Experiencing Interruptions?

Finding their niche:Unheard stories of migrant women

This film documents the lives of two Indian women migrants who moved to Japan more than a decade ago, as a case study of the ‘trailing spouses’ concept in migration.

Jyoti, 41 and Mandeep, 39, grew up in the state of Punjab, northern India, in middle-class households. They received a good education and had promising careers in India. Then, in their early 20s, they each agreed to marry men living in Japan by arrangement.

The women were excited to move to a foreign country and to be with their husbands but they had no prior knowledge of Japan. Having witnessed at a distance the lives of their relatives settled in the US, UK and Canada, they had similar expectations for their own future lives in Japan. But the reality was to prove different from the expectation.

In place of comfort, luxury, love, and fun, loneliness and fear took over. Through personal narratives told by the women, we examine past, present and future expectations and see how these affect their roles as Indian women, wives, mothers and workers in a foreign country, as well as the challenges they faced in ‘Finding their Niche’.

  • Megha Wadhwa
    Director
  • Megha Wadhwa
    Editor
  • Megha Wadhwa
    Cinematography
  • Andy Lawrence
    Editorial Advice
  • Francois Yazbeck
    Re-recording mixing
  • Nour Yazbech
    Colour Correction
  • Megha Wadhwa
    Subtitles
  • Ben Stubbings
    Subtitles
  • Project Type:
    Documentary
  • Runtime:
    58 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    August 24, 2022
  • Production Budget:
    3,000 EUR
  • Country of Origin:
    Japan
  • Country of Filming:
    India, Japan
  • Language:
    English, Hindi
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Digital Cinema Package:
    Unavailable
  • Jaipur International Film Festival
    Jaipur
    India
    January 8, 2023
Director Biography - Megha Wadhwa

Dr. Megha Wadhwa is a migration researcher and Japanese and Indian studies Scholar. She is a Research Associate at Free University of Berlin, and a visiting scholar at Sophia University, Tokyo, which is also her alma mater. Her research focuses on identity, ethnicity, race, social class, women, and skills in migration. She is originally from New Delhi and was a resident of Tokyo for about 15 years before she moved to Berlin in 2021. She is the author of the book ‘Indian Migrants in Tokyo: A Study of Socio-Cultural, Religious and Working Worlds’ (Routledge:2021). She has also written several articles on the Indian community in Japan and other topics for The Japan Times and other mediums. Currently her project focuses on ‘Indian Professionals in Japan and Singapore: Migration Trends, Labor Market Integration and Challenges’ and is a part of the research project – ‘Qualifications and Skill in the Migration Process of Foreign Workers in Asia’(QuaMaFA), supported by Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Germany (BMBF) as a part of the ‘Small Subjects’ funding initiative.

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