.912 --> 01:24:45.046
brewed in a glass
or a metal pot,

01:24:45.181 --> 01:24:48.683
or poured by hand through
a mesh filter, any of which

01:24:48.818 --> 01:24:51.553
lasts longer than an
electrical appliance planned

01:24:51.687 --> 01:24:56.024
for obsolesce.

01:24:56.159 --> 01:25:00.462
In 2007, because we work with
so many different manufacturers,

01:25:00.597 --> 01:25:03.832
we started to hear more
and more that manufacturers

01:25:03.967 --> 01:25:07.102
were complaining of not being
able to fill their production

01:25:07.235 --> 01:25:08.170
lines.

01:25:08.304 --> 01:25:10.839
And normally, in a
crisis, in a recession,

01:25:10.973 --> 01:25:14.042
people go for less
expensive items.

01:25:14.177 --> 01:25:18.646
So we started to design
items that are low cost.

01:25:18.781 --> 01:25:20.882
But we also started
making items which

01:25:21.017 --> 01:25:24.386
are more expensive
and better quality

01:25:24.521 --> 01:25:28.590
because consumers are
a lot more prudent.

01:25:28.725 --> 01:25:31.126
So if they, for instance,
buy a coffee maker,

01:25:31.260 --> 01:25:34.362
they no longer buy it with the
idea of using it for a year,

01:25:34.496 --> 01:25:35.931
then discarding it.

01:25:36.065 --> 01:25:37.933
They buy it and
they want to keep it

01:25:38.067 --> 01:25:41.303
for five years or 10 years.

01:25:41.437 --> 01:25:43.605
In other words, the
center drops out

01:25:43.740 --> 01:25:48.043
of the market, goods for the
poor, goods for the rich.

01:25:48.177 --> 01:26:06.361
There's no one in the middle.

01:26:06.495 --> 01:26:53.541
[speaking chinese]

01:26:53.675 --> 01:29:03.371
[singing - chinese]

01:29:03.506 --> 01:29:06.508
Where will these young
women be in 20 years?

01:29:06.642 --> 01:29:08.911
Will they return to
villages that have finally

01:29:09.045 --> 01:29:12.647
been developed or will the
Chinese industrial economy

01:29:12.782 --> 01:29:16.485
continue to rely upon the
cheap labor of 100 million

01:29:16.619 --> 01:29:19.888
young migrants
from poor villages.

01:29:20.022 --> 01:30:43.138
[speaking chinese]

01:30:43.272 --> 01:30:45.540
Wages are indeed
rising, as labor

01:30:45.675 --> 01:30:48.943
becomes scarce in the
Southeastern industrial belts.

01:30:49.077 --> 01:30:50.679
And migrant workers
are increasingly

01:30:50.813 --> 01:30:57.351
taking to the streets
to press their demands.

01:30:57.485 --> 01:31:04.759
[rumbling]

01:31:04.893 --> 01:31:27.582
[prayer - indonesian]

01:31:27.716 --> 01:33:56.364
[speaking indonesian]

01:33:56.498 --> 01:34:16.317
[speaking korean]

01:34:16.451 --> 01:35:07.234
[speaking spanish]

01:35:07.369 --> 01:35:10.504
A smaller port
allows us to rethink.

01:35:10.639 --> 01:35:14.842
What is the way forward for
a small city near the sea?

01:35:14.977 --> 01:35:18.613
The rhetoric of efficiency, the
miracle of the global supply

01:35:18.747 --> 01:35:23.284
chain, just in time, intermodal,
cheap goods from China,

01:35:23.418 --> 01:35:26.253
more and more stuff
with no end in sight,

01:35:26.388 --> 01:35:29.424
this rhetoric goes only
so far in justifying

01:35:29.558 --> 01:35:32.894
the global trading system.

01:35:33.027 --> 01:35:40.435
[rattling]

01:35:40.570 --> 01:35:45.406
There is a softer alternative,
the McDonaldization of culture,

01:35:45.540 --> 01:35:47.108
the franchise model.

01:35:47.243 --> 01:35:49.310
This is the velvet
glove that cushions

01:35:49.444 --> 01:35:53.347
the iron fist of world trade.

01:35:53.482 --> 01:35:56.283
In order to establish
its autonomy for Madrid,

01:35:56.418 --> 01:35:58.285
the Basque bourgeoisie
makes an alliance

01:35:58.420 --> 01:36:00.221
with a New York
museum that can only

01:36:00.355 --> 01:36:06.027
survive by exporting
its operations.

01:36:06.162 --> 01:36:09.197
If there's a building
that refuses to be a box,

01:36:09.332 --> 01:36:12.700
this is it-- Frank Gehry's
Guggenheim, Bilbao.

01:36:12.835 --> 01:36:15.036
A museum clad in
titanium, bought cheaply

01:36:15.171 --> 01:36:18.572
on the Russian market, as
the former socialist economy

01:36:18.707 --> 01:36:23.444
was butchered for quick profits;
aerospace metal, a metal that

01:36:23.578 --> 01:36:25.947
defies time and rust.

