​Re-Connect/Centre/Converge: The Arts Festival by The Substation, Sept 2023, Singapore


Sama-sama: Comfort is on the menu is an installation with performance activation that is part of the Substation’s Re-Connect/Centre/Converge: The Arts Festival curated by John Tung. What a wonderful gathering with many generous sharing by the participants. Felt like time travel - the fact that yesterday was Malaysia Day was to me, equally poignant.

Sama-sama is a Malay term that has a few meanings. It could mean “you’re welcome”, “together”, and “we’re the same”. The main focus of this project is to invite more persons to the table to talk about the difference(s) we embody, to emphasize the politics of care, and to establish meaningful connections via the sharing of a simple meal. Such connections over meals facilitates questions of what constitutes “home”, and how meals may remind us of the relationships with people that matter. Places and memories are often evoked and re-enacted through embodied acts of partaking food and our senses. How food is made and eaten, speaks also of particular practices, histories and generational knowledge systems.