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Taiwan's betel nut girl culture | Tobie Openshaw | TEDxMonga

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    A female colleague asked me the other day,
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    "What dose it feel like to know
    that people think you are a weirdo?"
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    (Laughter)
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    And not wanting to admit that I didn't
    know people thought I was a weirdo,
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    I said: "Well, I think that weirdos
    look at the world in a different way,
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    and they try to see a little bit behind
    that which everybody accepts."
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    So if that's the definition of a weirdo,
    then I'm happy to be called one.
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    So, I arrived in Taiwan 12 years ago,
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    and I learned about
    the thing called "betel nut."
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    And I was really surprised
    and interested in this
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    because I'd never come
    across anything like this before.
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    And, for the uninitiated, betel nut
    is in fact a fruit, it's not a nut.
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    It grows on the areca palm tree.
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    And it actually is chewed all over Asia.
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    It's very popular and very
    common all over Asia.
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    It is a stimulant.
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    It contains something called arecoline,
    which gives you a little bit of a rush.
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    Chewing a betel nut is little bit like
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    drinking three cups of espresso coffee
    immediately after each other.
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    It needs to be activated,
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    so it gets wrapped in a leaf
    which gives it some taste,
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    and then on the inside of the leaf
    they put some paste -
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    a white lime paste which actually
    activates the active ingredients.
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    So, this then is a product
    which doesn't look like very much.
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    So how do you sell this product
    to people who are driving by your store?
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    Right?
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    You could stand out there
    and wave your betel nut
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    but I don't think that
    is going to work, all right?
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    (Laughter)
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    You could put some
    bright lights on your store,
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    but hey, every store in Taiwan
    has bright lights on it,
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    so that's not going to
    help very much either.
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    So, then somebody about
    somewhere around the 1980s,
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    hit on the idea of getting a pretty girl
    wearing a skimpy outfit
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    to sit by the roadside
    in your store with the bright lights
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    and entice passing drivers to come into -
    and stop, and buy your betel nut.
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    So, when I arrived in Taiwan,
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    and I saw these glass boxes
    by the side of the road
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    with pretty girls sitting inside,
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    what did I think?
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    "Are they prostitutes?"
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    (Laughter)
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    "Is it so open here in Taiwan?"
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    (Laughter)
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    That was - Obviously everybody
    has that thought at first.
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    But I asked my foreigner friends:
    "What is the story here?"
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    They say, "No, no,
    they just sell betel nut,
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    they sell drinks, and they sell
    cigarettes, and nothing else."
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    I'm like, "Oh yeah, really. Right."
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    (Laughter) OK.
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    And when I asked the locals,
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    they all said: "Oh, bad girls, bad girls.
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    Don't even think about it.
    Don't even talk about it. OK?
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    No. They will do all kinds of things
    in those betel nut stores of theirs."
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    But then I started looking
    at this, and I thought,
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    "How does it work? I don't understand.
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    How can a girl sitting in a glass box
    by the side of the road brightly lit
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    actually engage in sexual activity?"
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    It doesn't actually make sense.
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    And so I thought I wanted
    to find out more about this.
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    Being a documentary filmmaker,
    I'm interested in how things work
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    and how people think
    and how people operate
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    what's going on in the world.
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    And so I decided I'm going
    to look at this subject, research it,
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    find out more about it,
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    and try and tell this interesting
    and fascinating and totally unique story.
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    But, as any filmmaker will tell you,
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    access to your subject
    is the most important thing.
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    And I found it very, very difficult
    to connect up with the betel nut girls.
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    They did not want to talk to me.
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    They would generally -
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    They actually don't want to
    talk to anybody.
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    They don't want to be photographed.
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    They say things like:
    "It's a shameful job."
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    They say things like: "My boss won't
    let you take photos of me or talk to me."
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    Or they say: "My parents or my family
    doesn't know that I do this job."
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    But finally I met one girl
    by the name of Jane.
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    At that time she was called Ada,
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    as Taiwanese girls sometimes do,
    they change their names.
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    And she was the first girl to agree
    for me to take her photo,
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    to interview her,
    to tape her, to record her.
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    And it was really a breakthrough for me.
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    And I found that she was,
    in many ways, a typical betel nut girl -
