Not Home Free : Thais Freed From Sweatshop Are Adjusting to Life in U.S., but the Future Is Uncertain

At their regular Thursday night meeting, 20 Thai workers who spent nearly three years confined in an El Monte sweatshop gather for English lessons. The lesson of the night: how to order a pizza.

The students diligently write down in their notebooks everything that instructor David Dashiell writes on the board: a sample pizza-ordering dialogue.

They obediently echo back the sentence, “I want two large, Hawaiian pizzas.”

The pizza drill is just one piece of the Thai workers’ routine here as they become more familiar with their new environment. It was nearly 10 months ago that state and federal agents freed a total of 70 workers from behind barbed wire at the El Monte factory, in which they toiled in near slave-like conditions.

Work still dominates their existence, but it is not the 17-hour days of drudgery they sometimes had to endure in El Monte. Today, most of them are employed at garment factories, earning at least minimum wage and often working six days a week. They live in groups of six or seven, sharing two-bedroom apartments.

But their future in this country is uncertain and their lawyer asks that only their nicknames be used in newspaper articles out of fear of reprisals.

The workers had been afforded protected status as material witnesses while the sweatshop operators were being prosecuted on federal charges. But that status may be lifted now that the operators have been sent to prison.

The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service has no plans for any deportation hearings against the Thai workers until their work authorizations run out in February, said Richard Rogers, INS’ Los Angeles district director.

What comes after that is “very unclear,” said Julie Su, a lawyer from the Asian Pacific Legal Center, who represents most of the workers.

One possibility would be “S” visas, which the government grants for witnesses who provide “critical information” in criminal prosecutions. Another is congressional legislation giving the workers permanent status.

Also plodding along is the civil lawsuit that Su and the workers have filed against manufacturers who bought clothing made at the El Monte site.

The immigrants get an update once a month on legal and work issues at the downtown offices of the Thai Community Development Center, where center director Chanchanit “Chancee” Martorell and Su brief them.

One of the women, Maliwan, likes to joke with her friends and co-workers. But when Maliwan talks about El Monte, the bounce drains out of her voice.

“I felt like no one saw me there,” she said. The workers stacked boxes in order to peek out of a small slit along the top of the boarded-up windows. “We wanted to know what was on the other side of the fence,” she said.

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In their letters home, Maliwan and the others never told their families what was happening to them. “We had to say we were OK,” Maliwan said. “We couldn’t tell them the truth.”

About 40 of the workers attended the sentencing of Suni Manasurangkun, whom authorities referred to as the “warden” of the El Monte factory. The workers do not express any glee in the punishment, a seven-year sentence, handed to Manasurangkun.

Sukanyasays she feels sorry for the 66-year-old Manasurangkun because of her age. But, she added, the prison sentence is a sort of balancing of fates. “They are getting what they did to us,” she said.

Like the others, Sukanya had been told she would be able to earn about $1,500 a month in the United States. Divorced and from a poor family, she had hoped to earn enough money to be able to buy a house back in Thailand for herself and the two children she left behind with her parents. “I was hoping my life was going to be a little better,” she said. “When I came to El Monte my dreams were gone.”

Now Sukanya saves enough to send home $100 or $200 every couple of months.

The workers are concerned that two members of the ring that smuggled them into this country remain at large in Thailand. Several say their families have been visited by the smugglers, though nothing bad has happened yet. “If I go back, I don’t know what would happen,” Maliwan said.

As the weeks go by, the workers are slowly expanding their circles. A few have gotten driver’s licenses and cars. A group of the women perform traditional Thai dances and at least one has tried singing professionally.

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On a recent Friday night, Kanit took the microphone for her first singing engagement at a small Vermont Avenue bar.

That night at the Lotus Room brought neither fame nor fortune to Kanit. Accompanied by a single keyboardist, she sang a dozen Thai pop songs. The crowd of 10 danced heartily. Kanit took home $20--minimum wage plus a slice of tips.

“It was fun,” she said. But her first gig was probably also her last. Her body, she said, cannot handle the rigors of the early morning hours.

On weekdays, Kanit wakes up at 5 a.m. and jogs before going to work at a clothing factory a couple of blocks away from her Glendale apartment.

About once a week, Kanit visits doctors for a myriad of problems. The long hours and dusty air at the El Monte sweatshop took a significant health toll on many.

But Kanit’s mood these days is far better.

She sings to herself as she exercises, as she watches TV, as she works. Her favorite song is one whose title roughly translates as “I don’t want your pity, I want your love.”