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On July 8th Join the Global Day of Action to Condemn Duterte’s Anti-Terror Law

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By Noelle San Jose

On July 3, 2020, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte signed into law the “Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020” (‘ATA’)— the latest example of the ever-worsening human rights conditions in the Philippines. It had been sitting on his desk as a bill and would’ve automatically become law on July 9th, but he signed it early. The title of the law is a bit misleading: anti-terrorism is a good thing, right? Well, not the way this law defines “terrorist activities.” For example: 

  • Worker’s strikes / pickets or public protest actions could be interpreted as “terrorism.” Under the law you can be suspected of terrorism if your actions cause or create “intimidation of the public, promotion of messages of fear, intimidation of the government, destruction or destabilization of the economy, politics, and society, to create public emergency and undermine public safety.” 

  • Speaking at a rally, giving a presentation to a class,  holding a sign,  posting a meme, or video could constitute “terrorism.” According to the law terrorist activities include any “means of speeches, proclamations, writings, emblems, banners or other representations of the same.” 

Even worse, accusations will be interpreted by an appointed (not elected) council. The law poses a serious threat to human rights defenders and activists who have long been critical of the government’s bloody drug war, attacks on press freedom, and crackdown on opposition and dissent. It also poses huge risks to privacy by giving the state power to surveill suspected terrorists and arrest activists, journalists, and social media users by simply accusing them of terrorist activities. 

The Anti-Terror Law comes at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines remains unresolved, and record-breaking unemployment challenges working class families to put food on the table. If protesting is the language of the unheard, what happens when the right to assemble is seen as terrorism? 

As with Martial Law, those hit hardest  by Draconian laws such as the Anti-Terror Bill will undoubtedly be poor and working class Filipinos who already suffer from the ever worsening economic and social conditions brought by Duterte’s administration. Those who lift up the issues of poor farmers / peasants and working class Filipinos will be arrested, detained, and even killed in the government’s vain attempt to decisively silence the rising clamour of dissatisfaction and longstanding demands for genuine employment opportunities or accessible and quality social services to name a few. 

Get Involved!

Human rights organizations around the world have been watching the Duterte presidency for four years now, and locally Boston PEAR and Malaya Movement Northeast are working hard to ensure activist voices are not silenced under this new law. But we need YOUR help as Filipino Americans to raise awareness and build support for this movement! Here are ways you can get involved:

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Star on Music, Poetry, & the Importance of Listening

Star grew up with a love hate relationship with music. They slept through piano lessons in their youth. However, writing poetry and eventually lyrics became a creative outlet for Star. That musical journey led them to release a solo album, move to Boston, and form their band The Sunset Kings. 

Today, Star is the lyricist and main singer for the group. They also play guitar and keyboard for the band. 

In this episode of the BOSFilipinos Podcast, Star shares the origin story of The Sunset Kings, their creative process, and how music has shaped who they are — as well as their relationship with culture. 

The Sunset Kings next single, “Metronomin’,” comes out on July 17. This podcast includes clips from that track, “Symphony Blues,” and “Come By” in that order. For more music from The Sunset Kings, visit the band’s YouTube Channel, Spotify page, and website.  

Transcript

[THEME MUSIC]

Kaitlin Milliken: Hello, and welcome to the BOSFilipinos Podcast. I'm your host, Kaitlin Milliken, and this show is obviously made by BOSFilipinos. 

This podcast is all about telling Filipino and Fim-Am stories in the Greater Boston community. 

And one way people share their stories is through music. From lyrics to melodies and harmonies, songs can take us on a journey. Artists generously share their experiences and how they feel through their work. 

I wanted to know how Filipino Americans express themselves through music. So, I hopped on a Zoom call with Star. Originally born in a Texas border town, Star began expressing themselves creatively as a poet. Then, they transitioned that love of writing to lyrics. After exploring the music scene in Orange County, California, Star moved to Boston in 2012. They created a solo album, which they toured around the US. 

Today, Star is the lyricist and main singer for the Boston-Based band the Sunset Kings. They also play guitar and keyboard for the group. 

[METRONOMIN’ BY THE SUNSET KINGS]

Kaitlin Milliken: The Sunset Kings have a musical style that feels all their own. The group blends genres including hip hop, jazz, rock, and indie music. Their first album, The Ballad of Bella Fury came out in 2018. The band has continued to evolve, as seen in their songs released since then. 

Star shared with me how the band settled on a sound, the creative process, and how music has shaped who they are — as well as their relationship with culture. But first, we talked about how the band got its start. 

So to kick us off, can you tell us a little bit about The Sunset Kings And what the group's origin story is?

Star: We all met in university. We were all in like this jazz ensemble. We were in different jazz ensembles, but they have like those end of the year performances, and we all saw each other play then and my guitarist and violinists came up to me and they said, they really liked what I was doing. 

I wasn't studying music. And they were. So I just finished a solo record. And I left Boston to tour that. My brother and I actually drove around the United States and toured that album solo, and then I came back, and I started linking up with my guitarist. He had a drummer, and pretty soon our saxophone player joined. Our bass player joined, and our violinist got into it. 

Originally I had started the group with the intention of like I was, I was working in a studio at the same time that I was in the university. So I wanted to cut demos of songs that I was writing for these artists. And I was like we should rehearse these, record them. And I can shop these to artists. And so we started doing that. But it eventually turned into us playing our own songs, and playing shows, and making money that way. And so that's The Sunset Kings.

Kaitlin Milliken: It's really interesting because the music blurs so many genres. Can you explain how you guys pick to go that route and have that sound?

Star: I don't think that it was like a conscious decision to be like, “We should play this genre music.” We all had so many conversations about what a rock band could be. Because we all grew up in different scenes, and we were like, “I don't want to play — sorry but we call it — butt rock.”  It's just music that's like super basic. We didn't want to be like Nickelback or something like that.

I mean, me and Neumi, my saxophone player. We grew up on hip hop. Matt and Mike grew up doing prog [rock] and stuff like that, and like I mean, we all grew up listening to emo music like that was pop music back then you know what I'm saying? So like, it wasn't conscious it was that I was writing certain songs, and having the instrumentation, and just hours and hours and hours of us just jamming together, like pulling all nighters and jamming together, that became the sound. And so when I listen to that first album, I love it because it's so... I know it's going to be established for me 10 years later. When I remember how we even came up with it, it was all just chemistry.

Kaitlin Milliken: Totally. I love how you mentioned bringing all of the musical backgrounds together. So I'd love to hear a little bit more about your personal musical journey and what role music has played in your life?

Star: I have always kind of had a love hate relationship with music. My parents, when they finally decided to settle down in the states, like together. They were building their own business, and they didn't really have time to take care of us all the time. And I totally understand that a lot of immigrant families have that story. 

But instead of going to play sports, they put me in piano lessons. And I really hated it. I hated it. I would fall asleep in that room with my teacher there and other students playing piano. I grew up listening to classical music. And I would never practice. It wasn't until I was in middle school, and I was going through a lot of hard stuff in my life that I started to discover writing. And I started to write poems, and one of my English teachers who actually passed away that year started taking me under his wing, and he said, “I think that you could be a really great writer.” And it kind of started with this book, Bridge to Terabithia. I don't know if you've ever read that

Kaitlin Milliken: Cry every time. It's such a good book.

Star: Yeah, that book is amazing like, and my, my teacher put me on to that book and started giving me a bunch of books to read. And at the same time, my mother's oldest sister came to visit us in Texas, and she had cancer. And she came to see us because we had better treatment in the States than they did in the Philippines. 

And at the same time, I was very interested in this person, and she got really sick as well. And so like that was happening parallel, and I didn't know how to process all this stuff. So I started writing. And my music journey kind of starts with me learning how to write. Playing guitar. I started setting up my own shows recording my own music. 

When I was 17, I released a record that I will never ever talk about again, but I raised enough money with those shows to move to California. And so I moved out in high school and tried to make it out there. And it was one of the hardest times of my life. I don't think that things are as forgiving for people of color around that time. I had a super tough time trying to break into that industry, and I almost gave up music. 

