Overview

Since first arriving in Canada, the Filipino community has contributed invaluably — and too often invisibly — to the fabric of Canadian society. In this anthology of Filipino-Canadian writing, Magdaragat explores the diverse intricacies of these growing yet underrepresented peoples, continuing the vital work of recognizing and celebrating their cultural contributions. The forty-three contributors to this anthology hail from across Turtle Island. They provide their singular yet universally resonating insights through stories of new homes and old homelands, of untangling internalized racism and championing solidarity, of the chasms within intergenerational households and the work of repairing them, and more. Poems, essays, short fiction, plays, and speeches — their works collected here showcase a wide breadth of Filipino-Canadian experience. Through stories of sacrifice, violence, and discrimination interspersed with stories of success, recovery, and solidarity, Magdaragat delves into Filipino-Canadian history, the joys and struggles of its present, and the hopes and aspirations for the future.

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9781770867727

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Reviews

“By striving to come up with this anthology, the editors and contributing writers have embraced the challenge to speak from their hearts and in the process they have truly become ‘mystic wanderers in the land of perpetual departures.’” -- Karl M. Gaspar * Minda News * “Magdaragat provides ample and eloquent proof of the Filipino-Canadian’s desire to reconnect with the homeland while charting their own course in the new country … The Fil-Cans have spoken, and theirs are voices worth listening to.” -- Butch Dalisay * The Philippine Star *

"""Magdaragat provides ample and eloquent proof of the Filipino-Canadian's desire to reconnect with the homeland while charting their own course in the new country ... The Fil-Cans have spoken, and theirs are voices worth listening to."" --Butch Dalisay ""The Philippine Star"" ""By striving to come up with this anthology, the editors and contributing writers have embraced the challenge to speak from their hearts and in the process they have truly become 'mystic wanderers in the land of perpetual departures.'"" --Karl M. Gaspar ""Minda News"""

Author Information

Jim Agapito hosts Recovering Filipino, a podcast featured on CBC Radio One, in which he reconnects to his Filipino heritage through self-discovery. Jim is a Filipino journalist and filmmaker from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Jim’s passion is storytelling, and his specialties include directing documentaries, music videos and podcasting. He has worked in the Canadian film and television industry for nearly two decades. When Jim isn’t working as a journalist, he writes, does martial arts, wrenches on his motorcycle and sings in a punk band. Hari Alluri (he/him/siya) is a migrant poet of Pangasinan, Ilokano, and Telugu descent who lives, loves, and writes on the unceded Coast Salish territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples, and Kwantlen, Katzie, and Kwikwetlem lands of Hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓-speaking peoples, a.k.a. New Westminster, British Columbia. Siya is author of The Flayed City and the chapbook Our Echo of Sudden Mercy. Recipient of the Vera Manuel Award for Poetry, among other prizes, grants, fellowships, and residencies, his work appears through these venues and elsewhere: Apogee, Marias at Sampaguitas, Michigan Quarterly Review, Poetry, poetry in Canada and — via Split This Rock — Best of the Net. @harialluri. Christine Añonuevo (she/her/hers) is a community organizer, writer, and educator who has worked in rural and remote communities across British Columbia and internationally in Ukraine, South Africa, and Japan. Her poetry has been shortlisted for Prism International’s Pacific Poetry Prize, the Malahat Review’s Long Poem Prize, and Room Magazine’s Poetry Contest. She is completing her PhD in Human and Health Sciences at the University of Northern British Columbia. She lives in the unincorporated community of South Hazelton, British Columbia. Kaia M. Arrow (she/her) is an artist, educator, and advocate. Kaia uses her writing to process and portray her experiences as a neurodivergent, sick & disabled, queer, Filipina settler. She applies structural understandings of power with an anti-colonial and anti-capitalist approach to her life and art. Kaia is privileged to be a part-time wheelchair user and full-time shit disturber. She dreams of supportive communities for all. Kaia writes from her apartment in Tkaronto (colonially known as Toronto), which she shares with her Bunny and her partner, Peter. She carries lineage from fierce and tender ancestors in Pampanga and Aklan. Isabel Palanca Aureus, from Toronto, Ontario, grew up in San Juan and San Mateo, Isabela, in Northern Philippines. A lover of books, she graduated from the University of Toronto, specializing in English. Isa’s