Where Women Bear the Burden of Water

In this film, water is not merely a backdrop. Nor is it a simple story about scarcity, abundance, or climate disaster. It is about the body, work, time, and everyday decisions. In Bangladesh, it leads to the stories of women living between water that provides a livelihood and water that destroys their health; between their duties to their homes and a system in which their voices rarely determine anything.

Agnieszka Hobot spoke with Marta Miaskowska—the film’s director, a multimedia artist, art curator, and university lecturer—about the first part of a documentary series on women and water. This is a conversation about intimacy, mindfulness, and the risks posed by an image that is too beautiful; about stories that begin where the viewer’s comfortable perspective ends.

Agnieszka Hobot: Marta, in your films, water isn’t just a backdrop. It’s a prerequisite for life and work, a source of risk, but also a lens through which inequalities can be seen. Why did you want to tell stories about women specifically through the context of water?

Marta Miaskowska: I work in documentary film and the arts, and the topic of water has long seemed extremely important to me. I’m interested in women, and I’m also interested in those areas of art and social life that are often treated as secondary, even though they actually say a great deal about the world in which we live.

For me, the issues of women and the environment are very closely intertwined. Our consumerist attitude toward nature—focused on the exploitation and depletion of resources—reminds me of the way women are often treated in a patriarchal world order. Women and nature are often viewed in a similar light: as something to be used, burdened, subjugated, and exploited. These themes run through both my documentary work and my art.

Water has become, for me, one of the most powerful reflections of this interdependence. It is also close to my heart personally—as an element, as a space with which I identify. If every person is searching for their place in the world, then for me, that place would be water.

Various artistic, documentary, and educational projects allowed me to travel to places where this topic took on an increasingly concrete dimension. That’s how I ended up in Bangladesh—a country where water is at once a part of everyday life, a threat, a source of employment, and one of the most pressing social issues. This place is particularly hard hit by the effects of climate change: floods, cyclones, and the salinization of water and soil. There, the issue of water is not an abstraction, but something that directly affects people’s lives.

A.H.: That journey led you to Monira—a woman who works in the water for many hours a day, but who also has to travel a long way to get drinking water. Did meeting her change the way you think about access to water?

M.M.: Yes, definitely. I didn’t expect this topic to turn out to be so multifaceted. Of course, before I left, I knew where I was going and what issue I would be working on. It wasn’t a trip based solely on intuition. I conducted in-depth research, prepared myself substantively, and also drew on academic support to better understand the context of the place and the people I was going to meet.

But it wasn’t until I got there that I began to uncover the different layers of that reality. Some were surprising to me, while others were difficult to grasp right away. One of them turned out to be prejudice based on skin tone—present even within the same community and affecting women in particular.

Monira works on a shrimp farm. From 7:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m., she stands in saltwater. This causes irritation, sores, and chronic skin conditions. Over time, her skin darkens, becomes more weathered, and less smooth. And where she lives, as in many other places, lighter skin is often associated with attractiveness, a higher social status, and greater social value.

It’s a very cruel mechanism. A woman has to work because the household depends on it. But this work takes a toll on her body and distances her from the ideal of femininity that society expects. The system forces her to participate in something that burdens her, judges her, and restricts her.

I already knew that women are often at the bottom of the decision-making chain. That issues related to work, the environment, the economy, or access to resources are discussed and decided somewhere outside of their sphere, without their meaningful participation or the opportunity to have a say. But it wasn’t until I went to Bangladesh that I saw just how much women are responsible for their families’ daily survival, while at the same time being ignored. They are the ones who fetch drinking water, care for the children, the home, their elderly parents, and the animals, yet no one considers their opinions worthy of attention.

Something that, from our perspective, is almost second nature—access to clean water, the ability to turn on a faucet, prepare a meal, wash up—turns out to be a fundamental necessity there. Not just an extra in life, but its very backbone. And it was precisely this experience that profoundly changed my way of thinking. I realized that access to water isn’t just an environmental or technical problem. It’s also a matter of women’s work, their health, their social standing, and their agency.

A.H.: You talk about water as something that structures the entire day. Did you already have a clear vision of the film before you left, or did working with Monira set the direction for you?

M.M.: The script for a documentary is always fluid. You can come up with a plan of action, you can know what you want to explore and what you want to tell, but a great deal depends on the filming process itself. As you work, you uncover new layers of the story.

This wasn’t my first documentary, so I knew I couldn’t expect everything to happen right away—and in front of the camera. It’s not a situation where we simply set up the equipment and wait for reality to reveal itself. You have to be observant, patient, and look for ways to get to the heart of certain things.

