Appreciating the distinction between work and labor

I'm standing among rows of kale in a greenhouse in Gaomi county, Shandong province, with a camera pointed at me, its lens vacant and black. My performance is captured and stored, where it will lie dormant in digital form until it is someday edited. Around me, women pick green and purple leaves from stalks and store them in mesh sacks hanging from their hips or strapped to their backs. The air is sticky with the smell of damp dirt and sweat. I am working, but they are laboring.