Singapore’s lonely poets: migrant workers who feel excluded find their voice through writing, as new documentary shows
With few friends and little connection to locals, people like Zhang Haitao are expressing their feelings through poetry and writing, captured in Singaporean filmmaker Upneet Kaur-Nagpal’s documentary Poets on Permits
Zhang Haitao is 3,800 kilometres from home. Four years ago, he left his family and friends behind in Baoji city, in central China’s Shaanxi province, to become a migrant worker in Singapore. He was only 22 years old when he arrived, and has spent much of his time in the city battling loneliness and social isolation.
Feeling invisible and out of the loop in the city of 5.6 million people, the softly spoken Zhang turned to poetry. His words speak volumes about his life as a migrant worker – feeling like an outsider in the wealthy and socially insular Lion City.
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“I actually like the company I work for,” says Zhang, who repairs and maintains machines on an assembly line for one of the world’s largest consumer technology manufacturers. He works 12-hour days on a rolling shift.
“My bosses take care of me well, and they’ve provided me with many opportunities to learn. It’s the dullness of living here that has been most difficult. There is very little connection that we as outsiders can make with the locals, and sometimes, people discriminate against migrant workers from specific countries.”
Zhang says that after four years in the country, he still has no Singaporean friends, only colleagues. It is his job that keeps him in the city state.
“Back in my country, I studied electrical engineering and automation in college. Then when I graduated, it was very difficult to find a job that corresponded to my major,” Zhang says, pointing out that about 6.8 million people graduate from university every year in China. “Then my teacher suggested that I try to find a job in Singapore.”