That’s why we worked with Monira in stages. One day we’d take photos, and the next we’d continue our conversation. That time was very important because she was getting to know us gradually. I knew that not everything would be said on the first day. A lot happened between shoots. Her husband, who works far away in a big city, came to visit. A family argument broke out. These were situations I couldn’t show, but I knew about them, and that knowledge helped me understand her behavior, the tension she was feeling, and her demeanor.

Something also began to change between her and us. When she told us about certain things off-camera, a sense of connection emerged. It’s not just about closeness, but about trust, which is very important in a documentary. Thanks to that, she began taking us to different places and showing us her everyday life. We were able to visit a shrimp farm, which is a workplace but also a place usually off-limits to cameras. She works there, knows the place, and introduces us to it.

We also accompanied her on her trip to get water. It wasn’t just a scene for the film. That day, we helped her get more water. She usually walks and can only carry one jug, especially if she has children with her. Transportation costs money, so it’s not always an option. Thanks to us, in addition to her daily jug, she was able to take two large barrels. These were very concrete, practical situations. A documentary is made up of moments like these: of presence, of everyday activities, of a relationship that, for a short time, works both ways.

A.H.: What was the hardest thing to capture on camera: the journey to get water, the exhaustion, the emotions, or perhaps the tension between the women’s everyday experiences and the scale of the problem you wanted to show?

M.M.: The hardest part for me was capturing the difference between the protagonists’ everyday experiences and the scale of the problem I wanted to address. They live in this reality every day: they work, take care of the house, their children, and their elderly parents, and fetch water. For them, this is part of life, not a topic defined by the language of hydrology or climate policy.

I knew there was more to these individual stories than met the eye. Sometimes I felt there was a huge gap between what I understood to be an environmental and hydrological problem and how they themselves described it. One of my subjects didn’t even know exactly how old she was because she had no documents. In situations like this, the question arises: how do you tell this story honestly, without imposing anything from the outside, but also without losing sight of the broader context?

I didn’t want to make a film based solely on scientists’ statements, because then it’s easy to lose touch with the protagonists and their everyday lives. At the same time, I wanted it to be credible. I wanted to make it clear that what I’m showing isn’t just a portrayal of the suffering of specific individuals, but the result of specific processes that have a scientific basis. My goal wasn’t simply to show a difficult life, but to understand why it is that way.

During the production, however, it turned out that many things can be understood without explaining them in scientific terms. Everyday life speaks volumes on its own. The fact that you have to set aside time to go get water and come back. That it can take half a day. That during the dry season, you can cut across the field and the trip takes less time, but during the rainy season, you have to take a detour and it takes three times as long. That there’s a line at the water collection point, or that water is only available at a specific time, for example, at eleven o’clock.

That’s when the struggle for water ceases to be abstract. It becomes a very concrete choice: go to work or wait. If she chooses to earn money, she might not make it back in time to fetch water. If she goes to fetch water, she might miss an opportunity to earn money. And yet he needs both. He has to work to support his family, but he also has to get water so that his family can function. And that was precisely what was hardest to grasp: not a single tragedy, but a daily cycle from which it’s very difficult to break free.

A.H.: The film opens with images of lush, beautiful nature. How can we ensure that the viewer doesn’t just focus on the landscape, but sees the everyday lives of these women behind it—their work, their exhaustion, and their struggle for water?

M.M.: It was a big dilemma for us. Bangladesh is very diverse; the cities are dirty, crowded, and filled with strange smells, but outside the major urban centers, the country is indeed very visually appealing: lush vegetation, vibrant colors, and a landscape that, in our imagination, can easily be associated with vacation. I was aware of this even before we started filming. I knew there was a risk that the story would be overshadowed by the beauty of the location.

When I started talking to the women, I also realized that this wouldn’t be like the situation we have now—where we set up a conversation, ask specific questions, and the answers come together to form a story. It was different there. The women talked about what they were going through, but they didn’t describe the situation in terms of data, research, or hydrological context. At some point, I started to wonder if I would have to base the film on an external narrative.

And that’s when there’s a danger that it will become too polished. That it will be visually beautiful and well-told, but will stray from the real experiences of these women. That’s why I ultimately decided that their voices must be heard. Even if they don’t discuss water issues in the language of research or reports. While they may not identify the sources of these processes, they can describe their consequences. They talk about how they experience them—that is, from the perspective of their own place, culture, religion, and community.

