Aung
Lin
ASA141-Valverde
Be
Green Challenge
Blog
#1
Week#1
When professor
Valverde gave the instructions for this be green challenge, I knew it was going
to be a piece of cake because I hate shopping except grocery shopping. My mom
buys all of my clothes and I have never spent a penny on clothes. Also my
parents buy all of my school supplies as well. I hope the rest of the class can
survive this four week torture. Week three of this challenge would be hard
since the black Friday is during that week. Professor mentioned in class that
if I want to buy clothes during these four weeks, I must shop at second hand
stores like Goodwill. I was curious about Goodwill because I only heard of it
and never once shop there so I did my research online about that store. I
visited www.goodwill.org and found out
that Goodwill stores items are actually donated by people. I always thought
things that they sell in their stores are bought from people but I was wrong.
Also I learned that Goodwill help people get jobs and I have never heard of
that. Another interesting thing I learned is that when you donate something to
Goodwill, you will receive a receipt from one of their employee and you can use
that receipt to claim a tax deduction for clothing and items you donated that
are in good conditions. So I was thinking people get paid for donating clothes
to Goodwill and they didn’t exactly took these items for free.
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| People Donating at Goodwill |
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| Taxes and Your Donations |
After
I read Holstein’s article “Santa’s Sweatshop” under week 6 reading, I learned
things I never once heard of. For example I learned that Reebok used to make
their soccer balls using child labor. I always thought sweatshops only used
adult labor. This is pretty shocking and I can’t believe companies like Reebok
would use poor innocent children from developing countries to make profit. I
grew up in Burma and after I read the Holstein’s article, I learned that there
used to be three Levi jeans factories in Burma. I never once heard of this
before and was shocked because I had no clue that a famous American jean company had some sweatshop in my country. One thing I know for sure is that any clothing brand
companies would do anything to get cheap labor; usually taking advantage of
poor people in developing countries.
I
learned another interesting story after I read The Beautiful Generation chapter
1 under week 6 reading. I learned that famous Asian fashion designers like Vera
Wang got their start from their parents. These young Asian American fashion
designers used to play with their moms’ or dads’ leftover materials and learned
how to make clothes. Also they all rented spaces in cheap part of NYC to get
started on their businesses. There are successes and failures. Designers like
Vera Wang became famous but there are some who had to close their doors. I
always thought fashion designers learned how to make clothes by going to
fashion schools but instead I learned that their parents are their real teachers.
I
felt very sad after I watched “Made in LA” in class because I didn't know that
Forever 21 would do such a thing like this to their garment workers. These
Mexican women garment workers got bullied because of their social status in
America and it was the perfect opportunity for Forever 21. One of the Forever
21 boss went way too far when he spat on the Mexican lady the day he fired her
and she was humiliated and devastated. All these workers were brave and
protested because Forever 21 didn't pay them minimum wage, overtime wage or
respect. If I were in their shoes I would never have the courage to do
that. In the end, I’m so glad that the
workers and Forever 21 negotiated after three years fighting.
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