I kept on working at it. I moved to Boston, and I was working out of a studio. I learned how to engineer and produce, and I got my first break in 2014. Some people heard the song that I wrote called “Stand Up, Stand Tall” and it was featured at the UN Youth Summit in New York City. And after that, I released a solo record, which led me to meeting my band. And, you know, I still I still play some of those songs with my band. I re-recorded a lot of those songs with the band.

Kaitlin Milliken: I think it's really interesting that you found yourself in Boston too. I think that especially like SoCal, La kind of has this whole myth around it. I'm from the Bay Area, so like, kind of grew up adjacent to all of that. Being in these different areas you've also toward what has been your experience in the Boston music scene specifically?

Star: I think that's something that I gotta acknowledge is that I think that in the, in the beginning of the band of my band being a thing we did very well, because Boston was hostile to hip hop. And they saw us as a rock band. And I mean...it's not necessarily that they can see who's fronting a band, you know what I mean? They just hear our music. And they weren't listening to every single song, so they didn't hear the poetry and the content of it. I don't think people are really listening to it for that. 

But we did very well in the beginning because we were doing rock music or being defined as rock music, and not doing like hip hop. And so my experience in the Boston music scene is having that initial push, and getting to see that shift to like Boston becoming more of a hip hop city. I really love that. It's interesting to me because now like, I try and collaborate with more hip hop artists. I try and be in shows with more of those artists because those are the people that I really line up with. But like outside of our most of our our listeners are outside of Boston now. We have listeners in Greece, Albania, Turkey, India, and then like other places in the States. But Boston, we have like our circle, and I love them, and then a lot of it is like hip hop. And it's really cool to be in that sphere of music. I feel like it's really informative and super inspiring.

Kaitlin Milliken: Yeah, that's really interesting because...I did like the college radio thing I went to school here. And I always think of Boston kind of having these almost two music scenes going on at the same time. We're one is very like Allston basement. white kids. And the other is a little bit more...like more genre bonding, jazz influenced, a little bit more diverse. But they all kind of exist in the same city.

Star: I love that observation of it because it really is like that. I think that's so specific to Boston's too because we're like a college town. And so like, you still get a little bit of that, like everyone wants to do how it shows but like, you got to use what you got. And then there's a bunch of other people who are like here for like...there's such a heavy undercurrent of intellectualism and academia that is like. 

And then also that counterculture of like, how do we survive in this heavily curated sphere of academia? A lot of this stuff that we think about doesn't necessarily exist yet, in academia. Like Bell Hooks, the way that she writes it's very accurate. But like if you brought that to a class like 20, 30 years ago, it's nothing like the writing of her contemporaries.

Kaitlin Milliken:  I do want to talk about the sort of writing process. I think you've mentioned how things that you've experienced inspired you very early on. What is the songwriting process and the lyric writing process look like for you now?

Star: I can really trace it back to this moment. We had just finished recording our album. And I wanted to celebrate so my brother and I... I got tickets for my brother and I to go to this new age music festival in the woods outside of Portland, Oregon. And it was called Beloved. I don't know if you've ever heard of it. It's pretty odd, but it was pretty cool. But I remember on one of the days a bunch of us were doing this soul gazing exercise

Kaitlin Milliken:  Is that just kind of like when you stare at each other and like, kind of sit in silence?

Star: Just like you're in a tent and you just walk around a circle. And you stop and you look into this person's eyes without saying a thing. And you're supposed to think about things that you're trying to, like heal and get through some traumas and things that you need to forgive. Really new agey stuff, right? But and you go to the next person, the next person, but there was this person who I kept walking by. And we kept smiling at each other. Because, I mean, it seemed like we were like the only brown people in the tent. 

And after a while, it seemed like we couldn't keep our eyes off each other. So we finally ended up doing the soul gazing exercise. And they were like, “This feels like home.” And we had that connection of like, “Okay, this is super comfortable.” So we kept on talking after that. Her name was Cassidy — and I remember that she told me she was a Pisces because that's how I had her in my phone before like we lost contact. 

But I remember playing her the album, and we had just finished getting all the tracks together. We hadn't mixed it yet. She said this thing that blew my mind, and I still think about it to this day. And she said, “Do you ever feel like writing about your pain is just perpetuating it?” You know, like, and that's something that I've heard come up a lot in the poetry community and writer communities now because everyone loves a sad song. But how much of our music, how much of that vibration are we perpetuating? 

And I've thought about that ever since. And after performing our first record, for the past couple years, I decided I wanted to try something new. And I thought, “What if I write about my joy? What if I try and perpetuate and memorialize my joy? And where will that take me if I'm singing those songs every single night?” I'm talking like that real juicy happiness that comes from knowing what the other side really feels like. 

It's trying to find those moments in my life. Whether that's hanging out with my friends, or, or taking time at night instead of scrolling through Instagram — 30 minutes putting myself to sleep I just by thinking about how much gratitude I have for every single year of my life in those low moments like where did they get me?

Kaitlin Milliken: That's awesome. I definitely want to talk about some of the songs that you've created. If there's like one song that you feel really proud of that you kind of want to dive into and share the writing of it and all of that other good stuff.

Star: I really, a song that I like will always be really proud of is this like it? It's my song “Symphony Blues.”

[SYMPHONY BLUES BY THE SUNSET KINGS] 

It's done. So well with people and really helps me connect to the person that I was becoming when I was not that person. I thought about that and just kind of this process of like, “How can I write about really deep things that I'm talking about, without alienating people?” There's a book called God's Debris that's written by the guy who wrote Dilbert, the comic. And basically, this theory that he has is that the way that you communicate with a ton of people is you talk about a common experience that everyone has. That everyone has their own individual, unique experience of it, and that's love. 

And so “Symphony Blues” is really important to me because I tried to talk about a lot of things that I was struggling with, in terms of like, my cultural upbringing, growing up in the States, and being in a totally different generation than my parents and trying to reconcile that. Also dealing with relationships. And how totally different cultures come together in those vulnerable states, and you don't really understand it all the time. But those things are, they cause very heavy stress points. And I wanted to write about that, but not necessarily isolated to like, “Oh, this is an experience that can only be felt by me.” This is a human experience. And it's art before it is like a personal story that I'm relating.

Kaitlin Milliken: I think it's really interesting, sort of what you just touched on when it comes to feeling separated. And I think a lot of kids with immigrant parents have that. So can you talk a little bit about that?

Star: Even though I feel like I had a unique experience growing up, a lot of people can relate to it. And both my parents were doctors in the Philippines, and they met in med school, but only my mother practices medicine here. She moved into a tiny spare room in her older sister's house in Chicago, immediately after getting married. And she left my father behind in the Philippines so that she could focus on studying and passing the board. 

And I didn't find this until I started writing poetry because my parents had actually come up to Austin...and they saw me perform. And they started getting really open about their experiences of racism and stuff. But she wrestled with depression, self isolation, just like not really connecting to anybody. And struggling with that racism in the hospital's, like, “Oh, it's a petite little Asian girl.” Everyone wanted to try and take advantage of that. And when finally she passed, the board got her first job in Maine where I was born. But when they finally decided to settle and really give it a go at building a family, we ended up in this small border town at the very southern tip of Texas. 

It's a place called the Rio Grande Valley. And honestly, a lot of people don't really know that much about it. But we end up in the news a lot. And it's wild because it feels like this closed off little town, like we have to go through a border checkpoint to get to like the next city. The next city is like six hours away. And the demographic here is mostly Hispanic. At the time that my parents moved there were not that many Filipinos. And there was a minority of like white people who all seem to make up the higher socioeconomic classes. And for the beginning of my mother's career like these were the people like she would rub shoulders with, elbows with. I remember like, being super young, really weird memory taking etiquette classes at like the Country Club. Like where the forks is supposed to go, like, why there's two forks.

Kaitlin Milliken: There's like the tiny ones up top, which like, “Who are they? I don't know them.”

Star: Like the napkins and all that stuff. But none of it lasted. And that's what's wild to me. So to me becoming more mature, I look back at it. And I think that it's because something didn't intrinsically click between my parents and those people. And there's this book called Limbo by this guy named Alfred Lubrano, I think. He talks about people who experience social mobility, especially going from lower classes to like higher ones. And what those people experience when they gain traction in building their status and wealth is that they don't have the same mannerisms, the same fundamental knowledge that people in upper society have. Some people figure that stuff out, and others never find their place. 

