07. Her Mother's Daughter (From UCB PCN 46: "Salamin ng Puso")
Channel: Cal PCN 46 Music Composition
Date: 2022-10-14

UC Berkeley's PCN 46: "Salamin ng Puso" Official Soundtrack is available on Spotify, Apple Music, and iTunes now!
Link: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/pilipinxculturalnightatucberkeley/pcn-46-salamin-ng-puso

"Her Mother's Daughter"
Written by Isabela Colmenar
Performed by Isabela Colmenar, Silayan Camson

LILA
I am my mother’s daughter
and trying not to be.
But maybe it’s in my blood, to leave.
 
UMA
To leave or not to leave, 
how can I ask her this when I 
never had the courage to stay? 
And how many homes have I broken for it?
Perhaps she is her mother’s daughter.

LILA
Daughter first, mother next.
She never belonged to herself.
And if my first breath was her last,
no wonder she loves me like that.

UMA
That feeling that I failed her.
I didn’t give her a home and now she’s building one
without me.

LILA
Without me, she’d be free.
I am the ghost of everything she could have been.
A reminder of all things lost, all roots poisoned.
Am I hers, or is she mine?

UMA
My rage and guilt and shame,
cursed heirlooms.
I didn’t mean to give them to her too.

LILA
Too late to ask her to hold me,
to tell her that I’m afraid.
but maybe she alone knows the depth of this longing.

UMA
Longing, losing, lost.
How can she live with all this weight?
How can I?

LILA
I inherited her tongue but not her silence.
I see now that her ugliness makes her whole.
But her ugly made me ugly too.

---

What is PCN?

PCN, or Pilipinx Cultural Night, is a student-run theatrical production hosted by UC Berkeley’s Pilipinx-American Alliance. The production allows participants to explore their Pilipinx identity through creative mediums such as dance, acting, and music. By holding PCN every year, we hope to provide a creative space for our cast to learn and grow. At Berkeley, we also choose to use PCN as a platform for activism and education on Pilipinx hxstory, culture, and current issues.

PCN HXSTORY @ UC Berkeley

PCN started in 1976 at the YWCA on Bancroft and Bowditch. The original show was a community dinner with traditional/folk dances that included a cast of about 10-15 members. In the 1980s, the show evolved into a full-scale performance, and by 1989, the Pilipinx American Alliance became the first student group on campus to hold a performance in Zellerbach Hall. Since then, the UC Berkeley Pilipinx community has continued to foster the annual tradition of Pilipinx Cultural Night.

About PCN 46:

PCN 46 tells the story of a family searching for and redefining “home”. 

Lila, an artist, is preparing to leave for New York with partner Hiraya, in search of opportunity. She struggles to tell her mother, Uma, and her grandmother, Anya, about the move. Frustrated, Lila faces internal and external conflicts with Hiraya, Uma, and Anya. 

As Lila is met with mixed reactions- Uma's defensiveness and disapproval, in contrast to Anya's support and care- these women are forced to reckon with the lifelong, generational traumas that have been interwoven in their “normal lifestyle."  Looking into their destructive family, we get a glimpse into how this cycle has rendered them both victims and perpetrators, simultaneously complicit and hurt.

Amidst building the foundations, they reflect on themselves and one another, in pursuit of new definitions of home, and new ways to love and be loved. The characters and audience are called to ask: "What does love look like? To what extent is It hereditary? How do we break cycles?"