Homecoming follows three generations of Filipinx women on a magical cross-continent journey
The Cultch and Urban Ink present Kamila Sediego’s play that explores cultural identity and familial duty
Homecoming. Photo by Emily Cooper
The Cultch and Urban Ink present Kamila Sediego’s Homecoming at the Historic Theatre from May 2 to 12 as part of the Femme Festival
“BAHAY KUBO”, WHICH TRANSLATES to “Nipa Hut” in English, is a traditional Filipino folk song that has been sung to children for centuries. Its gentle lyrics tell a simple story of a stilt house made from bamboo and nipa palm leaves, and the vegetables—squash, beans, eggplant, and more—that grow in abundance around it.
For Filipinx playwright Kamila Sediego, the widely popular song holds a nostalgic place in her life, and it’s now a central piece of the sound design in her multigenerational play Homecoming that’s premiering at The Cultch’s Femme Festival. “Bahay Kubo” is just one of many deep ties to Sediego’s own life that figure in the production.
Shortly before she started writing Homecoming in 2014, her mother had flown back home to the Philippines for the first time since she and Sediego’s father had emigrated to Canada in the ’80s. The journey was to visit Sediego’s grandfather, who had fallen ill—but it wasn’t financially possible for the whole family to make the trip to see him.
Sediego stayed behind, wondering what it must have been like for her mom to finally experience a homecoming after nearly three decades away. The playwright, who was born in Canada, says that creating Homecoming allowed her to gain a greater understanding of her family’s immigration process.
“I think when you grew up born here, not really hearing much about the homeland or the motherland, you have to create your own ideas of what your parents’ experience was like,” Sediego tells Stir over a Zoom call before Homecoming’s premiere. “It’s very much also that thing of when you’re growing up, you only see your mom and dad as your mom and dad, and not full people. So just working through this has really opened my eyes to the many different experiences that immigrants have to go through, and the ways that those filter through to their children. Again, very vast, and this is just one type of immigrant story. But it really opened my eyes to their own experience, and what others’ could be like.”
Homecoming tells the story of three generations of Filipinx women—a grandmother, two daughters, and granddaughter—as they experience a magical journey through time and across an ocean. Sifting through dreams and memories, the women explore their own relationships to cultural identity and familial duty as they grapple with what returning home means for different people.
Produced by Urban Ink and directed by Hazel Venzon, the production weaves together humour, connection, and delicious Filipino food to help balance a story full of intimate moments.
Kamila Sediego. Photo by The Portrait Sessions
“This show is the first time I’ve been in a process where it’s all Filipino people in the cast and direction,” Sediego says. “A lot of the creative team as well are of Filipino heritage. And we all come from different backgrounds in terms of our own lived experiences—so though there are diverse perspectives coming into the room, we all do have a sense of shared connection, you know? And it’s great, because we can even use some Tagalog in the room. There’s a certain level of connection in not having to explain ourselves all the time, which is so different and refreshing.”
In Homecoming, the two sisters each take a different path in life. While the eldest stays in the Philippines with her mother and embraces a more traditional role of familial duty, the second immigrates to Canada, where she begins to feel a new sense of identity and must learn to balance it with her Filipinx heritage.
Meanwhile, the second sister’s daughter is born in Canada—much like Sediego—and struggles with her own “definition” of what it means to be Filipinx when she has lived her whole life outside of the Philippines. (Sediego uses air quotes around “definition” to emphasize the fact that you can’t really define a person’s relationship to their heritage in one single way.)
“While the show is very culturally specific at the core, it is still about belonging, and understanding, and finding belonging,” she says. “So I hope that people who are on those journeys can see themselves there.”
As Sediego reflects on the decade-long journey she took to create Homecoming, which is her first play, she tells Stir it has changed her career trajectory as an artist; she has found the most fulfillment in crafting stories that reflect her rich Filipinx heritage. She’s currently developing a second play, Engkanto, about a parent and child that come face to face with the mythical spirits of Filipinx folktales.
“So rarely do we get to see ourselves as Filipinos on stage in general, if we aren’t already being portrayed as the help, or any other kind of stereotype like that,” Sediego says. “So to be able to present complex, layered Filipino characters is something that’s really important to me. And I hope for my fellow Filipino people out there in the audience that we can finally see ourselves, and be recognized, and acknowledged.” 
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