That's kind of what informs my writing. And I feel like that's a heavy part of my culture because I feel like that strive, that ambition, like the American dream in my eyes kept my parents so busy building their family and chasing the next thing that they felt they needed to have, that they were never able to see the subtleties of existing here. And that's the role that I've kind of taken as I've matured, navigating those things. First for myself, and then like coming back and being like, “Hey, this is why I feel like we had these conversations when I was younger. We're hitting walls because we don't understand that word from two different cultures.” 

Being Filipino American heavily influences my work, because I think about that all the time. And it's something that I meditate on like every single time I try and write something, like that's my unique experience. Like it's something that I don't feel a lot of artists are writing about, especially now that we have an oversaturation of music. People want to do the trendiest thing and yeah, I want to do that too, and make people move and vibe and feel things like that, but I also don't want to lose this very integral part of me that understands that my experience is a political one.

Kaitlin Milliken: I thought it was really awesome how you talked about when you were able to share your music with your family. That was something that brought you closer together and offered a point of connection. I did want to talk about one of the songs that you released last year “Come By.” Can you talk about how that song came to be and working with other artists?

Star: The idea for come by was one that I had where I wanted to kind of frustrate the idea of like a lead singer.

[COME BY, BY THE SUNSET KINGS]

Star:In my brain, it's not a band. It's a movement. We just finished our record. Put it out on Spotify. And we were getting these shows, and we had a tour set up. I'm not going too deeply into it. Our bass player passed away in a freak accident in August 2018 right before we got to release that record. I felt like we had such a strong musical connection that we had to keep on going like in order to like he recorded all the bass parts on our first record, and it's a trip to listen to just every single time I listened to it. I can see him playing every single part and just like him really struggling with some of those ideas and being like, “Oh, let me get this again.” 

Losing him at such a crucial moment. And our manager being like, “This is what you got to do. You got to tour that album. This is just how music works. This is how the industry works.” We had to switch our entire lineup. So I started playing keys. My guitar player, Matt shifted to the bass. And then you know, we went touring. 

“Come By,” to me, is kind of like a photograph. It's like a snapshot of the way that our tour ended up being. To me on the keys, Matt on the bass, me and Miu are sharing vocals because like, to me, that's how the band survived.

Kaitlin Milliken: I think a lot of people are asking themselves, “What can I do to support local musicians, local music?” A  lot of times it's you go to a show you buy merch. Um...don't know when that's gonna happen again. So like, what are some ways that people can pull through and support that type of creative work?

Star: It's great for people to buy merch and support us in that way. I love that. I wish that it would happen more but I mean, I'm not really complaining. I really feel like the best way to support local musicians is to engage with us. Ask us those questions because, I mean, this is the kind of stuff that I love. The fact that there's someone who wants to get deeper into my process, hopefully, because it'll help them with something that they're going through and possibly inspire them to start their own creative processes. Check out this stuff. Propose things that we could create. How can we better serve those communities? I think that those direct conversations are the most helpful thing.

Kaitlin Milliken: What would you say to people who are looking at these creative outlets and want to get started or want to pursue it and like... there is that anxiety. There is a little bit of being afraid to get into it. How do you get past that?

Star: I learned from like, going to a ton of protests and a ton of poetry readings, and trying to hold space for those people and for me and my friends. The best thing that you can do when you're starting out is to, to show up and just listen. Showing up to everything and listening as hard as I could, and then finding ways that I could contribute. And for me that started off, like, “I'll shoot photos. I'll shoot videos. Let me do that for you. Can I edit your poems?” 

And also, in the beginning, don't worry too much about making mistakes. You know, like who's really listening? and the people that are like, they're gonna push you to get better.

Kaitlin Milliken: And this is my final question that I have on the list. What's coming up next for you and what's coming up next for The Sunset Kings?

Star: July 17, we are going to release a single that is a precursor to our next EP, and the song's called “Metronomin’” and I'm really excited about it. It's the first song that I have lyrically collaborated on with my sax player Neumi. And so we're really excited to put this kind of music out. And it really talks about the stuff that we were talking about earlier in the interview about really injecting your experience with that joy and trying to find that joy, and express it and live it. So that this is one of the first songs that I really feel that with, and I'm excited to see where it takes us. 

And as far as like, what I'm doing on the other side is like I'm working with my brother. We're trying to write a script, dealing with issues of anti-colonialism. Something that we talk a lot about is like we grew up with this, you know, like we had relatives who brought this stuff from the Philippines [papaya soap] and they're like, you should use this you're getting kind of dark. And we wanted to write a couple of pieces kind of centered on like, “What is that? What is that a symbol of? What is that a clue or indicator of in our communities?” And so like I'm working on some very specific writing towards that and trying to find other people, the other artists who are willing to collaborate on that.

Kaitlin Milliken: Well, we look forward to seeing all of that awesome stuff. Thank you so much, Star, for taking the time to chat.

Star: I appreciate you making time for me and holding space for me.

[THEME MUSIC]

Kaitlin Milliken: This has been the BOSFilipinos Podcast. I'm your host, Kaitlin Milliken. Music for our episode was made by Matt Garamella. Other music featured on this show was created by The Sunset Kings. Special thanks to Star for sharing their art with us. If you haven't already, check out the sunset kings on Spotify, YouTube, and SoundCloud. You can learn more about the band at their website thesunsetkings.com.

Now I'm going to plug some BOSFilipinos content. If you haven't already, you can subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also follow us on Instagram, @bosfilipinos, to stay connected. What do you want us to cover? Let us know at bosfilipinos.com. Thanks for listening and see you soon.

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Filipinos In Boston: An Interview With Senior Outreach Manager Constantino "Coco" Alinsug

By Trish Fontanilla

This month’s Filipinos in Boston highlight is Constantino "Coco" Alinsug. He was nominated by Maria Dolorico, who we featured on our social media feeds during Asian Pacific American Heritage Month (ICYMI - we did 26 profiles!). We’re so grateful to have a community that continuously pays it forward like ours does, and love how much we’ve expanded through referrals.

I hope you enjoy our profile of Coco, and if you or someone you know wants to be highlighted on our blog or social media this year, you can fill out our nomination form.

Photo provided by Coco Alinsug.

Photo provided by Coco Alinsug.

But first, a bio provided by Coco: “Constantino "Coco" Alinsug is an immigrant, a minority, and a community leader who devotes himself to social justice, culture and arts, and LGBT youth issues and receives recognition both nationally and internationally for his relentless work. Currently the Co-Chair of Lynn Cultural Council; Board Member of Lynn Community Association, Inc.; and Board Member of Lynn's Goldfish Pond Association, Inc., Boston Public Schools CAB, Global HIV Advisory Board, Consolacionanon Original, Inc, to name a few. Coco attends international conferences around the world as a polyglot, fluent in several languages. He is originally from the Philippines and is not new to politics being a son of a Vice-Mayor and grandson of politicians. Coco and his husband Peter moved to Lynn 17 years ago. Coco was elected to the Massachusetts Democratic State Committee on April 4, 2020 on a 4 year-term.”

Where do you work and what do you do? 
Coco: I work at Fenway Health, the world’s biggest LGBTQ health organization, and I am the Senior Outreach Manager. While in the Philippines, I work as a staff of then Philippine President Fidel Ramos in Malacanang and help start the National Youth Commission.

What inspired you to pursue that career path?
Coco: My community.

On Boston…

How long have you been in Boston?
Coco: 17 years.

What are your favorite Boston spots? 
Coco: Fenway Park. I stare at it every day from my building. It inspires me.

On Filipino Food...

What's your all time favorite Filipino dish?
Coco: Chicharong bulaklak (deep fried pig fat) and lechon (roast pig).

What's your favorite Filipino recipe / dish to make?
Coco: Fried lumpia (Filipino spring rolls).

On staying in touch… 

Do you have any upcoming events / programs that you want to highlight? 
Coco:

How can people stay in touch?
Coco: Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/cocoalinsug/

Photo provided by Coco Alinsug.

Photo provided by Coco Alinsug.

We’re always looking for BOSFilipinos blog writers, so if you’d like to contribute, send us a note at info@bosfilipinos.com.

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Grace Talusan on Her Memoir and Identity

By Kaitlin Milliken

When researching for her memoir, Grace Talusan found pictures of herself as a 1-year-old, mimicking the acts of reading and writing. In 2019, Grace shared her stories with the world in her memoir, The Body Papers. 