Filipinx-Canadian pride was nurtured during her tenure as board secretary and later, board chair, at Kapisanan Philippine Centre for Arts + Culture. This work led to her board advisory and associate producer role at Carlos Bulosan Theatre. She usually writes about technology and business as a product marketing leader. Isa’s favourite story is the one she is still writing with her two sons, Leon Victor and Anders Noel, and her husband, Leon. Leon Aureus is a writer, actor, director, producer, and community leader dedicated to creating and supporting proud and diverse stories. He is currently the artistic producer of Carlos Bulosan Theatre, a founding member of fu-GEN Theatre, and the associate producer of the inaugural theatrical run of Kim’s Convenience. As a playwright, Leon adapted the novel Banana Boys for the stage, and he wrote and directed the children’s play Kaldero. He also co-wrote the plays People Power and In the Shadow of Elephants and is a Dora Award–nominated actor and filmmaker with multiple credits in theatre, television, and film. Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio is a community worker, public speaker, tour guide in Toronto's Little Manila, and founder of Filipino Talks-- an initiative that builds bridges between Canadian educators and Filipino families. Her debut novel, Reuniting with Strangers (Douglas & McIntyre), was one of CBC's Best Books of 2023 and was a finalist for the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award. After completing her Masters in Immigration and Settlement Studies, she studied at the Humber School for Writers and the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. Born and raised in Sarnia, Ontario, she is a founding member of Pluma-- a collective of Toronto-based Filipino writers. Jellyn Ayudan is a recent graduate of the University of Regina with an honours degree in English. She currently works at University of Regina Press as an editorial assistant. Born in Pateros, Metro Manila, Philippines, she now resides in Treaty 4 lands in oskana kāasastēki (Regina, Saskatchewan) with her close-knit family and their dogs, Max and Rocky. Hannah Balba was born in the Philippines and immigrated to Richmond, British Columbia, in 2001. Inspired by her deep involvement with Filipino community groups in Vancouver, her research interests centre around Canadian foreign domestic worker movements, with a special emphasis on the socio-economic impacts of caregiver programs on Filipino-Canadians. She holds a BA in History from the University of British Columbia, and she will begin her legal studies as a JD candidate in September 2023. She speaks Tagalog. Monica Anne Batac (she/they/siya) is a teacher, community organizer, and PhD candidate at the School of Social Work at McGill University. Monica identifies as a second-generation Filipina/x in the Canadian diaspora, born and raised in Tkaronto (Toronto). She is currently residing between Whitehorse, Yukon; Montréal, Québec; and Winnipeg, Manitoba. Monica’s writings include Growing Up Pinay, published in 2020 as part of the Home is in the Body anthology by ANAK Publishing, and “‘Failing’ and Finding a Filipina Diasporic Scholarly ‘Home’: A De/Colonizing Autoethnography,” published in 2021/22 in the academic journal, Qualitative Inquiry. Alexa Batitis is a second-generation Filipino-Canadian writer living in Ottawa, Ontario, where she was born and raised. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from Carleton University and a diploma in Professional Writing from Algonquin College. Alexa's published works include poetry, fiction, and non-fiction. She is a proud federal public servant and amateur astrologer, and hopes to visit the Philippines one day. She lives with her husband, Shane, and their two cats, Kiwi and Kochi. Mila Bongco-Philipzig has published five children's books, four of which are bilingual (Filipino-English). She also translated two children's books from Filipino to German, which were included in the Frankfurter Buchmesse 2022. Mila has poetry, personal essays, and articles published in various magazines, anthologies, and podcasts in the Philippines, Canada, and Germany. In 2021, Mila was an Edmonton Arts Council's Featured Artist for Asian Heritage Month and the first featured reader for Edmonton Public Library's Multilingual Storytime. When she is not writing or painting, Mila is busy organizing community events, running long-distance, and helping various organizations promote human rights and social justice. Isabel Carlin is a librarian and archivist in the occupied territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations (so-called Vancouver, British Columbia). They are a Filipinx poet and activist who writes and struggles for the national democratic revolution in the Philippines. Their research and writing focus on the intersections of imperialism, resource extraction, record-keeping, and class struggle. Rachel Evangeline Chiong is an author, poet, and happy person. Kabangka, a Canadian-Filipinx not-for-profit, was named after