And it is precisely that voice that disrupts the beauty of the image. Because some shots, viewed from a distance, may seem appealing, almost painterly. But when we hear a young girl say that her seven sisters have husbands, while she does not, because water-related illnesses are destroying her body and her standing in the community, that image ceases to be merely beautiful. We begin to understand that behind the landscape lies a very specific situation related to water, work, health, and women’s place in society. And that for them, this isn’t an exotic landscape, but a reality that shapes their lives every day.

A.H.: As a documentary filmmaker, you have to get close, but you also have to know when to stop. How do you tell when your interviewee wants to keep talking, and when a topic becomes too difficult or too uncomfortable for her?

M.M.: It’s different every time. In Bangladesh, I had four protagonists, and the conversation unfolded differently with each one. Monira was very open. She wanted to talk, to get all her problems off her chest. She was ready to talk a lot—sometimes even more than we needed. From a documentary perspective, that was obviously very helpful.

It was completely different with Komola. In her case, it wasn’t even a matter of not wanting to talk, but rather a lack of time. She was so busy with her daily chores that our filming plans had to take a back seat to whatever was more important for her household at that moment. We agreed that we’d go get water in the morning. I wanted the camera to follow her along the way so that her fatigue, the distance, and the effort would be visible. When we arrived, it turned out that the plan had changed. That day, she could only go get water later, because she had to catch snails first—she simply had to feed her family.

In this situation, filming isn’t a priority. She has a list of things she needs to do: fetch water, go to work, get something to eat. There’s no room to say, “Okay, let’s meet at ten and talk.” That’s why this part of the film is less of a narrative and more of an observation. We see her catching snails, preparing them, cooking, and finally going to get water.

And that, too, speaks volumes. Sometimes just walking, going through the motions, the rhythm of the day—that explains more than a conversation ever could. If all the women in the film spoke just as much and in a similar way, the film wouldn’t feel authentic either. In a documentary, you have to follow the subject. One person tells the story through words, another through gestures, work, silence, or simply by being there. And you have to adapt your filming style to that.

A.H.: I watched a micro-documentary that’s part of a larger story about women and water. After Monira’s story, did you feel like you’d found questions worth exploring further, or did each protagonist lead you in a different direction?

M.M.: There was one aspect of the problem that was common to all my subjects in Bangladesh, so some of the questions were repeated. But in South Africa, where we filmed the next set of scenes, the problems were completely different, so we had to approach them differently. There’s always some kind of foundation, a starting point, but then you go with whatever the subjects bring to the table.

What they all had in common was that I spoke with women who work, live, and strive every day to meet their families’ most basic needs: water, food, shelter, and care for their loved ones. But there were also people we hadn’t previously included in our plan. That was the case with Nastrin, who initially served as our guide.

To reach these women, I couldn’t just show up with a camera and hope to make contact. It required preparation, time, and collaboration with organizations that could connect us with specific individuals. I was also convinced that a team working closely with women should be all-female. And that turned out to be very important. In Bangladesh, however, this isn’t easy, because men handle many aspects of public life, while women often stay at home. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to put together an all-female team, but I had a female producer with me, and a woman working for an aid organization facilitated our contact with the women featured in the film. She accompanied us during our meetings and photo shoots.

At some point, it turned out that she, too, was affected by water-related problems. Although she had come to help others, the effects of living in such a place began to affect her as well: problems with her period, her skin, and her health. This was very important to me because it showed that you can’t oversimplify the story. It’s not as if there are only women in Bangladesh who are unaware of the problem, and someone from the outside comes and points it out for them. Even people who understand the situation and work to help others are vulnerable to it.

We just filmed our latest episode with Nastrin. She took us to her parents’ house, where floodwaters had been standing for many months. Many animals had died, and people were getting sick, because when water stands for a long time, the pollution begins to have a real impact on the residents’ health. That’s why there’s no single formula for these stories. There’s a common set of problems, but with each protagonist, you have to find a different way of telling the story—a different angle.

From the Editor:

We don’t wrap up this conversation with a punchline. Rather, we leave it open—with questions that have a broader context than just one protagonist, one place, and one trip to fetch water. The feature-length film is worth the wait precisely because a single story does not exhaust the subject. It does, however, show that behind a single image and a single conversation lies much more: different places, different experiences, different ways of living with water—its scarcity, its abundance, its salinity, its pollution. In *Water Matters*, we’ll keep returning to this story: to the next parts of the documentary, the next protagonists, and the next places where water allows us to see more than what fits within the frame.

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Main photo: Adib Ahmed, Robiul Hassan Robin