The book gathers Grace’s essays, touching on deeply personal topics. Her writing explores her cultural identity, experiences as an undocumented immigrant, genetic disease, and her time as Fulbright Scholar in the Philippines. In this episode, Grace shares how writing the book has shaped her life. 

You can get a copy of The Body Papers at your local bookstore, or you can listen to the audio book. Listen to the full conversation with Grace below, or subscribe to our podcast on Apple Podcast, Google Play, Stitcher, and Spotify.

Transcript

Kaitlin Milliken: Hello, and welcome to the BOSFilipinos podcast. I'm your host, Kaitlin Milliken, And this show is obviously made by BOSFilipinos. 

This show is all about telling Filipino and Fim-Am stories in the Greater Boston community. Today’s episode will focus on how the Fil-Am experience has been reflected in literature.  

To do that, I sat down with Grace Talusan. Born in the Philippines and raised largely in Massachusetts, Grace is a powerful author, writer, and academic. She is currently the Fannie Hurst Writer in residence at Brandeis University. She has also taught writing courses at Tufts University in Sommerville. 

 Grace published her first book — titled the Body Paper — in 2019. Her memoir is the winner of the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing and was a New York Times Editor’s choice. Throughout the memoir, Grace tells her story non-linearly with legal documents, letters, and photos printed alongside her anecdotes. The different chapters cover a wide range of topics. That includes her time as an undocumented child. Her experience as both a Filipina living in the largely-white north east and as an American returning to her home country in adulthood. And family relationships, both healthy and otherwise. 

Her descriptions of places in her memoir, from Boston to Bonifacio Global City in Manila, are written with such careful observation and care. Her words are filled with power. I met with Grace at Tufts in November of 2019 to talk about her experience writing The Body Papers. We also discussed the role writing has played in her life. 

Before we get started, it’s worth noting: Grace’s memoir is incredibly complex. As much as her story is about joy, celebration, and self-discovery, there are many anecdotes that deal with tough topics. That includes abuse — both sexual and physical — generational trauma, living with mental illness, and genetic disease. Grace and I talked about her experience as a sexual abuse survivor around the 20 minute mark, just in case you want to skip that part of the discussion. 

If you’re not able to read The Body Papers due to past experiences, you should still check out Grace’s writing. You can find a selection from her book titled “Crossing the Street in Manila” in Tuft’s Magazine, and  “The Thing is, I’m Undocumented” a journalistic piece that ran in Boston Magazine. 

Now on with the interview. 

So tell us a little bit about the book that you released in April of 2019, for folks who may not know The Body Papers or be aware of the book.

Grace Talusan: The book is a memoir, and it's a bunch of stories and essays about my life. It's nonfiction, so all of it is true. And it's interspersed with documents, and photographs from my life. And they cover a lot of different topics and themes, from my experiences with hereditary breast and ovarian cancer, to my experiences as an aunt, as a formerly undocumented immigrant. And as someone who's had childhood trauma, and so it's about a lot of things. And in some ways, it's about the things that we don't talk about. You know, some of the people closest to me were kind of surprised when they read my book, because I hadn't talked with them about the things that I was thinking and feeling and going through. But that's because I could only write them like that's why they exist in the book. It's not really the stuff of conversation. Maybe it should be. At least it wasn't for me.

Kaitlin Milliken: So it's a book that has a lot of opening up being vulnerable. What really inspired you to start the writing process?

Grace Talusan: I've always loved to write. When I was looking at the hundreds of slides that my father took of my childhood, in order to research this book, I came across like two slides, one of me reading, probably at age like one-and-a-half, or pretending to read. And one of me writing, also at like one and a half. So before I could even really read and write, I wanted to do those things. So I think I've always wanted to write, and I've always been a huge reader. And in terms of this book, I didn't know I was writing it. I just was like, writing things that I felt an urge to write. And those pieces started to gather and accrete, and then eventually, I had like enough of these things, to put together a book.

Kaitlin Milliken: So you mentioned that you grew up and are really connected to the Boston area. But you were initially born in the Philippines. Can you talk about your relationship to culture and that move and how you feel as being not only a person who is Filipino, but also someone who's a Bostonian?

Grace Talusan: Boston is a has the...you have the potential that have a very particular cultural identity in lots of ways actually. It could be through sports, like there are people who are like, really into Boston sports. My family, I have family members who are like that. Even though they've moved away, their identity is around being a Patriots fan, or a Sox fan. That's not it for me. But I still do feel really tied to this place. I've been here since I was two except for some times off and on. And I really like that I can feel tied to a place. 

It's not like it's the friendliest place in the world. It's not, you know, particularly like people have complained about Boston is really like racist. Yeah, like most things that all might be true. And I have experienced some of them. And yet, because this is the place that I came to after being in the Philippines, I do feel like it's home. And that's really important to me to have a place that I feel like is home. Because one of my first experiences of life is having my home taken away, or like leaving my home, of the Philippines and not having the choice at all. Like I had this whole life going on. We left when I was two, we lived in a family compound. I had a nanny that was with me, 24-seven. Not all the time, of course, she had days off, but like, I have this unknown person who was like my caregiver all the time. I had family around all the time. And we left it, and we came here to Boston. And you know, that's like a really jarring experience. 

I thought I wanted to be Irish for a long time. Like, it's kind of a bit like celebrating St. Patrick's Day would be big here when I was growing up. People would wear their green. My classmates who were of Irish heritage, like really got into it. And I wanted to be Irish, like I would wear green. And I would wear stickers that say, “Kiss me, I'm Irish,” because I very much wanted a cultural identity to belong to. And it took me a while to warm up to the Philippines as being that identity, having a Filipino cultural identity or whatever that means. 

It's something that is dynamic and that I'm still figuring out after like, a lifetime. The book is framed by a six month trip that I took to the Philippines. I lived in the Philippines for several months on a Fulbright Fellowship. And that experience taught me so much and including like, I am an American. I don't know a thing about the Philippines. I'm Filipino, but I'm not also.  I don't have the language skills. I don’t have like the sense of my body, the sense of humor, the kind of ways of relating that I saw people relate to that I think is so beautiful. It's kind of intimacy among strangers that I saw this way of thinking of each other as brother and sister. At least that's what I interpreted. There was this kind of warmth that I saw all the time. 

That's not me. I didn't grow up that way, but I admire it. 

Kaitlin Milliken: The differences you notice, things you related to, things that seemed distant. Can you talk a little bit more about what you learned and experienced while you were there? 

Grace Talusan: You know, family's really important to me here, I see that. And there's ways that like, some people might think my boundaries or our boundaries with family, are unhealthy or something, but I don't think so. I mean, there's a closeness that I think is comforting and that I don't think it's unhealthy. And then I went to the Philippines and I'm like, “Yeah, I get it even more.” They are enduring, an hour and a half, three hour daily commutes in traffic in really crowded, hot conditions crammed onto jeepneys or on buses standing. They're enduring a lot, and it's for their family. Or they have to go abroad or they are what's called temporal migrants where they work the night shift in call centers to serve us in the West. Meanwhile, their family is living in the daytime, and they're working at night, right? So they're these temporal migrants. And like they will do all of that for the love of their family. And that really came through to me this kind of, you know, and I don't just mean blood family, but whoever they decide is their family. I saw that and that was just really really inspiring and beautiful. 

This kind of devotion to each other was incredible because I was like a whiny, spoiled American. Like there's traffic it's too hot. The air conditioner’s not working. I was totally like a lightweight, and people were enduring so much with a much better sense of humor and attitude than I was.

Kaitlin Milliken: So you mentioned the book is framed through your journey there. Another important theme is bodies. It's called The Body Papers. Can you talk a little bit about the title and what role the body plays in your memoir?

Grace Talusan: It is a book about what it means to have papers attached to your body, that decide what your life is going to be, and where you can exist. I'm thinking particularly about immigration documents, and how those kinds of papers really impact someone's life experience. And we know now that like, horrible experiences that people are enduring on the southern border, because of lack of papers or not the right papers or something. And just like someone is more human, or treated more or less human, because of that documentation, and how I just find that unconscionable. And so that's so that's some of what I write about is my experiences. 