her poem, which encapsulated the values and hopes of the community. She has published a comic book based on her poem “Dark Magic” with illustrator and absolute lad Sven (@svencomicsart). Currently, she is working on her fantasy YA novel, Doctor Daniri and the Mythical Beasts of the Mundo, which was awarded the Ontario Arts Council recommender grant (2021–2022) and long listed on Voyage’s First Chapters Contest (2021). Kay Costales is an author and poet represented by Lesley Sabga of the Seymour Agency. She is based in Toronto, Ontario. Her poetry collection, the EMOTIONS series, is available now and her debut novel, WHEN THEY BECKON, will be released by City Owl Press in late 2023. As a child of immigrants, it is important for her to always provide Filipino diaspora representation in her stories regardless of genre. You can usually find her constantly daydreaming about monsters, magic, and romance. Gemma Derpo Dalayoan was a high school teacher in the Philippines and immigrated to Canada in 1976. She finished a BEd and a master’s degree in English as a Second Language (ESL) at the University of Manitoba. She was one of the founders and a three-time president of the Manitoba Association of Filipino Teachers’ Inc. (MAFTI). She served as vice-principal of three schools in the Winnipeg School Division from 1994 to 2004. She has received several awards for her community work and is the author of four books. She lives in Winnipeg and is currently finishing a memoir. Ariel Dela Cruz (they/he/siya) is an educator and care worker based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Currently, they are a doctoral student in the Department of Performing and Media Arts at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Their current research project focuses on alternative modes of care performed by tomboy and transmasculine caregivers across the Filipinx labour diaspora. They hold a BSc with Honours in Neuroscience and Psychology as well as an MA in Women and Gender Studies from the University of Toronto. Nathalie De Los Santos is a writer and creative based in Vancouver, British Columbia. She created PilipinxPages, a bookstagram featuring Filipino/a/x authors. She has written for or appeared in interviews for the following publications and festivals: Kapwa Magazine, TFC, Marias at Sampaguitas, Ricepaper Magazine, Gastrofork, Chopsticks Alley Pinoy, CBC, Cold Tea Collective, Sampaguita Press, Filipino Fridays podcast, Stories with Sapphire podcast, UBC’s Games in Action conference, and LiterASIAN Writers Festival (2020). She is also the creator of the podcast, Filipino Fairy Tales, Mythology and Folklore. She is the author of Hasta Mañana, Alice’s Order and is working on a Filipino fantasy novel, Diyosa Mata. Sol Diana is a spoken word artist and teacher born and raised on the traditional, ancestral, unceded, and occupied lands of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tseil-Waututh First Nations. He is of mixed Filipino and Scottish background and credits the Filipino artists he grew up around as his biggest influences. Sol’s passion lies with empowering youth through art and education. His biggest hope is for a future where diasporic Filipinx youth are connected as a cohesive, safe community; their voices are heard; and their humanities are affirmed. Erica Dionora is a Filipina poet and illustrator. She grew up in Saipan, Northern Marianas Islands, and migrated to Canada in 2008. Erica studied Publishing at Centennial College and completed her MA in Creative Writing at the University of Gloucestershire. She is currently based in Scarborough, Ontario, where she is working on a collaboration for an illustrated poetry book. Based in Toronto, Ontario, Carolyn Fe is a trilingual actress (English/French/Tagalog), award-winning singer-songwriter-lyricist, former contemporary dancer-choreographer, and in a former life owned and operated a science and technology human resources firm. Her continuous pursuit of artistic evolution adds new instruments to her creative portfolio as a published writer and emerging playwright. Some TV/streaming credits include Lola in Nickelodeon’s Blue’s Clues & You!, Madame Z in the award-winning French series Meilleur Avant, and voices on animated series on DreamWorks’ Pinecone & Pony and PBS Kids’ Work It Out Wombats. More of Carolyn at https://linktr.ee/TheCarolynFe. Renato Gandia, born and raised in the Philippines, emigrated to Canada in 1997 when he was twenty-seven years old. He studied theology and holds a Master of Divinity degree. He worked as a journalist for daily newspapers in Alberta for several years. He became a Canadian citizen in 2007. He currently works as a communications advisor in the oil and gas industry. He lives in Calgary with his husband and their fourteen-year-old dog. Kawika Guillermo is the author of Stamped: an anti-travel novel (2018), which won the Asian American Studies Book Award for Best Novel, as well as the queer speculative fiction novel, All Flowers Bloom (2020), and the prose-poetry book, Nimrods: a