Young Heroes: Voices of RugMark Children
The Most Beautiful Rug Campaign Comes to Life!
April 10-17, 2007
As part of The Most Beautiful Rug awareness campaign, RugMark proudly hosted a speaking tour, Young Heroes: Voices of RugMark Children. Sanita Lama and Jaya Bhandari, two former child weavers from Nepal, traveled throughout the East Coast to tell their stories firsthand. Sanita and Jaya were found working in carpet factories in Kathmandu and rescued by RugMark inspectors at ages 10 and 11 respectively. With RugMark's ongoing support, they are now in school at 19 years old. Sanita and Jaya represent more than 3,000 children that RugMark has rescued from carpet looms. But, nearly 300,000 children are still exploited by the carpet industry. In sharing Sanita and Jaya's stories, RugMark's Young Heroes tour sought to educate American consumers about child servitude and the human impact of individual purchasing power. RugMark is deeply grateful to our Young Heroes tour event hosts: Domini Social Investments, Odegard Miami, Odegard New York, Maureen Orth, Tisch College at Tufts University, The University of Miami and Walden Asset Management. The Young Heroes tour was made possible by the generous sponsorship of Humanity United, Ramsay Merriam Fund and Donna E. Shalala via Kaiser Family Foundation. |
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"Education shows us the real beauty of the world. I hope that all the children of the world can have freedom and the golden chance for education." -Jaya Bhandari "I feel as if I've been given a new birth in this life."
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Children's Stories
At the age of five, Manju was already working on the rug looms. While she has since been found and freed from illegal carpet work, some 250,000 children throughout South Asia still toil in obscurity. Through the GoodWeave certification program more than 3,600 kids like Manju have been rescued, rehabilitated and educated, and thousands more deterred from entering the work force.
More Stories »About the Organization
GoodWeave works to end illegal child labor in the carpet industry by certifying child-labor-free rugs and by providing education and opportunities to rescued and at-risk children. Learn More »
