Cultural Kultivators

Cultural Kultivators - Joy Regullano

We are so excited to welcome another powerful pinay, writer, actor-comedian based in L.A.: Joy Regullano! From Sesame Street writer to Modern Family cameos, YouTube sketch artist to creator of Asian American comedy musical, Supportive White Parents, Joy is a multitalented creatrix in the entertainment scene.
This week she speaks with us about her journey as a former pre-med track student at UC Berkeley and her switch to theater while detailing an experience many of us struggle with: bringing our parental figures into the fold of our dreams. As creatives, we’re often reluctantly and somewhat unknowingly designated to expand the horizons of what’s “possible” within our family and past/current generations. For Joy, part of this sometimes means meeting our parents where they’re at.
She also opens up about the responsibility that comes with screenwriting for children’s shows and raising the next generation as an act of service. In normalizing BIPOC experiences on screen, Joy brings intention and sensitivity to writing stories and characters that are relatable, funny, and embraced as a fundamental mirror for children to see themselves in.
She reminds us that we all have something important to say and something important to offer the world. In Joy’s words, we encourage you to, “write the story that no one else is ever going to write."
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative

Cultural Kultivators - Ouida

Welcome back and Happy New Year to all of our listeners! For our first episode of the year, we are running it back full circle with past Kreative Growth artist, Ouida!
As a SF born and raised singer-songwriter with rising national and international recognition, Ouida gives us an inside scoop on the new Bolo Music Group, Ruby Ibarra and Ian Santillano’s latest project announced last October.
Trailblazer in her own right, she sheds light on her journey towards finding her “why” in music, taking us through her introspective pathfinding around the associations and self-beliefs we all make when relying on institutions to validate our worth. For Ouida, all it came down to was the music.
With the joy and the pitfalls of the entertainment industry that she experienced from management to breaking into songwriting, she emerged resilient with wisdom born out of falling for the mistakes early on. In navigating the industry herself, she encourages against the commodification of art, to keep artistic integrity for artists and by artists.
As a Filipino-Irish American, she also touches on how straddling between the “nowhere and everywhere” informs her music, sense of collaboration and belonging, rejecting the preconceived notions of authenticity that often comes with exploring what it means to be biracial.
Bring in the new year with this powerful conversation on joy, resilience, and living in your truth!
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative
 

Cultural Kultivators x Unsung Heroes: Rochelle Berdan

As we close out 2023, we are proud to welcome our final Unsung Heroes guest host, Rochelle Berdan! This episode features their mentor and friend, Jordan Raye, a queer, non-binary healer whose vulnerability turns out to be their greatest strength. Together, they dive deep into what healing intergenerational trauma looks like as an ongoing, non-linear process.
Tune in for a deeply emotional and candid examination into how growing up Fil-Am is different for everyone. For Jordan, they grew up surrounded by secrecy and complicated relationships with some of their family. Yet despite all of their hardship, they’ve grounded themselves in reclaiming their experiences, identities, and found much healing through dancing, chosen family, and unapologetically showing up as they are.
In a world where generational trauma exists, generational joy and wisdom exist too because, “In the same way love can look differently and have so many definitions. Healing isn’t definitive. It’s an ongoing definition.” As Jordan says, the real work of healing is not linear but it does start with you.
Trigger Warning: This episode contains mentions of sexual violence & child abuse that may be triggering for some individuals.
Apply for next year’s Unsung Heroes Youth Podcast Scholarship Here!
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative

Cultural Kultivators x Unsung Heroes: Benedict Del Rosario

Our next guest host episode for this week features Bay Area high school student, Benedict Del Rosario! Right in time for the holidays, this student-produced episode dives into Filipino cultural celebrations and its role in forming a strong sense of identity, belonging, and community.
As Benedict interviews his father, Reynaldo, a first generation immigrant, we witness the importance of storytelling and the tradition of passing down oral history as a way to preserve cultural practices across generations. We also learn about the Del Rosario family’s history of resistance and resilience, highlighting the role of personal heroes, like Benny’s great uncle Pepe, who actively participated in the guerrilla movement against the Japanese invasion of World War II.
From the Cultural Kultivators team to our local and international listeners abroad, we hope this conversation encourages all of us to dig a little deeper with our elders this holiday season and discover something new about our own traditions and roots!
Apply for next year’s Unsung Heroes Youth Podcast Scholarship Here!
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative

Cultural Kultivators x Unsung Heroes - Luci Herrera-Set

This week we are kicking off the end of the year with a very special guest host: Luci Herrera-Set! Luci is a local Bay Area highschooler and graduate of our Unsung Heroes youth podcast program. In this student-produced episode, Lucy invites her uncle, Michael Herrera, to talk about his journey as a teacher nurtured by the Pin@y Educational Partnerships program (PEP).
From teaching Oakland first graders to striving to open up a restaurant in the homeland, Michael opens up about how important it is to be resilient when overcoming life’s biggest transitions and the sometimes not so quiet self-doubt that creeps in for many of us. Despite the challenges of assimilation that we as first, second, and third generation Filipino-Americans face, Michael hopes to leave a lasting legacy for future generations, whether that’s building a home base in the Philippines or teaching Filipino-American youth to embrace their history for a better path into the future.
In his words, “Don’t be afraid to fail, accept that and really trust in your community,” he reminds us that developing a growth mindset and leaning into our mistakes is what will see us through to our goals.
Follow Michael’s food journey on Instagram! @ninong_loy_kitchen
Apply to the 2024 Summer Unsung Heroes Youth Podcast program here: https://balaykreative.com/unsung-heroes
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative

Cultural Kultivators - Rudy Corpuz Jr.