My experiences were really not that bad. I didn't suffer that much as an undocumented immigrant in the ways that I see people are suffering today. But I had a little bit of insight into it by having the same experience of not having proper documentation. 

The other kinds of ways that the body is in the book is that I got paperwork that gives me test results that told me that I had a really high susceptibility of breast and ovarian cancer. And so I had to make a choice like, “What am I going to do. I have this for knowledge. Am I going to wait for cancer to develop?” That seems like a really bad idea. Some people think it was a good idea, because they're like, “Well, why would you cut and remove healthy organs?” But the counter to that is, “Well, then why would forego this genetic fore knowledge? That something is about to happen and not prevent that from happening.” 

I really, I mean, I thought a lot about it. Talked to a lot of people, studied a lot of like, studies and scientific outcomes, and talked to doctors and all kinds of things. And I just kept coming back to the same — the only answer at this point, and I didn't like the answer, but I also was not about to go get cancer like, and wait for cancer. I have known people who died of cancer, like they sure they treated it, which was quite horrible. You know, the chemo and the radiation are really difficult. And then you might still get cancer like it could come back. It wasn't easy, but eventually I felt really lucky that I had this knowledge and that I could prevent it like my sister, my other relatives and cousins they did not, and they live with various levels of fear about cancer, including one cousin —who she has metastasis to the brain and from her breast cancer, and she's just been living with it for years. And I just think, “Oh my gosh, it's like this tipping point. Like, will you have to keep taking the medication and hoping that it's going to work? But what happens when the day it doesn't? And so I needed to do something.” And that's what I did is I traded up or traded away my healthy organs for not getting cancer.

Kaitlin Milliken: Having the mastectomy is definitely an exercise in like autonomy and being able to make your choices, which is great.

Grace Talusan: Yeah. You know, my nieces are getting older. And you know, I think about them. But I do think the word autonomy is the right one, it's like they have to make the choice. We’ll be there for them and support them. If they find out that they also carry this genetic mutation, but it is up to them in their life, and they have to make their own choices.

Kaitlin Milliken: You mentioned immigration, which I know is something that's on the forefront of everyone's mind all the time in this day and age that we're living in America. Did you decide to share those experiences because of the political climate when you were writing the book? Or was that something that you had decided to include much earlier, when you first began the writing process?

Grace Talusan: I very much only wrote about it because of the political climate. I was always told to never talk about it. And in some ways, I could just pass and move on, right? Like, I had my US citizenship. I have my blue passport. I don't actually have to deal with it at all. But I started to meet people, including students who were undocumented. And I thought I realized like, “No, I'm safe, and they're not. I need to do something.” If my story can do anything to help understanding around this issue, I need to do it because I'm safe. And so I was reporting for Boston Magazine on a high school senior. And that's when I started to write about it. And I just saw her and her bravery and about telling her story and also how stuck she was. She had some really low moments. 

And that's when I thought, like, “I can't keep my story actually, is important in this situation, because I was also at one time, a high school student who was undocumented.” And that's when I started to tell that story. And then I interviewed my parents. And then later on, I even did a FOIA request, and I got 100 pages back of documents from the government. And, you know, that became important because children were being separated from their parents at the southern border. And I was so upset by that. And then I was looking at the paperwork that I got back from Immigration and Naturalization Services, and they said all over it, “She is a nine-year-old child.” They wrote it in big writing all over my documentation, as if to remind the arresting officers and the other immigration officers like, have compassion here. Like she is a nine-year-old child. And so I really appreciated that, that they had that kind of discretion. And they listened to the story of my family, and that we were a mixed status family. We had it. My parents owned a home. My father had a business in which he employed people. We had US citizens, children, in our family, and they didn't disrupt our family. They let us stay together until all the documentation was cleared up. And I really did appreciate that.

Kaitlin Milliken: So you mentioned you interviewed your parents, you did a FOIA request. That's a lot of researching. And I know most books take research, but it's not always about you as an author. So how did it feel to really research yourself and take that time to be very introspective about your life?

Grace Talusan: Well, I have, because I've done some reporting, as a freelancer, I wanted to use those same skills in writing this memoir. It actually didn't feel right for me to just base it all on memory. I think it's possible, that it's fine. Like it's a memoir, it's based on your memory. But in terms of the story I wanted to tell, I felt more ethically comfortable if I at least tried to verify the things that I was writing about. And I discovered that I was actually wrong. Like the story I've been told is that I came to this country when I was three-years-old in the winter. And that's not true. My paperwork showed that I came here at age two in July. And so like my parents had just kind of forgotten. I don't think they meant to it's just that that's my memory started in my memory corroborated their memory because I remember being really cold. I remember sitting on Santa's lap. It was like snowing in Chicago, like I remember all these things. But that's when my memory begins. That's not where my story in the US actually begins. 

So I was glad that I got this outside documentation, because it taught me things about memory and storytelling and like, “Why was that story so important to me about being three? And it's snowing, when actually it wasn’t. It was the summer.” And I was like, “What does all that mean?” But I also think facts are incredibly important. If you have the opportunity to verify and have like other kinds of documentation, why not? Like, why wouldn't you do that? Unless you're trying to do some other kind of project about memory, that's fine, but it just seems like there's great information there to use, including photographs. Like there's so much information in photographs.

If you're writing a memoir, I would recommend you utilize all of it, including maps, like go on Google Maps and like, take a walk inside like a former neighborhood or something like that. It's all like really great material.

Kaitlin Milliken: I know something else that you discuss in your book is that you are a sexual abuse survivor. Can you share a little bit about the process of writing that portion of your story?

Grace Talusan: Because I was looking through all my archives and papers that my father had saved, like he saved my school papers. One of the things I came across was that I actually wrote and turned in an essay about it in high school, like, just two years after I told my parents. I had written about what had happened to me. It's pretty similar to what I have in the book, because it was… What happened to me was pretty repetitive. And so there wasn't...it wasn't going to be like so different from what I wrote about. So I've been writing about it for a long time, but not publishing about it. 

So in graduate school, I wrote a pretty close novel that was really close to my experience autobiographically. And I wrote that I didn't publish that material, but I have been interested in the material in a long time. It's not like I want to write about it. I'd have to work up to write about it, because it's not something I want to do. But it has felt important to do it. And so when I wrote the version for this memoir, I showed my writing group, and some people in the group said, like, “Well, what happened? Because like, you never actually write about what happened directly.” And then I realized, like, “Okay, I guess I have to do that.” And so I did. 

So I thought very, a lot and deeply and closely about like, what am I going to say about my experience, and why would I say it, and what will I leave out and why would I leave that out? And so ultimately, I thought that he would do more damage if I didn't...if I was not transparent and just matter of factly said, like, “This is what happened.” Because I just didn't... I wanted to be transparent and say like, this is what happened, and it was very repetitive. And so that is the thing that happened very repetitively for seven years. And so, it taught me a lot because like, I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to think about it. But it forced me to, and it forced me to contend with the kind of damage that I mean. I wish I just want to pretend it didn't happen. But when I wrote about it, I'm like, “Oh my gosh, okay, almost every night for seven years, for basically my entire childhood. Like, oh my gosh, how did I even deal? How did I get through the day?” I mean, all those things. 

I was able to see it as an adult and have much more compassion for myself. Kind of give myself a break. Like, that's kind of why I struggle with some of the things I struggle with to this day. You know, it's a pretty big trauma. And I've done a lot of work to deal with it. But, um, you know, at one of my, my first readings in Seattle, someone in the audience to ask me if I was healed yet, from what happened. And I was, you know, I mean...I took the person seriously, but I was also kind of angry about the question. And I was just like, “No. Healed. I mean, what does that even mean?” 

Am I going to be healed from it in my life? I hope so. I think I just learned to grow around it and like, move, create a life around it, but heal to me means it like connotates something like that or know something different like almost like it never happened or something. But I mean,  my symptoms are very... I don't suffer the extent of the symptoms I did when I was, you know, 10 years ago or 20 years ago. I don't suffer those symptoms, but there are reverberations still in my life for sure. But writing about it was a another kind of way to process and another way to approach some kind of — not healing — but like a way to deal with it. 

