University student Shiori Suzuki visited Myanmar in 2013 as a tourist. What she did not notice there was the plight of the Muslim minority Rohingya — and only learned about them and their situation from a newspaper article upon her return.
“What did I see in Myanmar?” the 22-year-old Keio University student recalls asking herself after reading the news piece about the persecution of Rohingya and the human trafficking they undergo to seek better conditions in other countries.
Suzuki decided to do something. She bought a secondhand video camera and began chronicling the lives of members of the ethnic group who have sought refuge in Japan.
She and her friends started making frequent visits to a community of Rohingya refugees in Tatebayashi, Gunma Prefecture. Over the course of about 18 months they followed the lives of 50 out of some 200 residents there.
Suzuki made a 20-minute film, titled “Hikari” (Light), which focuses on everyday life for the migrants in Japan rather than what they have left behind.
She filmed children playing together as their fathers look on smiling. (Courtesy of Rohingya Vision TV)
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