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    dropped out of school; was doing
    this job for several years already,
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    complained about being
    harassed by men, things like that.
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    But in many ways she was also
    against expectations.
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    She was very smart,
    and she spoke really well.
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    And she had a very good unstanding
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    about exactly what it is that she's doing.
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    And in that way she helped
    to introduce me to this business.
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    And that, in fact, is one of
    the very first photos I ever took
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    of a betel nut girl with her consent.
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    So,
    (Laughter)
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    and that's about 2003 or 2004.
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    So I managed to work out a strategy
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    for dealing with the betel nut girls,
    getting them to talk to me.
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    I would become a customer first.
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    I would buy coffee and cigarettes
    from them, chit-chat,
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    and then if I'd get a feeling
    that they would be interested to talk,
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    I'd get a female, Chinese-speaking
    assistant to go with me,
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    and we go and chat to them
    and explain to them what I do.
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    And I found that when you
    approach them in that way,
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    that all of us, everyone here
    has a story to tell.
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    that's why we are here today, right?
    because we have a story to tell.
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    And if you show a genuine
    interest in someone's story,
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    they will generally
    be happy to tell it to you.
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    So I wanted to make a film.
    I couldn't get funding for it.
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    The government wouldn't
    give money for a film
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    that promotes this part
    of the Taiwanese culture.
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    But eventually it sort of transformed
    itself into a photography project.
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    2007, I had my first photo exhibition.
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    And for some reason, that photo
    exhibition just sort of hit a nerve.
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    And the media picked it up
    and went crazy about it.
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    This foreigner, being in Taiwan,
    and looking at betel nut girls,
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    and showing Taiwanese people
    something about their culture,
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    and looking at it in a different way,
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    the girls became very famous,
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    and the stores down the road complained
    that I hadn't photographed their girls,
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    because these ones are getting more money.
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    (Laughter)
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    And so it went.
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    Discovery did a program on them,
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    and National Geographic did some stuff,
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    and some of them ended up on TV shows.
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    And it was really just interesting.
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    As I say, it really just hit a nerve.
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    I started to get a very good idea
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    about what people in general
    think betel nut girls are,
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    and what the realities are.
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    And I found that
    they are different things.
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    And I found that the betel nut girl issue
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    has many, many layers;
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    it has many, many sides;
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    there are no simple and clear answers.
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    And those are the kinds of things
    that I enjoy dealing with,
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    and having conversations about.
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    It's all about the conversation.
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    So let's see, what is
    the betel nut girls business in?
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    Is it prostitution?
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    Is it girls who actually
    are just prostitutes?
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    Is the business run by gangsters?
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    The girls are all exhibitionists?
    They all like to show off?
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    Or not?
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    Is it some deep-seated and long-running
    culture expression in Taiwan?
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    How about female exploitation?
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    Are these girls exploited or are they not?
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    On the scale of exploitation
    that perhaps all of us have to deal with,
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    where do they fall?
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    Is it maybe a form of female
    empowerment? Who knows?
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    Is it just a blight on the landscape
    and a heath issue, a health problem?
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    Is it just a job like any other?
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    Or is it actually a form of urban art?
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    So, the answer lies somewhere
    along in that whole spectrum.
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    So let's take the first one, prostitution.
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    As I mentioned,
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    doing business in a glass cage
    is probably not going to actually happen.
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    But I do believe that, in general,
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    the business is not, in fact,
    around prostitution.
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    The business is around a pretty girl
    sitting in a glass cage
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    and selling betel nuts girls -
    betel nut, um -
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    (Laughter)
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    Freudian slip there -
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    (Laughter)
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    etc., to passing motorists.
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    Is it a business run by gangsters?
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    Well, if you asked to take
    some of those bosses' photos,
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    they'll say: "Yeah,
    but just don't show my face."
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    So yes, there are certain elements.
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    But I find these days, more and more,
    the stores are actually run by women.
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    So this woman in red is Ada's former boss.