Like if part of the issue around it was keeping it secret, the fact that I did the exact opposite of that, and put my story in a book that exists all over the world and including sitting in libraries, and in bookshelves, and in Amazon warehouses and whatever, like, that means something that's meaningful to me that I didn't just keep it and like die with this story, but I put it out in the world and that's meaningful to me.

Kaitlin Milliken: Coming through the end of that writing process, do you feel like your relationship or understanding of yourself has shifted at all? Has it changed your relationship with yourself?

Grace Talusan: I think writing both writing and reading are really profound activities that have the potential to change you. Yes. And in my particular case, yes. As soon as I got the book deal, something in me changed. And then the process of working with my editor and publisher to develop the book, revise it, go through all the steps of copy editing, and making it into what I think is a beautiful object. That changed me. And then even recording my audio book changed me. Like the person who recorded the book with me, he was my engineer, you know. He sat with me for a week for hours every day. He was so kind and so gentle. And it was my first time recording an audio book. And like that was a really wonderful healing experience to like, tell my story to this audio engineer. 

It was, I don't know, there's just all these experiences that I've been able to have from the act of publishing that I would not have had if I had just stayed despairing and depressed, and not just like thought the things I was thinking before I got the book deal, which is like, “Nobody cares about my story. No one wants to publish it. And you're like, I'm just a loser.” You know, those things aren't true. I don't think those are true if people haven't published a book and have wanted to, but that's how I was feeling. I was feeling pretty bad about myself. But you know, as bad as I ever feel, there's always a part of me that wants to fight. So even though I was feeling bad about my writing and thought, like, “I'll never publish a book,” I still did enter the contest, there was still a part of me that wanted to keep going and fighting. And I entered the contest, like, I never thought I would win. And yet I did. 

And so those are, those are things that changed me. And then like reading the book, like I know I wrote the book. So obviously, I've read it. By the time we were done with the very extensive revision process, I almost didn't even know what I had anymore, because I was looking very closely at like sentences as at the space between words at commas at this section, that section. It's like I couldn't see the whole thing. And so I got it back. And I got the hardcover in Seattle, that was the first time I saw it. And then at some point, I read the book and I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is a book about my father. What have I done?” Because I did not expect that it was a book about my father. I thought it was about me. And yet it was so much about how I understand myself, and which is understanding myself through my father.

Kaitlin Milliken: That was really great. I definitely understand the process of like, when you look at something for so long, that it just starts to become its own very small fixation, instead of looking something up as a whole picture.

Grace Talusan: Yes, yeah. And by the time this comes out, probably my paperback will have come out or be about to come out. And what I'm in the process of doing now is trying to look at the book holistically, and take out some errors or repetitions or things like that. And so now that the book is a thing, I can go back and like go back in and try to make some corrections and change some things, some tiny, tiny things that I saw as errors now that I can see the whole book.

Kaitlin Milliken: So this is my final question. What do you hope readers will take away after they complete your book?

Grace Talusan: That's a really great question. And it is a privilege to even think about that question. So I wonder if there is a story that you don't tell, even to yourself. And if so, why is that? Like, what is that part of yourself that you don't even want to touch? And what would it mean to attempt it? And I don't mean like, you should do this. You should do this in a safe way. Like, if the best, safest way to do this is with a trusted therapist, like definitely do it that way. But I just wonder, you know, why do we want to hide things from our own self? 

And then if you go beyond that, and think like, what are the things that we need to share with each other? And we need to tell each other. Part of the reason I was driven to publish this book is because I thought about the next generation like my students, my nieces and nephews, my nibbling, like, I want them to have the truth. I want them to be equipped with the full truth of things, even though it's painful sometimes when it's appropriate for them to know the truth. It's better that they know what then they not. Like, in a way people lied to me and told me, you know, and I wanted to believe a story about my grandfather, and it actually wasn't true. And it kind of ruined or like, in lots of ways, ruined parts of my life. And like, almost destroyed it because I didn't have the truth. And so I think the truth is really important. 

And at the very beginning, we need to start with ourselves. And then we have to start to think about like, what would it mean to tell the truth in this relationship or that relationship? And I think it's worth it to try and to see how your life might change for better or probably will change for the better. And like that secret that you've been holding on to, maybe you shouldn't hold on to it. 

Kaitlin Milliken: Definitely. That's very powerful. Thank you. Thank you so much Grace again for taking the time out. 

Grace Talusan: Oh, this has been such an honor. Thank you for interviewing me and this opportunity to talk.

Kaitlin Milliken: This has been the BOSFilipinos Podcast. I’m your host, Kaitlin Milliken. Music for this episode was made by Matt Garamella. 

 Special thanks to Grace Talusan for sharing her story. If you haven’t already, read The Body Papers and experience her writing first hand. 

Before you go, Friday June 12 is Filipino Independence Day. Even if gatherings are still restricted, we hope that you can share Filipino culture and heritage with the people you care about. You can also keep up with opportunities to celebrate, and other stories from Boston’s Fil-Am community at bosFilipinos.com. 

If you haven't already, you can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, Spotify, and Google Play. You can also follow us on Instagram @bosfilipinos to stay connected. Thanks for listening and see you soon.

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Filipinos In Boston: An Interview With Reporter Elysia Rodriguez

By Trish Fontanilla

This month’s Filipinos in Boston highlight is Elysia Rodriguez! We first connected on Instagram a few months ago, and I was so excited to hear that we had some representation on local TV. Although glancing at the Fil-lennials of New England feed, it looks like we have a handful of Filipina reporters in our midst!

Hope you enjoy our profile of Elysia, and if you or someone you know wants to be highlighted on our blog or social media this year, you can fill out our nomination form.

Photo provided by Elysia Rodriguez.

Photo provided by Elysia Rodriguez.

Where are you and your family from?
Elysia: I was born in Florida but moved to the Philippines just before high school and lived in Metro Manila. I went to Dominican High School in San Juan before coming back to the US for college. 

My father’s side of the family is originally from Sorsogon but my immediate family now lives in Antipolo. 

Where do you work and what do you do? 
Elysia:  I am a reporter for Boston 25 News.  

How did you get into broadcast journalism?
Elysia: I honestly have wanted to be a reporter for as long as I can remember. My father is a musician and taught me to be confident and how to perform. However, instead of entertainment, I chose journalism. I love getting to the bottom of an issue, I love telling stories that impact people, and I love getting to know members of the community in ways that my job gives me access to do. 

On Boston…

How long have you been in Boston?
Elysia: About 6 years.

What are your favorite Boston spots? 
Elysia: I love the MFA and the New England Aquarium (I used to volunteer there as a penguin aquarist).

My two dogs and I love Copley Square - they love that they’re allowed to walk into the Fairmont Copley and say hi, and then also say hello to each and every person who lets them on Boylston and Newbury.

Photo provided by Elysia Rodriguez.

Photo provided by Elysia Rodriguez.

On Filipino Food...

What's your all time favorite Filipino dish?
Elysia: I like the simple classics (basically the ones I know how to make) adobo, chicken not pork. And pancit bihon, because I can’t eat gluten. I can also inhale a platter of suman. 

What's your favorite Filipino recipe / dish to make?
Elysia: Pancit - it’s really beautiful at the end, or halo halo because there are just so many colors. 

Photo provided by Elysia Rodriguez.

Photo provided by Elysia Rodriguez.

On staying in touch… 

How can people stay in touch?
Elysia: They can find me on instagram elysiarodrigueztv or my website elysiarodriguez.com - those are the best.

We’re always looking for BOSFilipinos blog writers, so if you’d like to contribute, send us a note at info@bosfilipinos.com.

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Podcast: Trish Fontanilla on Founding BOSFilipinos

By Kaitlin Milliken

If you’ve ever been to a BOSFilipinos event, you definitely know Trish Fontanilla. She’s the one running the show. She’s also the person who does most of the BOSFilipinos spotlights and the group’s newsletter. 

In this episode of our podcast, we put Trish on the other side of the interview and ask her about founding BOSFilipinos. Trish also shares her experience growing up as a Filipino American in New Jersey — including why she grew up with two birthday parties. 

Listen to the full episode below, or subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast, Google Play, Stitcher, and Spotify.

