By Joel Chong

Thanks to the inclusion of young volunteers and migrants in the cast and crew, a Lao television mini-drama series

about the lives and struggles of young migrants who freely cross the border turned out to be just the right vehicle for getting their attention to migration and its risks.

Dubbed ‘Keun Ni Yang Mi Saeng Deuan’ (loosely translated as ‘The Moonlight Is Never Forgotten’), the series was produced by the Lao Youth Union in Savannakhet province to raise awareness of some of the major issues confronting youth migrant, such as trafficking and HIV/AIDS.

The mini-drama series, produced in both Lao and Vietnamese languages, was targeted at Lao and Vietnamese youth who move freely along the Lao-Vietnam border.

“We use this drama to push them to talk, to talk about themselves,” said Somkiao Kingsada, producer of the series and chief of the Lao Youth Radio and TV programme under the department, who spoke to TerraViva on the sidelines of the Mekong Media Forum being held in this northern Thai city from Dec. 9-12.

Savannakhet, which borders Thailand on the west and Vietnam on the east, has seen an influx of Vietnamese migrants from the nearby Vietnamese border town of Lao Bao due to the easy movement across the border. Young people make up a sizable number of such migrants, said Somkiao.

Vietnamese children and youth cross over to Laos to find employment. Some are brought along by their parents who migrate to Laos to work.

To produce the series, the Union department tapped volunteer cast and crew from the local chapter of the Union, the Savannakhet Youth Committee. Young migrants from Vietnam were part the production team and cast. “They were very excited,” Somkiao said.

Probably another first for the production was the participation of HIV-positive youth in the drama series, both behind and in front of the TV camera. “They really enjoyed seeing themselves [on television],” said Somkiao.

Production began in August 2008 and the series is airing in December on Lao National Television’s Channel 9. The series was part of the efforts of the Union’s youth department to broaden its focus beyond the urban youth.

“We used to think of our [urban] members only, but what about the others … the ethnic minorities [on the] rural borders?” asked Somkiao.

The title of the series, ‘The Moonlight Is Never Forgotten’, alludes to the nostalgia gripping youth migrants in big cities away from home. “In the countryside, where they don’t have any electricity, they can see the full moon clearly, but when they go to the city they can’t,” said Somkiao.

The series is also available in DVD format to reach a wider audience. “Some parts of Laos do not have television access, so we also use DVDs at monthly (youth) meetings and analyse the characters,” said Somkiao.

In the pipeline is a similar production focusing on Lao girls who end up working as bar girls and sex workers in neighbouring Thailand.

Laos is not the only country in the Mekong region that has used the media, in particular television dramas, to raise awareness of social issues.

In 2004 a Cambodian soap opera, ‘Rous Cheat Chivit’ (‘The Taste of Life’), began airing episodes revolving a female trafficker’s attempts to traffic in Cambodian street children for labour and sexual exploitation. These episodes were intended to raise awareness about trafficking of children using the popular TV drama series — an idea broached to its producers by the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) regional office in Bangkok.

‘The Taste Of Life’, funded by the BBC World Service Trust had previously tackled social issues such as HIV. The TV drama is considered the highest-rating soap opera in Cambodia.

“We thought that it was an excellent way to get the message across to massive Cambodian audiences in the right age group,” Allan Dow, advocacy officer at the ILO office in Bangkok, said at session called ‘Children and Borders’.

“The beauty of a drama is you have more chance of reaching more people. Viewers follow characters for months and they identify with them and their situations,” said Charles Hamilton of the BBC Trust in the ILO report, ‘Meeting the Challenge’.

Due to the positive feedback received by ‘The Taste of Life’s 21-episode arc on trafficking, it was eventually adapted to film and then into comic book form.

“I don’t know whether a documentary, news, or popular dramas are the best way to get messages out,” said Dow, “but we’re always looking for new ideas”.