"Kuttin it Collectively"

Bitch Magazine, in the Love It / Shove It section of its spring 2009 issue, featured an interview with DJ Kuttin Kandi. I swear, I live off finds like these.

DJ Kuttin Kandi is a battler. A fiercely skilled turntablist, she's one of the first women to bust through the testosterone-laced barriers blocking DJ booths across the land. She's been cutting and spinning since the 1990's, along the way winning a number of prestigious competitions and leaving less skilled DJs - both males and females - in her wake. [...] She's a fighter for social justice as well: on top of her renowned hip hop and spoken word artistry, Kandi is a longtime community and youth organiser. Born as Candice Custodio and raised in NYC, she recently relocated to San Diego. These days much of her activism is carried out on the University of California - San Diego campus, where she works with students at the Women's Centre and helps direct and produce the play Export Quality: Monologues Based on True Stories of Mail Order Brides from the Philippines

You've mentioned not really coming into your Filipina identity until your early 20s.

Hip hop is what started me on my path to political awareness, and connected me with some great social change organisers. But yeah, I was born and raised in NYC, and because of my parents' assimilation to this country, I hadn't heard anything about U.S. Filipina culture, issues of colonization, or the trafficking of women in the Philippines until 2000, when the Gabriela Network [ a Philippine-U.S. women's solidarity organisation] asked me to DJ at their Los Angeles conference. I said, "Sure, but what's Gabriela Network?"

I live, live, live for finds like these. Outreaching in cegeps and high schools recently, I've been doing some weird positive-profiling and getting some well interesting responses from youth - some of whom are maybe reading this, I hope! From looks of dismay (Yeah, you called it I'm Pinoy - ugh) to shy glances (Yes, is that ok?) the common links between many people I approach seems the exact same as what would link me to all of you: I'm sick of being asked! lol

But beside that, I've been getting what I would serve everyone else who was bold enough to ask: "Yes, I'm Filipino but I'm not that involved. So don't ask anything, I've got no more info." "I don't know what Pinoy means." "I'm also other things." "Don't ask me about anything typically Filipino, I'm sick of explaining Pansit." You're Pinoy too... are you asking me to give you money / go to church more?

Nah, none of the above. What took me a while to figure out and what I'm inviting you to do when I'm handing a flyer is really, really simple: to make the link between everything you are and the community you were born out of. It took me a really really long time to realize that what I had, even though it had nothing to do with sashes, crosses and tinikling sticks, could be of some use to the Montreal Pinoy community.

The fact that we're having a hellah good time doing it all helps a little, too. It's taken a few decades, but I've finally become able to look back at the face posing the question "Are you Filipina" with a bit of victorious defiance and give them my own answer to whatever follow up question they may bring my way, and wear my Pinoyness with pride.

On the theme of beat and hip hop, we're having a fundraiser!

It's going to be a spoken word / performance night showcasing some of CDN / NDG's talents. Come for beats, thought, eats, and beer - and come support a good cause as all the proceeds will be going to conference costs.

Place: MUCS (Montreal Urban Community Sustainment)
2000 Northcliffe #218, Metro Vendome
May 9th, @ 8pm
door is 5-10$ sliding scale