In my last “Deep Dive” (Let’s talk TikTok), I explored the use of TikTok by migrant workers. However, I neglected to discuss one particular post: A young woman, employed as a domestic worker in a Gulf country, used TikTok to express her yearning for intimacy and her desire for a relationship. Fortunately for her, technology provided a space to share her emotions without revealing her identity.
Migrant workers are often labelled as “remittance warriors.” While this term may sound heroic, it is ultimately patronizing and reductive. It limits their identity to their economic contributions, overlooking the richness and complexity of their lives.
But migrant workers are not merely economic agents labouring abroad in domestic work or construction to send money home. This utilitarian view, though widespread, erases their emotional depth. It ignores their inner lives, silencing their longing for love, connection, and sexual fulfillment.
Migrant workers lead lives as multilayered and meaningful as anyone else. Whether in Southeast Asia or the Gulf, they are not just labouring bodies. They are full human beings -- carrying dreams, memories, and desires. To see them otherwise is to deny them dignity and their rightful place in our shared humanity
The emotional cost of migration
Migrants often leave behind loved ones -- spouses, partners, children -- whom they may not see for years. Many are unable to return home even for major life events. Domestic workers, in particular, live in their employers’ homes, often with little personal autonomy.
Beyond the loneliness, there is a deeper sense of invisibility. As they clean homes, build cities, and care for children, their own emotional and physical needs go unacknowledged. The prolonged physical separation from loved ones takes a serious emotional and psychological toll.
Social constraints
Desire does not vanish with migration. On the contrary, the enforced absence of intimacy often intensifies longing. Yet in many conservative host countries, migrant workers -- especially women -- face legal and social prohibitions against expressing their sexuality. Unmarried sex is often criminalized. Same-sex relationships may be persecuted. Even holding hands in public can lead to censure.
These restrictions push expressions of sexuality underground -- making them risky, transactional, or emotionally strained.
In parts of Southeast Asia, where moral norms may be slightly more flexible, migrant workers still face stigma but may have more room to seek intimacy. Some use dating apps, find local partners, or engage in casual relationships. These may be fleeting, but they offer moments of recognition -- of being seen, touched, and desired.
On weekends, in places like Singapore’s Lucky Plaza or Little India, migrant workers take a break from their daily routines. Amid the bustle, they also seek moments to express emotions -- though always within tightly controlled boundaries.
In the late 1990s in Malaysia, Bangladeshi workers were sometimes seen as heartthrobs. Many Indian and Malay women admired them for their respectful behaviour and abstention from alcohol.
Authorities, however, took a different view. They issued warnings against such relationships, pointing out that migrants would have to leave once their visas expired. Despite this, many relationships and even marriages took place -- so much so that the matter was debated in Parliament.
Digital intimacy and long-distance love
Technology has transformed how migrant workers navigate love and intimacy across borders. Smartphones serve as emotional lifelines. Through voice notes and video calls, couples stay connected. Married women abroad send virtual kisses to their husbands; long-distance lovers exchange tender messages across time zones.
These interactions are not superficial -- they carry real emotional weight. They help sustain bonds and keep love alive.
Yet digital intimacy has limits. It cannot replace the comfort of touch or the reassurance of falling asleep beside someone. Nor can it ease the guilt many migrants feel -- toward the partners they’ve left behind, the children they seldom see, or the relationships they must keep secret.
The emotional strain can wear down even the strongest bonds. In these spaces of absence, new relationships sometimes form, adding layers of complexity to already tangled emotional lives.
Migrant workers are often labelled as remittance warriors. While this term may sound heroic, it is ultimately patronizing and reductive and limits their identity to their economic contributions, overlooking the richness and complexity of their lives
Love, romance, and the right to feel
To love, to be touched, to feel desired -- these are not luxuries. They are basic human needs. Migrant workers, like anyone else, seek affection. They fall in love, write poems, share meals, and celebrate anniversaries in modest, improvised ways. These stories often go untold, hidden in the shadows of migration -- but they are real, and they matter.
Professor Mohan Dutta, during his time at the National University of Singapore, helped collect and compile some of these poems -- testaments to love and longing.
Migrant workers carry more than the burden of labour. They carry desire. They yearn for love, sex, and tenderness -- just like anyone else. To acknowledge this is not to sentimentalize migration; it is to humanize it. So long as we reduce migrants to their economic function, we fail to see the full spectrum of lives they actually live.