01:36:26.081 --> 01:36:28.783
The museum contributes
to a pervasive illusion,

01:36:28.917 --> 01:36:33.087
only it and it's artistic
contents are contemporary.

01:36:33.222 --> 01:36:36.758
The city must struggle to
keep up with the new fashion.

01:36:36.892 --> 01:36:39.193
In a way, the
contemporary art museum

01:36:39.327 --> 01:36:43.565
turns the city into
an antique shop.

01:36:43.699 --> 01:38:01.543
[speaking spanish]

01:38:01.677 --> 01:38:05.379
Following the container terminal
that moved seven years earlier,

01:38:05.513 --> 01:38:08.316
this chain factory will
relocate down river,

01:38:08.451 --> 01:38:11.119
making way for a new zone
of expensive housing,

01:38:11.253 --> 01:38:15.423
designed by another famous
international architect.

01:38:15.557 --> 01:38:17.491
These chains are not antiques.

01:38:17.626 --> 01:38:19.994
Without them, ships
would never anchor

01:38:20.129 --> 01:38:25.933
and there would
be no world trade.

01:38:26.068 --> 01:38:28.869
Cultural tourism can
replace industry.

01:38:29.004 --> 01:38:32.406
A dingy city will thrive
anew and escape the drudgery

01:38:32.540 --> 01:38:39.413
of the maritime industrial past.

01:38:39.547 --> 01:38:43.617
A fish that never rots,
a ship that never rusts,

01:38:43.752 --> 01:38:48.922
a lighthouse that only
shines when the Sun is out.

01:38:49.056 --> 01:38:56.297
[bells clanging]

01:38:56.432 --> 01:38:59.500
Down river from the
Guggenheim, the industrial past

01:38:59.634 --> 01:39:01.569
refuses to go away.

01:39:01.704 --> 01:39:05.973
The strange mix of bourgeoisie
heroism and social realism,

01:39:06.108 --> 01:39:08.843
dating from the end of the
19th century, the heyday

01:39:08.977 --> 01:39:11.279
of the steel industry in Bilbao.

01:39:11.413 --> 01:39:14.949
Behind, the transporter
bridge of the same period.

01:39:15.083 --> 01:39:28.629
Metallic capitalist wonders that
fly beneath the tourist radar.

01:39:28.763 --> 01:39:32.400
Outside the museum, we
find works in rusty steel

01:39:32.535 --> 01:39:36.737
by the Basque sculptors
Oteiza and Chillida.

01:39:36.872 --> 01:39:39.006
To the end of his
life, Oteiza refused

01:39:39.141 --> 01:39:41.809
to exhibit at the
Guggenheim, regarding it

01:39:41.943 --> 01:39:46.648
as a bastion of America
cultural imperialism.

01:39:46.782 --> 01:39:50.851
The title of this work is called
The Matter of Time because time

01:39:50.986 --> 01:39:55.657
was the major input into how
we place the entire field that

01:39:55.790 --> 01:39:56.290
we're--

01:39:56.424 --> 01:40:30.457
[speaking spanish]

01:40:30.592 --> 01:40:33.060
--the subject is the
apples on the table

01:40:33.195 --> 01:40:35.896
or the time is in the
landscape of the painting.

01:40:36.031 --> 01:40:40.067
My pieces are based on
the subject matter, not--

01:40:40.202 --> 01:40:41.969
The Guggenheim fortune
was made in the copper

01:40:42.104 --> 01:40:44.772
mines of New Mexico and Chile.

01:40:44.906 --> 01:40:47.108
The vast gallery is sponsored
by the largest steel

01:40:47.242 --> 01:40:49.643
company in the
world, ArcelorMittal.

01:40:49.778 --> 01:40:51.879
--in relation to
your body rhythm--

01:40:52.013 --> 01:40:54.482
The spiraling labyrinths
of the American sculptor,

01:40:54.617 --> 01:40:58.653
Richard Serra, a shipyard
worker in his youth.

01:40:58.787 --> 01:41:40.561
[rumbling]

01:41:40.695 --> 01:42:17.832
[music playing]

01:42:17.966 --> 01:42:20.901
The imbalance of
trade-- the world

01:42:21.036 --> 01:42:24.004
is increasingly divided
between producing nations

01:42:24.139 --> 01:42:26.174
that strive to
develop and consuming

01:42:26.308 --> 01:42:28.809
nations mired in debt.

01:42:28.943 --> 01:42:30.344
In the rich
countries, capital is

01:42:30.479 --> 01:42:32.880
freed from its
industrial obligations.

01:42:33.014 --> 01:42:37.185
And finance is king, inventing
ever more clever and risky

01:42:37.319 --> 01:42:41.121
instruments for enrichment.

