Invisible

A documentary short by Valentina Montoya Robledo and Daniel Gómez Restrepo.
(Spanish, with English subtitles).

Two domestic workers, Reinalda in Medellín and Belén in Bogotá, explain the challenges they face when travelling on public transport day after day from their own neighbourhoods to the communities where they work. Their long, costly and overcrowded journeys are invisible to their employers and to those that plan the public transport networks. Despite everything, they carry on with characteristic tenacity. Each day they wake up and keep a part of Colombian society going by undertaking a job that is undervalued and underpaid. They fight for a better life – for themselves, for their communities and above all for their children and grandchildren and their co-workers.

‘Invisible’ refers to something that is present but not seen.

In Colombia, the contribution of domestic workers has long been invisible, but today they are speaking out. This documentary film is part of the project ‘Invisible Commutes’ that seeks to make domestic workers’ long, and often violent, commutes more visible and to campaign for public transport that takes their needs into account.