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    And she runs the business
    completely by herself
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    together with their Indonesian maid
    who helps to prepare the betel nut there.
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    Some of the other women like May,
    for instance, manages the store.
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    She manages three other girls
    and the store.
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    The boss almost never comes there.
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    She's totally in charge
    of the place there.
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    Do the girls have some
    element of exhibitionism to them?
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    So, for sure, girls like to dress sexy.
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    They have competitions
    with each other to be sexy.
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    So sometimes, in some places,
    in some areas they will look like this,
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    or they would look like this.
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    And then all the girls
    in the street complain
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    because they have to compete against that.
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    And they don't like it, all right?
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    This, for instance, was quite
    an interesting incident.
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    One of the few times that I saw
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    really sort of overt behavior
    from a betel nut girl,
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    because normally they're very prim.
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    They're sexily dressed
    but their behavior is very prim.
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    This was during a typhoon
    about three or four years ago.
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    The girls were actually working
    in the middle of it.
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    I stopped and took photos.
    It was amazing.
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    This girl was like jumping
    up and down all the time,
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    and the wind's catching
    her dress, lifting it up.
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    After two or three times I'm like,
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    "You're doing it on purpose,
    aren't you? I could tell."
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    (Laughter)
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    But, generally speaking, as I say,
    the manner is actually quite prim.
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    It's that balance between being sexy
    and yet being somehow innocent
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    that I think men find interesting too.
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    How about culture?
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    So Taiwan,
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    or betel nut haa been used
    in Taiwan for hundreds of years
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    by the Aboriginal people,
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    it's a part of their love rituals,
    marriage rituals,
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    and also just simply
    hospitality, you know.
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    When somebody visits your home,
    you are supposed to give them betel nut.
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    And there has been some research done.
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    My friend Daniel did his PhD.
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    And he had some really
    interesting information about
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    during the Japanese period, for instance,
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    betel nut was completely
    eradicated in Taiwan.
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    Only the Aboriginal people
    could have one or two trees in their area
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    to keep going
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    because the Japanese
    wanted to stamp out this habit.
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    But after the Japanese left,
    there was a resurgence in betel nut.
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    And it became, to some extent, a very
    Taiwanese thing to chew betel nut.
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    It became part of the Taiwanese culture.
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    And even more recently, we have
    this idea of "Tai-Ke," right?
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    which is very Taiwanese.
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    It's very earthy; it's very down-to-earth.
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    Of course, there's a large group
    of people who call it low class.
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    But people like this guy, for instance,
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    he's the chairman of the betel nut
    business association in Taoyuan area.
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    I interviewed him, also from my phone.
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    And yeah, he's very typical of that very
    go-getter, businessman kind of guy,
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    and who's prompting
    his business in everything
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    and very proud of being Taiwanese.
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    The girls themselves have a certain
    manner which I find quite interesting.
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    Just a little bit of idea from the way
    they talk, and the way they react.
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    (Video) (Chatter)
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    (Video ends)
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    This is just to show again
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    that the betel nut girls can sometimes
    wear very little clothes
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    but can actually be shy.
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    And it's also about the boundaries
    that they set up for themselves.
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    I found that these girls
    very strict, very clear
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    about what they're prepared to show,
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    and what they're prepared to do,
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    and what they're not.
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    And for instance,
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    Ada, one day, came out
    of her store when I stopped,
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    and she was wearing her usual
    pretty see-through top,
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    so you could see her bra,
    but with a short skirt.
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    And when she stepped out, the wind
    caught her skirt and sort of blew it up.
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    And I thought, you know, nothing of it,
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    but she was so ashamed,
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    she crouched down
    with her face in her hands
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    because she was so embarrassed.
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    I was really surprised by this,
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    but I realized that there was
    a boundary that had been crossed
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    in that moment being I stopped there,
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    and her skirt blew up
    so that one could see her underwear.
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    And so I found that really interesting.
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    The girls have to deal with things like
    harassment from customers, for sure.
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    The guys will talk to them, they'll
