Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Slave Labor

This December 23, 2012 Portland Oregonian carries a news story about a woman who opened up a box of Halloween decorations and found something really frightening inside: a letter from one of the workers in China who made them:
That's when Keith found it. Scribbled onto paper and folded into eighths, the letter was tucked between two Styrofoam headstones.

"Sir: 

"If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization. Thousands people here who are under the persicution of the Chinese Communist Party Government will thank and remember you forever." 
As the article points out, it has been unlawful for many years to import goods manufactured by slave labor.  I have read that this law was originally passed to prevent goods made by Nazi slave labor from being sold here before World War II.

One of the commenters claims that the Chinese characters in the letter, and the use of a particular abbreviation, indicate that it was written by Hong Kongers or Taiwanese.  It seems unlikely that Taiwanese would be a mainland slave labor camp, but I could see someone form Hong Kong ending up there.  Does anyone who is a native speaker of Chinese want to look at the images of the letter at that article, and tell me if there is merit to this claim?

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