This week’s special guest brings decades of experience working with at-risk youth in San Francisco: Rudy Corpuz Jr.! Founder and Executive Director of United Playaz, a violence prevention program that serves the youth, Rudy has dedicated his life to the rehabilitation and development of previously incarcerated folks and our youth as an ex-felon.
 
In this episode, Rudy shares with us how he got started at Balboa High School as a gang prevention counselor for Filipino youth and his first major case and inspiration for United Playaz: breaking up a multiracial brawl. He also shares with us the challenges of healing a community he once harmed, answering the call to service by keeping power in the people’s hands and minds. 
 
As we play the long game in building generational abundance, Rudy’s vision embraces ex-felons and the previously incarcerated by giving them job opportunities and a community to come back to. Join us this week to learn more about Rudy’s approach to teaching self discipline and cultural history to our young kings and queens of the future. 
 
It takes the Hood to save the Hood. Visit unitedplayaz.org to learn more!
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative

Cultural Kultivators - Terry Valen

As Filipino American History Month comes to end, we are proud to lead with this next episodes’ guest, Terry Valen! Organizer with the Bay Area Seafarers Coalition and Executive Board and International Coordinating Body Member of the International Migrants Alliance (IMA).
In this episode, Terry bridges international gaps by connecting migrant struggles in America to working class conditions in the homeland. From workers rights in San Francisco, Excelsior, and Daly City, to the rice farms of Luzon and Jollibees of Manila.
Terry also enlightens us about the impact of APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) not only in the Asia-Pacific region, but in our hometown with money and resources being diverted towards this national, special security event, highlighting the wealth gap that many San Franciscans struggle with in their daily lives. According to Terry, APEC’s militarization, threat to food sovereignty and basic access to needs is a historic opportunity for international solidarity.
With Terry’s 20+ years of experience in organizing and building solidarity amongst class, race, and immigrant lines, he continues to remind us of our responsibility to exercise our rights to both free speech and assembly.
 
To find out more information about Terry and the events in November, visit https://linktr.ee/No2APEC 
The views and opinions expressed in this episode are solely that of the guest’s and does not necessarily reflect the views of Kultivate Labs or its associated programs.
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.
EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative

Cultural Kultivators - Luna Salaver

In honor of Filipino-American History Month, we are proud to share space with Luna Salaver!  As the first half of the famous Jose Rizal quote goes,“Know History, Know Self,” Luna brings us home through nearly 100 years of Salaver family history in the Bay Area.
From 10 cent Taxi Dance Halls to the introduction of Tinikling in the Bay Area and the Third World Liberation Front, Luna walks us through the decades since the patriarch of the family, Canuto Salaver, first immigrated to San Francisco in the first wave of 20th century migration from the homeland and became one of the first business owners in the original Manilatown.
Her mother, Estrella’s efforts in the arts and culture scene and brother, Pat’s sacrifices for the establishment of ethnic studies at SF State laid the foundation for schools across the United States. Luna’s own advocacy work in the Bay Area Air Quality Management District mirrors her family’s legacy of activism and continues to shape our community today.
Whether it’s launching a podcast or simply sharing Merienda while pouring over old photographs with your Lola, Luna urges us to learn our history through our elders, our peers, and presents a moment of personal reflection:
How do we as a community take our ancestors’ efforts and struggles further? And no matter where you are in the world, how will you be part of the living body of collective, Filipino History?
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative
 

Cultural Kultivators.- Gayle Romasanta

Happy Filipino-American History Month! We are incredibly honored to welcome Gayle Romasanta as this week’s writer, art-tivist, mother, and executive director of the Filipino-American Development Foundation. Gayle unwraps her process behind her latest work Larry: The Musical about Larry Itliong with us and her decades long experience working in community.
A true powerhouse of the Filipino American community, she brings us into the fold with her wisdom as a scholar and activist in the crucial movement of raising a generation of creators, artists, and feelers who come from a long lineage of working class fighters and the Manong generation as a form of resistance.
As we navigate the trauma of being deemed cheap labor and the racial violence we experience in our daily lives, Gayle urges us to continue fighting for the soul and core of who we are as a people in the stories we tell ourselves, our children, and our collective.
She also offers a reframe of the realities of full time parenthood, artist-hood, and community organizing and the illusion of “balance” when your craft, family, and community demand nothing but the best of you and your gifts.
Her advice? Create by any means necessary! Just do it!
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative
 

Cultural Kultivators - Sarina Bolden

Find out what it takes to represent the Philippines in the Women’s World Cup in this week’s episode with Sarina Bolden! Bay Area local turned international star, Sarina lets us in on the secrets behind her success: her growth mindset, taking her mental health seriously, and good coffee. 
Behind Sarina’s many successes, is her soul searching journey outside of her identity as an athlete, finding that it’s both passion and a growth mindset that will see you through, whether it’s taking a long break, starting a new career, or traveling in order to come back to yourself and your purpose. 
In this episode, we also discuss the perpetual identity crisis we as fellow Filipino Americans experience in trying to answer the question, what exactly does it mean to be Filipino? In fielding these questions on an international level and in the media, Sarina transcends national borders and language barriers with unmistakable Filipino American pride: “it’s how you represent and carry yourself.” 
Tune in for nitrogen ice bath advice, coffee recommendations, and travel tips!
 
WHAT IS BALAY KREATIVE?BALAY KREATIVE is a pop-up Filipino-American arts hub in SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco, California.EXPLORE BALAY KREATIVEWebsite: www.balaykreative.com
Instagram: @balaykreative 
Facebook.com/balaykreative
Kumu: @balaykreative