Director: May Thin Kyi
Myanmar/Germany, 2021
15′
Every year, thousands of young people flock to Yangon from Myanmar’s rural dry zone to work in the factories that have sprung up on the outskirts of the country’s former capital. Ma Nwet Yin Win is one of them. She and her sister left their home on an alluvial island in the Ayeyarwaddy River twenty years ago. Climate change has made life there difficult, but fighting for workers’ rights in Yangon is no less daunting.
May Thyn Kyi (24) was born in Yangon to parents from the Rakhine and Inn ethnic groups in western Myanmar and central Shan State, respectively. Frustrated by constraints for women working in journalism, she left reporting and announcing jobs at the Eleven Media Group and Mandalay FM to instead work in communications for the Rainfall Feminist Organization. Since joining YFS in 2020, she has worked on several projects, such as fellow student Mai Aik Yunn’s A Boy with Dreams. Shifting Sands is her directing debut.
Camera: Theingi Win Tin
Editing: Mi Mi Lwin
Sound: Sai Nyi Min Htut
Producer: Khin Myanmar / Yangon Film School