fake-punk self-hurt anti-memoir (2023). Under his patrilineal/legal name, Christopher Patterson, he is an associate professor in the Social Justice Institute at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and is the author of the books Transitive Cultures: Anglophone Literature of the Transpacific (2018) and Open World Empire: Race, Erotics, and the Global Rise of Video Games (2020). Primrose Madayag Knazan (she/her) is an award-winning playwright and author and has been featured at Winnipeg Jewish Theatre, Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre, the Winnipeg International Writers Festival, CBC Radio, the Winnipeg Fringe, and the Tales from the Flipside Festival of new Filipinx-Canadian Plays. She won the bi-annual Canadian Jewish Playwriting Competition and her plays have been published by Scirocco Drama and Playwrights Canada Press. Her debut novel, Lessons in Fusion, won the Manitoba Book Award for Young People, and was nominated for both the Manitoba and Saskatchewan Young Readers Choice Awards, as well as the Manitoba Book Award for Best New Book. José Romelo Lagman hails from Angeles, Pampanga. He graduated cum laude from the University of Santo Tomás (Manila) with a BS in Mathematics degree in 1989. He has since worked as a computer programmer in the Philippines, Malaysia, U.S., and Canada, arriving in Toronto as an immigrant in January 1994. José is also an internationally published sports and travel photographer. He started writing during the pandemic lockdowns, and he is nearly finished with his first novel — a multilingual historical fiction piece set in Manila in the tumultuous 1890s. Yves Lamson is a second-generation Filipino-Canadian writer who takes from the Philippine oral tradition to spin tales of fantastic creatures. He also enjoys writing around the historical elements of the islands he is wistful and wondrous for. He is a writer by profession, but at the core, he is a storyteller. Interested in preserving the intangible histories, he writes the stories down as a tool to not forget, to keep the precious things safe. Grace Sanchez MacCall (she/her) was born in Manila, grew up in Calgary, and went to university in Vancouver. She currently splits her time between Toronto, where she lives and writes, and Tatamagouche, where she tries not to do anything at all. Her work has appeared in the Capilano Review and Hamilton Arts and Letters. She is a founding member of the Eastwood Writers Collective and is currently working on a novel. Her writing explores themes of power, culture, construction of knowledge, inequality, and strategies of resistance. Lorina Mapa was born in Manila and at the age of sixteen moved with her family to Washington, DC. In 1991 she graduated from the Kubert School of Comic and Graphic Art in New Jersey, where she met her husband, artist Daniel Shelton. They have four children and live in Hudson, Québec. Her graphic novel Duran Duran, Imelda Marcos, and Me was nominated by the American Library Association as a Great Graphic Novel for Teens. Lorina was featured on the CBC’s 2017 list of Writers to Watch and nominated for the Joe Schuster Award for best writer. Deann Louise C. Nardo is a poet, interwoven artist, and cultural worker living and napping in Tiohtiá:ke/Montréal, Québec. They work as mycelium: connecting, decomposing, metabolizing, and regenerating nutrients for/with their community. Their practice thrives on the thin line where questions live and curiosity flowers. Rafael Palma (he/him) is an English major at Brandon University, with a minor in Creative Writing. He was born and raised in the province of Laguna, in the Calabarzon region. As a kid, he read science fiction and fantasy novels and started writing short stories in his elementary days. He immigrated to Brandon, Manitoba, with his family when he was fifteen and continued his studies. He discovered Western Poetry in high school and has been writing poetry ever since. He follows the styles of Margaret Atwood, Mary Oliver, Sylvia Plath, and Robin Morgan, his favourite poets. Remilyn “Felix” Policarpio is a Filipino transmasculine artist, musician, educator, and storyteller. Member of the Filipino artist group Dupil Collective, he performs in charity events and arts shows around Ottawa. The oldest of four siblings and first in his family to be born on Canadian soil in Toronto, and inspired by a thirst for learning, he grew up reading encyclopedias for fun. He attended the Iona School of the Arts, specializing in instrumental works there before later transferring to visual arts. He moved to Ottawa in 2015 to study philosophy, stopping short due to mental illness but continuing his work as an educator. Felix currently resides in Britannia, Ottawa, lurking around as a member of the Haunted Walk and learning how to be a death worker. Leah Ranada’s stories have been published in On Spec, Room Magazine, Santa Ana River Review, emerge 2013, and elsewhere. Her writing is informed by her childhood in Metro Manila and eventual move to Vancouver in 2006, where she made