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BOSFilipinos Podcast Episode One: Introducing Your Host

by Kaitlin Milliken

Most people who grow up in the US as a -American have a complicated relationship with culture. Maybe you’re teased for it. Or you have a dual identity between your classmates and your cousins. Or you compartmentalize how you act at home from the rest of the world. 

As a kid, I always felt too American when compared to my Asian-American classmates and friends. I only spoke English and preferred pasta over palabok. I saw culture as a checklist. If you filled in enough boxes, then you could call yourself Filipino. 

When I moved to Massachusetts for college, my experience flipped. At Boston University, I was one of a few people of color in groups. I began to see how my background shaped my worldview. Being Filipino-Japanese-American became a larger part of how I defined myself. 

In the first episode of this show, I take a deeper dive into my relationship with Filipino culture. I also sit down with my grandma to get a better sense of the family history and her journey to America. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed sharing this story.

Transcript

[MUSIC]

Kaitlin Milliken: Hello, and welcome to the first ever episode of the BOSFilipinos podcast. I'm your host, Kaitlin Milliken. This is a brand new podcast created by, you guessed it, BOSFilipinos. For those of you who don't know, BOSFilipinos is a volunteer run organization that aims to elevate Filipino culture in Boston. This podcast is one way that we tell those stories. The group also has a blog and an Instagram which you should also check out. 

In each episode we highlight a different aspect of the Filipino American experience, from language, to food, to dance, and so much more. Our show is going to be Boston-centric, sharing Filipino stories from the Bay Sate. But we'll also talk about people promoting FilAm culture from other parts of the country. 

But before we dive deep into all of those topics, I'm going to spend our first episode introducing myself and talking about my relationship with culture. To do that, I want to start at the very beginning by talking to my grandma, Odette Semana Rojas.

Odette Rojas: Okay, when do you want me to start?

Kaitlin Milliken: So tell me where you grew up in the Philippines.

Odette Rojas: I was born in May of 1946 in San Juan, Batangas, in the Philippines, and we migrated to Manila, when I was two years old, and that's where I grew up. It’s also called San Juan Rizal. I went to public school there. And then when I went to high school, my mom, my dad enrolled me in a private school, which is called Forresten University, where I also finished my nursing career. And I got married in 1967, and we migrated to the United States with a child, and it's your mom. Her name is Maria Ayna Rojas.

Kaitlin Milliken: So we’re gonna go back, like a while. I feel like we just went through, like 40 years in like five minutes. 

Kaitlin Milliken:  In this recording, I'm sitting with my grandma in her house in San Jose, California. My mom and boyfriend are sitting on the couch off to the side attempting to be a quiet audience. 

My grandma is the coolest person I know. I always picture her as this radiant woman with an unforgettable smile. She has an objectively better taste in fashion than I do, and never ever wears sneakers. Even as a nurse clogs are her walking shoes. 

On top of being an absolute icon. She is also the matriarch of our family. She knows all of the gossip and holds all of our stories close. The CliffNotes version about her journey to the US and have asked her a few questions about her immigrant story for school projects. But this is one of the first times we really dove deep. 

Kaitlin Milliken: What was it like growing up in the Batangas? What was that like? I've never been.

Odette Rojas: Okay, okay. Batangas is like a province. That's where I really enjoyed myself when I was young. We used to go to the beach, and we used to play with jellyfish and sometimes it gets caught in your skin. It gets itchy but all you do is rub yourself with the sand and it goes away.

I will walk with my friends and wherever we will take us. When it's raining and there's water flowing water nearby, what we do is we used to use wooden shoes and you can slip it on and take it off. So what we used to do is we race those shoes. We put one of our shoes in the water, and we race the shoe and see who first will go the other end. 

The other one too is the, you know, the spiders. It's the one that has the big butt. It’s not the regular spider that has more legs. I don't know what you call it, but anyway we put them in a batch max… What do you call that? 

Kaitlin Milliken: Match box.

Odette Rojas: The match box.  We put them in there, and then we get a stick. Then one end, someone puts their spider then, and then the other one was deep spider at the other end we did have them fight and the one that false loses the game. [LAUGHS]

Kaitlin Milliken: My grandma grew up with her six siblings in the Batangas, fighting spiders and racing shoes in the rain. When it was time for her to go to university, she decided to study nursing, one of the big professions in the Filipino community. She went to school in Manila writing the jeepney to and from university for the first two years. After that, she moved to the dorm and even with the strict rules of nursing school, my grandma was her usual fun loving self.

Odette Rojas:  And I always get involved with activities because even when I was a student and I was the president of our nursing school organization before I graduated. And then besides that, I was one of the representatives of our department to the university that meets with others. That's where I met your grandpa. Yeah, so that's how I get involved. And then when there was, before martial law, I was really married at that time. When I was a student, and I was one of the activists. We used to run around and we had placards about you know, this and that, this and that. And then we go to the classroom and tell them not to go to school and we go out there in the street. And you know...

Kaitlin Milliken: My grandma always knew she wanted to come to America. In one of her journals, she had written that her dream was to move to the US, drive a fancy car, and send all of her kids to school. Around the same time, a number of my grandpa's relatives started immigrating to the country looking for opportunity. He was an engineer, so he was able to get a professional visa. And thus the small family's immigration journey began

Odette Rojas: Using your grandpa's certificate graduating from engineering department, because I didn't graduate at that time, I have to wait another year. I applied for a second type of visa to the United States which is professional, and if you are accepted, they'll issue you an immigrant visa. So we were able to get an American visa, and your mom was born at that time. Your mom was only 14-months when we left. 

We stayed with Auntie Dorith, which is your great-grandma's sister. That's where we rented a room. And on the way coming to the United States, all I had was $10 in my purse, and our transportation was fly-now-pay-later. There was such thing before. And it was, I believe it was like $475 each at that time. That was expensive at the time. That was in the 70s. So we stayed here and rented the room with Auntie Dorith. 

Kaitlin Milliken: My grandparents lived with relatives when getting their footing in the US. My grandma had to take an exam to continue her nursing career in America. After two tries, she was able to pass, and the rest is sort of the American dream. My grandma eventually got a job.

Odette Rojas: So I got hired at the hospital and I had to work evening shift because of babysitting. So your grandpa and I used to switch. I work 3am to 11am. He comes home at 5 o'clock and takes care of you to care of — not you — but your mom. And so that's how we did it. I worked 3 to 11 and he worked, what do you call it, days.

Kaitlin Milliken: They bought a house in San Jose, California.

Odette Rojas: Then we bought the home, and we could not afford anything so we ended up, as I said, buying stuff from the garage sale. So our plates were like 10 cents apiece. And then the table I think we bought it for five bucks. The two chairs were like $1 each. And they are so cheap when your grandpa was sitting on one, he fell on the floor. [LAUGHS]

Kaitlin Milliken: She got her first American credit card from Macy's to buy better stuff for the house.

Odette Rojas: Mind you the only department store, or any place, that issued us a credit card, because we could not get any credit because we didn't have any credit reference, right? So Macy’s was the first one. That's why I've been with Macy’s for years, even before your uncles were born. So they gave me a credit card good for $500. So we bought our mattress there and the box spring so at least we have a bed. And you're your mom slept with us anyways, so it didn't make any difference whether she has a bed or not.

Kaitlin Milliken: She and my grandpa helped out some friends who also immigrated from the Philippines.

Odette Rojas: Your dad, your grandpa's best friend and another friend needed a place to stay. They came from the Philippines too, and they didn't know anyone. So what I did is I rented the two rooms to the two guys with the food too, so that way, we have enough money to buy the other stuff. 

Kaitlin Milliken: They also helped my grandma's siblings and parents when they came to the US.

Odette Rojas:  Mama Josie, dad’s mother, had three sisters that were here. It was all on his side, none on my side. So every Christmas then, I always cried because I didn't have anyone. Then my sister came with the husband, and that got a little bit better. And then later on I petitioned for my dad and my mom. And so everybody got here, but it took a while before we got them all here.

Kaitlin Milliken: My grandma had two more kids. She got involved with the FilAm association at the local church; divorced my grandpa; fell in love with my Lolo Sol, who has been like a grandparent to me ever since.

She watched her children grow. My mom got married and at some point in the mix, my brother and I happened. And we grew up with two loving parents, my grandma close by, and the whole Filipino side of the family within city limits.

