Key Points
- Migrants face challenges of writing their own story.
- There's a lesson behind every story written in diverse languages.
- Family is a common theme for every Filipino migrant story.
Challenges
Settling in a new country is a challenge for many migrants. Women, in particular, find it difficult to create new relationships.
"Based on our own experience of moving from overseas to Australia, we realised that it is really hard to get to know people and build connections for women especially," Indian migrant and co-founder of Key Into Australia (KIA) Novela Corda says.
Sydney-based Corda and her friend, Maia Saxena, experienced various challenges during their early years living in Australia.
"We realised how difficult it was for us to meet other people and make the connections, that's why we thought of establishing Key Into Australia."
Their charity aims to help migrant women find opportunities, such as work and personal relationships.
"Usually you tend to stick with you own community, say the Indian or Filipino community; but for me, I was not living in an area where there were a lot of Indian people so it was hard for me," Corda admits.
Key Into Australia is a community of international and local women in Sydney who support each other to find connection, get support for job opportunities and support others. Credit: Key Into Australia (Facebook)
KIA is open to women from different cultural backgrounds.
Freely sharing one's migrant story
One of the programs that Saxena and Corda initiated is 'Tongue Set Free, a workshop initially conducted online during the pandemic with the purpose of connecting migrant women.
"During the pandemic, we kept our program going online for members to get connected with each other spreading information in different languages.
"We created this program where women can come together and write their stories."
In the form of flash fiction, women wrote short-form stories in English.
"We had a very successful round in English where we've done many workshops, write stories about their experiences back home and here [Australia]," shares Novela.
With the success of the project, Corda's group thought of conducting 'Tongue Set Free' in various languages.
"We're taking this program to different languages. We have Arabic writing group, Mandarin. We will also do one in Filipino, Spanish and Sinhalese."
myTIA is a group of women supporting women through entrepreneurship and believing in the power of inclusion and diversity. Credit: Supplied by Grace Panlican
Filipino migrant women stories
Although the workshop stories were varied and were written in different languages, home was a common theme in all of them.
In the initial English version of the workshop, women participants recall everything about their homeland.
"Every woman spoke about their childhood very fondly. They remember the kitchen in their homes, their mothers and grandmothers. They also remember the food and smells," Novela says.
Western Sydney resident andmyTitas in Australia (myTIA) co-founder Grace Panlican was one of the participants in the English story writing workshop. Her story revolved around her hometown of Tarlac and her experience as an international student in Australia.
"I pulled through my story from my hometown in Capas, Tarlac. I was reminded of my humble beginnings and linked that to my migration to Australia.
"It's quite different when you're telling your story to when you write it where you are able to go back through each words. We're always looking for connection to our homeland.
"That special feeling of being able to relive where I came from and be able to freely write about it," Panlican shares.
In collaboration with Key Into Australia, myTIA will hold 'The Tongue Set Free: Malayang Pagsusulat ng Kwento ng Migrasyon ng mga Kababaihan sa Wikang Filipino" .
How to listen to this podcast episode. Credit: SBS Filipino
"It's also an opportunity to enrich the beauty of our own language."
myTIA will hold 'Tongue Set Free in Filipino' at the Green Square Library in Zetland, NSW this August 20 as their participation in celebrating Philippines' Buwan ng Wika [Language Month].
Panlican wishes to read and hear the stories of other Filipino women in their workshop, which she believes will help "our family back home as one of the main commonalities in many Filipino migrant stories."