writing her permanent home. She now lives in New Westminster, British Columbia. In 2013, she attended the Writer’s Studio (TWS) at SFU. She released her debut novel, The Cine Star Salon (NeWest Press), in 2021. Alma Salazar Retuta, MD, a veterinarian and a doctor of medicine, works in Calgary, Alberta, as a physician. She came to Canada in 2011 with her husband and five children. She loves cooking, reading, camping, and singing. She also adores babies and children. She hopes to uplift the lives of close family members by assisting them to come to Canada to build a new life here. In her brief life, Rani Rivera (1981–2016) experienced moments of darkness and light. She worked among the marginalized in two of the neediest neighbourhoods in Toronto: first, at St. James Town, where she organized after-school activities for children and youth, and later, at the Community Place Hub in the Weston and Mount Denis area. She enrolled in the English program of the University of Toronto on a bridging scholarship. Her poetry collection All Violet was published by Caitlin Press (Dagger Editions) in 2017. For a review of Rivera’s posthumous collection, All Violet, please go to: http://themaynard.org/views/rivera0218.php. Aileen Santiago (she/they) is a teacher in Toronto, Ontario, with a background in languages, literacy, and social justice education. Born in the Philippines to Filipino and Chinese parents and coming to Canada at the age of seven, Aileen has some understanding of what it feels to straddle diverse cultures, embrace shifting identities, and the discomfort of learning how to unlearn. Her ongoing journey of reconnecting to her Philippine Taga-Ilog and Chinese Fukien roots has led her to curriculum writing projects, poetry performances, building the Fil-Can Educators Network, and research in anti-racist and decolonizing pedagogies. She shares her story as a racialized settler who is always ready to learn in community with others. Angelo Santos is a writer, filmmaker, and physiotherapist who spent his formative years living in many places around the world — namely, the Philippines, the Middle East, the United States, and Canada. He now lives in Oakville, Ontario. Angelo's work has been published in various outlets including Ricepaper Magazine and filling Station. He is currently working on a collection of essays. Carlo Sayo is a cultural worker engaging in diverse artistic disciplines such as visual and installation art, poetry, new media, and performance work. Drawing from experiences as the child of Filipino immigrants who left the Philippines during the Martial Law era of the 1970s, Carlo's creative endeavours delve into themes of culture, identity, migration and settlement. His work is rooted in community building, striving to foster a greater understanding of the Filipino settler experience on unceded territories. Born in Montréal and later moving to Vancouver during Expo 86, Carlo’s imaginative spirit grew partly from being a child of the 1980s. As a youth, Carlo grew up in and around the Kalayaan Centre, a Filipino community centre based in Vancouver’s downtown eastside that was the heart of Filipino political activism in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Alongside his artistic pursuits, Carlo takes immense pride in being a devoted parent to two curious children. Maribeth Manalaysay Tabanera a.k.a. Kilusan (siya/sanda/they/she/he) is a Tagalog Visayan filipinx queer non-binary multi-hyphenate artist, educator, and community organizer. They were born and raised on Treaty 1 Territory (Winnipeg, Manitoba) and spent thirty-five years based in this community. They have presented their work as an educator, dancer, and dj at events all over Turtle Island (North America). Maribeth is now based in Tkaronto (Toronto, Ontario) completing their Master of Education in Social Justice Education at the University of Toronto and working part-time as a research assistant for Elevate Equity. For more information about them, please visit: https://www.maribethtabanera.com. Born and raised in Manila, Philippines, Steffi Tad-y is a poet and writer based in the territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations, also known as Vancouver, British Columbia. Her chapbook of poems Merienda, published by Rahila’s Ghost Press, was nominated for the 2021 bpNichol Chapbook Award. In 2022, she published her debut book of poetry, From the Shoreline, with Gordon Hill Press. Steffi’s poems often reflect on kinship, diasporic geographies, and formations of the mind. Vincent Ternida is the author of the novella The Seven Muses of Harry Salcedo. His essays, articles, and poetry have appeared in several publications, including The Polyglot, The British Columbia Review, rabble.ca, Rappler, Voice and Verse Poetry Magazine, and PR&TA Journal. His short story “Elevator Lady” was long listed for the CBC Short Story Prize in 2019. He is currently completing a short story collection. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.

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