    try to get them to go out with them,
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    things like that,
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    or will try to touch them sometimes.
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    And also, occasionally,
    some of the girls complain
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    that guys will stop their cars and will
    actually expose themselves to the girls.
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    So one of the girls, Shao Wen,
    has this board on her wall,
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    so she will write the registration number
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    of any cars of any guys
    that give her trouble
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    so that next time when they come,
    she just doesn't go out of her stand.
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    Most of the stores
    also have security cameras.
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    And the word on the street is,
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    if you give a betel nut girl trouble,
    her boss will see to you.
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    (Laughter) And then -
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    Shao Wen, who actually
    also owns her own store,
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    also has something else that she can use
    in case anybody gets frisky,
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    though she does say
    she's never had to use it.
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    But then I also like to show
    a little bit more closely sometimes,
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    show the girl and give you
    the opportunity to stop and look,
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    because normally
    you'd just drive past, right?
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    All your interactions
    with betel nut girl would be fleeting,
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    would be just driving past -
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    those of you who don't buy betel nuts
    from betel nut girls.
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    So just looking at her
    and seeing this girl,
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    this is like two o'clock in the morning,
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    and you can see
    the hours are getting long.
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    It tells you something, it shows you
    something about the person.
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    Then, others, for instance,
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    you can see there's a friendliness,
    there's a happiness -
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    I have not met any betel nut girls
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    who complain about
    being coerced into doing this job
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    or coerced into wearing
    clothes in a particular way.
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    The turnover in the stores is very high.
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    If she doesn't like what her boss
    wants her to do, then she just goes.
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    She goes to the next store.
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    There's not a problem with that.
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    OK, about the health issue,
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    I would just like to say very clearly
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    that chewing betel nut
    is not good for your health.
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    It's a very strong part
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    of getting esophageal and mouth cancer
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    for people who use it a lot.
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    You do have to chew it a lot.
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    It's not like you chew one and you
    are going to have cancer tomorrow.
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    And especially when combined with
    cigarettes, it's definitely a major issue.
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    So in that part I want to say very clearly
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    that I support the troops
    but I don't support the war.
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    My issue is about the girls.
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    And most importantly then,
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    I just want to say
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    when you look at the girl's
    interaction with the customers there ...
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    girls getting bored...
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    Oh, of course, I always take
    some photos to the girls
  • 15:38 - 15:40
    to show them or to give to them.
  • 15:40 - 15:41
    They like that.
  • 15:41 - 15:46
    And - just going to skip through -
  • 15:51 - 15:52
    OK.
  • 15:52 - 15:56
    And so, I think the conclusion
    I want to come to
  • 15:56 - 16:02
    is that this business
    has many, many layers,
  • 16:02 - 16:03
    and just as with life.
  • 16:03 - 16:07
    Somebody asked me before I started,
    when I was preparing for this,
  • 16:07 - 16:10
    they said, "So, what is
    this idea worth spreading?"
  • 16:10 - 16:12
    You know, the TED
    "ideas worth spreading."
  • 16:12 - 16:15
    "What is the idea worth spreading
    about the betel nut girls of Taiwan?"
  • 16:15 - 16:18
    I thought that's actually
    a very good question.
  • 16:18 - 16:22
    And so what I want to say is
    that in today's world,
  • 16:22 - 16:26
    we are living in a world
    that is increasingly polarized.
  • 16:26 - 16:31
    We are constantly being told
    that things are black or white.
  • 16:31 - 16:35
    With the information age,
    we have more and more information,
  • 16:35 - 16:38
    but somehow the conversation
    is getting lost,
  • 16:38 - 16:40
    the nuances is getting lost.
  • 16:40 - 16:43
    So, what I do with the betel nut girls
    is to look at all the layers -
  • 16:43 - 16:47
    realize that there's a spectrum
    from black to white
  • 16:47 - 16:49
    on all those issues that I mentioned.
  • 16:49 - 16:53
    And it's not all good and all bad
    on any one of those.
  • 16:53 - 16:56
    And I think if we can keep
    the conversation going -
  • 16:56 - 16:57
    I have people come to me and say:
  • 16:57 - 17:00
    "I think you should stop
    taking photos of betel nut girls
  • 17:00 - 17:04
    because it's a bad image for Taiwan"
    or "bad for them" or whatever it is,
  • 17:04 - 17:06
    I'm happy to be part of that conversation.
  • 17:06 - 17:08
    That conversation doesn't have to end.
  • 17:08 - 17:10
    And while we are having conversations,
  • 17:10 - 17:13
    we can find the best solutions
  • 17:13 - 17:16
    to the problems that face us
    like climate change,
  • 17:16 - 17:18
    like leaking government information,
  • 17:18 - 17:19
    like going to war, you know,
  • 17:19 - 17:22
    all the things we are dealing with today.
  • 17:22 - 17:24
    Because while you
    are having a conversation,
  • 17:24 - 17:26
    while you are talking,
    you cannot swing a sword.
  • 17:26 - 17:32
    So, I'd like to invite all of you
    to consider the grey areas.
  • 17:32 - 17:35
    Consider all the lovely layers
    that there are in the world
  • 17:35 - 17:38
    and not just accept
    the given on any one side.
  • 17:38 - 17:40
    And let's all be "weirdos" together.
  • 17:40 - 17:41
    Thank you.
  • 17:41 - 17:43
    (Applause)
Title:
Taiwan's betel nut girl culture | Tobie Openshaw | TEDxMonga
Description:

Photographer and documentary filmmaker Tobie Openshaw shares his unique and privileged view into Taiwan's famous "binlang beauties" - the scantily-clad girls who make their living selling betel nuts from glass booths on the roadside. In this fascinating talk, he also confronts some often-held assumptions.

攝影師兼記錄片拍攝者,歐陽峰Tobie對於台灣最具爭議性的現象--檳榔西施文化,分享了獨特而深入的觀點。 Dec 9, 2010 TEDxMonga - Hearts and Minds http://www.tedxmonga.com

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

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Video Language:
English
Team:
closed TED
Project:
TEDxTalks
Duration:
17:48

English subtitles

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