My grandma and her siblings were the side of the family we spent the holidays with. My idea of Christmas is incomplete without the full spread of my uncle Amado’s cooking. My maternal cousins and I spent summers together. My Tita Baby spent a long time attempting to teach me words in Tagalog, which I never internalized. I grew up surrounded by all of this culture and a large part of that came from my family. 

On top of the culture that came from my family, I grew up surrounded by other Filipinos in my community. Most of the students at my middle and elementary school were Filipino, and my high school was also very diverse. Lots of students were bilingual and very in touch with their cultural roots. So I never felt like I was different. Sometimes I actually felt like I wasn't Filipino enough. I wasn't full Filipino. My dad is Japanese and white. I didn't speak the language or own a filipinana. We stopped doing mano-po, where you touch an elders hand to your forehead as a blessing, after my great grandfather passed away. To me, I was just like any other American and way less Asian than other people in the Bay Area. 

My relationship with my cultural identity changed when I moved back east. My grandma and mom dropped me off at Boston University in 2014 for my freshman year of college. I was the first person to go to school on the east coast in my family. I studied journalism, did radio, made a bunch of great friends, and met a lot of people from different backgrounds. And of course, going to BU, a good number of my friends were white. 

And that's when I realized that I was raised differently. The traditions in my family, the food, the close knit nature of my relatives — that was all a part of who I was, and I missed it. So I went to the internet, more specifically Instagram, to find ways to meet other people from the same background. BOSFilipinos was one of the first groups I found, and they had a meetup that was relatively soon. The rest is history. 

At the end of the conversation with my grandma, I asked her what she wanted me to know about being a Filipina.

Odette Rojas: I am a Filipino by blood, and then of course, accepting the way who I am, wherever I go. And then my feeling is we're the same, excuse me, but if we scrape off our skin, my skin will be brown. When we scrape off our skin, my blood and your blood is the same. Maybe we come from a different place, I come from a different place, but that doesn't mean that you're higher than I am. That's why I have an attitude, “If you can do it, I can do it too.”

 Kaitlin Milliken: What role do you want Filipino identity to play for like me?

Odette Rojas: I guess. Consider yourself as a Filipino, and just like people here they accept to be American. Just respect each other's values and beliefs. And you take the way you are as a Filipino. You always always have the attitude of respect. Dignity.

Kaitlin Milliken: If you can do it, I can do it. And if I'm going to do it, I'm going to be the best at it. I think about that all the time. I'm still figuring out what it means to be a Filipino-American. But as I search, I think that mantra will be with me all along that journey.

[MUSIC]

Kaitlin Milliken:  This has been the BOSFilipinos podcast. This episode was written and produced by me, Kaitlin Milliken. The amazing Trish Fontanilla helped me get this podcast off the ground. Thank you so much, Trish, for everything you do. Special thanks to my grandma and my family for helping me tell my story. If you haven't already, you can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, Spotify, and Google Play. For more stories from Boston's film community, visit bosfilipinos.com or follow us on Instagram @bosfilipinos. Thanks for listening and see you soon.

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Trish Fontanilla Trish Fontanilla

The BOSFilipinos Podcast

By Katie Milliken

As people, we always crave community and connection. In the era of self-quarantine and election cycles, lifting each other up has become especially important. We can listen to other's stories and cheer each other on, even though we don’t share a physical space. 

That’s one of the reasons why we’re very excited to announce our new show, The BOSFilipinos Podcast. In each episode, we’ll explore a different aspect of the Filipino American experience, with a focus on members of the Boston community. Our first full episode will come out on April 3rd, and we’ll be posting new content on the first Friday of every month. You can listen to the trailer below. 

I also wanted to share a little bit about myself. I’m a Filipino-Japanese American journalist from San Jose, California. Growing up, I was surrounded by the Filipino side of my family and the Bay Area’s large Asian community. When I moved to Boston for university, I missed the cultural elements that reminded me of my home. 

So, I began to search out Boston-based FilAm groups and found BOSFilipinos. The more I participated in the group’s activities, the more I wanted to volunteer. Shortly after, I had a conversation with Trish and the podcast was born!  

I’ll explore my background and relationship with culture in our first episode. You can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast, Google Play Music, Spotify, and Stitcher for more updates. Do you have a topic we should discuss, want to be featured, or know anyone we should interview? Let us know by filling out the form below the Trailer Transcript.

Thanks for listening! 

Trailer Transcript

Hello and welcome to the trailer for The BOSFilipinos Podcast.  This is a brand new podcast created by, you guessed it, BOSFilipinos. We’re a volunteer-run organization that aims to highlight Filipino culture in Boston. I’m your host Kaitlin Milliken. In each episode of this show, we’ll highlight a different aspect of the Filipino American experience—from language, to food, to dance, and so much more. Our show is going to be Boston-centric, but we’ll also talk about  aspects of FilAm culture from other parts of the country as well. 

Our first episode will be up soon, but until then, subscribe to our show wherever you listen to podcasts. We’ll be streaming on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Google Play Music and Stitcher. You can also listen to the show, read awesome profiles, and catch up with our blog posts at bosfilipinos.com. If you want to be highlighted or know someone who we should feature, DM us on Instagram, @bosfilipinos. Thanks for listening, and see you soon. 

Podcast Submission

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Trish Fontanilla Trish Fontanilla

What's Next for BOSFilipinos

Photo taken / edited by Trish Fontanilla.

Photo taken / edited by Trish Fontanilla.

Hi BF-fers,

I’ve tried to write this post over the past week but since things kept changing day to day, and honestly, I found myself overwhelmed… as a Bostonian, an Asian American, a freelancer, someone who has one living parent in their 70s, someone that volunteers with vulnerable populations, and as the person that runs BOSFilipinos. I think all of us are feeling some pressure or distress on all different sides of our identity.

“This is just what I needed,” is something that I often hear at BF events. Knowing that our community has created spaces where people feel safe, seen, and included, I was hoping that we’d be able to keep doing our in-person events, but modified. However, as you all know, any kind of in-person event right now is unsafe. So while I feel like a lot of us could use some home-cooked Filipino food and company, I’m postponing all of our events until we know more. Here are a few more bulleted notes about our future plans:

  • Events (Meetups / Classes / Pot Lucks / Volunteer-led Excursions) - As mentioned, all of our events are canceled until May. Mid-April we’ll reassess and see if that needs to be extended, and we’ll announce that here on the blog as well as on our social feeds (Facebook / Twitter / Instagram) and in our newsletter. We will, however, continue to list community events on our Events page. While we do not encourage public gatherings until it’s communicated that it’s safe to do so, we do want to amplify the efforts of our community so that you can follow those individual organizations as they send out updates / reschedule.

  • Conversation Circles - People have expressed interest in learning Filipino languages, and we were beginning to do some intake, but these meetups will also will be postponed for now. I’ll think about how we can achieve this online (and not be repetitive with current resources out there), but for now, if you’d like to know more about when this launches, you can fill out this form: https://forms.gle/9dEX9Z5a51iMaaG88 We’re especially in need of people that are fluent!

  • Profiles - Now more than ever it’s important that we tell stories about our incredible community. So if you’d like to nominate someone to be featured (I’m looking at you too!), and they haven’t already been nominated (we’ll cross check - if they have been highlighted already, we’ll send them a nice note that someone was thinking of them), please fill out this form: https://forms.gle/9dEX9Z5a51iMaaG88 If you’ve already been highlighted but have an update, feel free to use that form as well, we’d love to hear what you’re up to these days.

  • Volunteer - As many of you know, the core BF team is three deep (Hyacinth, Katie, and myself), so if you find yourself with some extra time and want to give back to this community, we’d love to work with you! We’re looking for people of all backgrounds and skill sets, so tell us more about yourself by filling out our contact form: https://www.bosfilipinos.com/contact

And last but certainly not least… please remember to take care of yourselves during this time (and always!). I know a lot of you out there are caregivers, whether that be through profession, community leadership, within your friend group, or within an intergenerational family, to name a few. It’s absolutely a time to look out for and uplift others, but you can’t do that if you’re not taking care of your physical and mental health, so please take time for yourself however you can.

If there’s any other way we can help you or someone you know in the community, please don’t hesitate to email us: info@bosfilipinos.com.

Love and tabos,
Trish and the BOSFilipinos Team

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