“Striving hard to fight against the boundary set by poverty” with real actions – Bottle Shoes Movement

An Interview of the founder of Bottle Shoes Movement, Hong Kong

“Buddy Shoes”

Tibet, Nepal, India, Thailand, Loas and Yunnan: Ken visited all these places together with his Bottle Shoes in December of 2012. He insisted to wear his Bottle Shoes on the snow even it was only -8 degree. He called the Bottle Shoes “Buddy Shoes” and insisted to fight against difficulties with his partner together.

“Months before, I saw a photo showing a poor African child wearing Bottle Shoes in facebook. I was touched. They were all living in very adverse environment, but they would never give up their lives. They used their creativity and made Bottle Shoes to fight against poverty.”

Ken discovered later that there are more than 750 million of people are infected or died from the infection caused by the wounds on the foot. These people walk long way across mountains and villages every day. Without shoes, they even carry out their treasure hunting in the garbage hill barefoot. For protecting their feet from infection, they invent Bottle Shoes out of scarce resources.

“Poverty Education”

Ken has finished his one-month Bottle Shoes Journey and come back home. However, he still keeps wearing his “Buddy Shoes” every day. You can hear the sound of Bottle Shoes whenever he is walking nearby. “I hope that this Bottle Shoes Movement could inspire more people to think more about the problem of poverty. Some Hong Kong people would say that they are poor just because they cannot afford to buy the latest smart phone. People earning over 50K a month would still think that they have not enough money to spend. No matter how much a person has have, it is useless if one never knows how to be contented with what he/she has. This is the “poverty” in the city.”

This “discontent” among the city people has already created a lot of global problems. There are more and more resources being wasted every year. There are more and more pollution everywhere around the world.

How can we really deal with these city people who feel that they have “no” shoes to wear, ever he/she is in front of an overloaded shoes cabinet? Shall we build more incinerator or carry out more poverty education?

“Bottle Shoes Movement”

– Bottle Shoes Day

Come join us on 13 Feb at Victoria Park. We gonna make our bottle shoes and experience how children in Africa strive for their lives.

– Bottle Shoes Marathon

We hope to have different people living their daily life in bottle shoes every day and make it a Bottle Shoes Marathon. Join us and upload your photo on our facebook page.