01:42:41.256 --> 01:42:44.658
In the poor countries, young
people labor long hours,

01:42:44.792 --> 01:42:47.328
making more and more
things for export.

01:42:47.462 --> 01:42:50.498
Worldwide supply
exceeds command.

01:42:50.632 --> 01:42:53.367
Profit margins fall in
both the real economy

01:42:53.502 --> 01:42:56.237
and in the finance
sector, leaving financiers

01:42:56.371 --> 01:42:59.774
to invent ever crazier
ways for selling debt

01:42:59.908 --> 01:43:02.143
to gullible creditors.

01:43:02.277 --> 01:43:07.348
Debt-driven consumerism
can last only so long.

01:43:07.482 --> 01:43:11.452
What happens when the system
runs out of workers to exploit,

01:43:11.587 --> 01:43:15.456
when the credit bubble breaks,
when hyperproducing China

01:43:15.591 --> 01:43:19.360
owns the debt of
hyperconsuming America.

01:43:19.494 --> 01:43:22.630
Can the system, as
we know it, survive?

01:43:22.765 --> 01:43:26.000
Does the container, like
capitalism in general,

01:43:26.134 --> 01:43:28.135
sow the seeds of
its own destruction

01:43:28.270 --> 01:43:31.939
by allowing industry
to take flight?

01:43:32.073 --> 01:43:44.818
A Trojan horse, that
turns on its inventors.

01:43:44.953 --> 01:43:47.554
Near Antwerp, we return
to a more brutal model

01:43:47.688 --> 01:43:49.923
of development.

01:43:50.058 --> 01:43:52.893
Containers conquer
the quaintest village.

01:43:53.027 --> 01:43:55.062
No one plans a Guggenheim here.

01:43:55.196 --> 01:45:30.824
[speaking dutch]

01:45:30.958 --> 01:45:34.194
This being Belgium,
things are complicated.

01:45:34.329 --> 01:45:35.829
The Flemish
nationalist government

01:45:35.963 --> 01:45:38.633
sees the Port of Antwerp
as the economic motor

01:45:38.767 --> 01:45:41.101
of an independent
Flemish state and seeks

01:45:41.236 --> 01:45:45.039
to catch up with, and surpass,
Rotterdam and Hamburg,

01:45:45.173 --> 01:45:47.174
as the gateway to Europe.

01:45:47.308 --> 01:45:50.711
For all their nationalism, they
play the globalization game

01:45:50.845 --> 01:45:52.112
well.

01:45:52.247 --> 01:45:55.582
Some of Doel's supporters
are left-wing antiglobalists

01:45:55.717 --> 01:46:01.355
and ecologists, who embrace the
ideal of universal hospitality.

01:46:01.489 --> 01:46:04.358
Others are radical
right-wing nationalists,

01:46:04.492 --> 01:46:07.627
who act in the name of Flemish
heritage and tradition,

01:46:07.762 --> 01:46:09.463
and who would exclude strangers.

01:46:09.597 --> 01:47:15.362
[speaking german]

01:47:15.496 --> 01:47:26.307
[music playing]

01:47:26.441 --> 01:47:37.251
[bike rattling]

01:47:37.385 --> 01:47:41.688
[ship horn]

01:47:41.822 --> 01:47:44.925
A last dance for Doel.

01:47:45.059 --> 01:47:47.728
[music playing]

01:47:47.863 --> 01:47:50.731
If the village of Doel were
to survive against all odds,

01:47:50.866 --> 01:47:54.468
we could pose another question,
perhaps unfair, and better

01:47:54.602 --> 01:47:56.771
directed to all the
people of Flanders

01:47:56.905 --> 01:47:59.974
and all the rich
countries of the world.

01:48:00.108 --> 01:48:04.077
What hospitality would be
extended to stranded seafarers

01:48:04.212 --> 01:48:06.781
if a bankrupt ship were
to moor in the estuary,

01:48:06.915 --> 01:48:09.950
or if a ship were to
sink in the channel?

01:48:10.085 --> 01:48:12.986
What hospitality to
refugees from the lowlands

01:48:13.120 --> 01:48:16.457
of the global south,
who flee rising tides?

01:48:16.591 --> 01:48:18.759
The managerial
elites, who profit

01:48:18.894 --> 01:48:23.497
from the flow of endless boxes,
have lost all credibility.

01:48:23.631 --> 01:48:26.133
More and more is not the answer.

01:48:26.268 --> 01:48:30.137
The lifeboat carved from the
wooden shoe of days gone by

01:48:30.271 --> 01:48:31.938
is all we've got.

01:48:32.073 --> 01:48:37.310
The lowly crew must
seize the helm.

01:48:37.445 --> 01:48:42.182
The last gift to remain safely
in Pandora's box, after evils

01:48:42.316 --> 01:48:49.589
have been unleashed
upon the world, is hope.

01:48:49.723 --> 01:48:52.659
[music playing]